No matter who you are, what you have seen,
If you are a lover and if your heart's beating to another's tune, 

I know two things about you, Lover 

You have found in yourself a dreamer 

You will find that time is your friend, never 

Wear down my veneer

I think all of us are always looking to be seen,

I think when we are drawn to someone,

We are so eager to be someone they see,

We don body paint that we think they can perceive, 

All the while hoping against hope, that they will call our bluff and wash off the paint, 

See us naked and love our mangled core,

So we can believe that we are invisible no more, 

Bodhi, my baby

'How do you know?' asked the angst-drenched, boy with the storm in his eyes and the petrichor-scented voice. 

And she with her purse full of painted bottles of regrets and custom-made masks, dropped her baggage into the abyss of yesterdays, her fingers meeting the curve of his face, intimately familiarly.

Her thirsty-mouth moved, 'I know, because there is peace in the crook of your neck, that sages traversed the earth to find, 

Because enveloped in your arms, I am a fledgling, emptied of fear, of doubt, of anger, of hurt, because when I see you I SEE you and I FIND me. 

Because, when you and I are US, you are not a storm and I am not a drought....'

Impasse

Creaking and groaning the ride goes round, 

Wobbling, shuddering, careening with doubt, 

I sit huddled at one end, you perch tensely at the other, 

We spin around, eyes sparring, held hostage and knowing no better,

Like shipwrecked smithereens sloppily washed to beach, 

We wait endlessly, dangling hopelessly in this stalemate,

Creaking and groaning, the ride goes around, 

Never shall we reach each other, till you, I and this ride run aground..

First Edition Lover

You are a rare, unread, unfathomed book of beauty paramount, hidden between earthen hard-binding,
I've found you now, in the dusty, mothballed, cobwebbed corner of the library of my life,
With you in my hands now, I am angsty and restless, fingers shake as I race to consume you wholly,

Then slowly, tracing lines like scintillating words carefully strung together to masterpiece, 

Each shining scar, a breathtaking twist of plot, every crease a masterful character,

I want to plunder into those eyes, the protagonist of this roller coaster ride,

I want paper cuts off your edges, want to dog ear the curves to revisit again and again, 

I want to arch in the pleasure of your erotic beckoning, spill myself on your paper, 

I want to lie with you in bed, inhaling the deep woody scent of you, tracing you lovingly,
I want to read between all your lines, leave charcoal scribbles on oft-handled corners,
I want to know all of you cover to cover, I want to know you differently each time I devour you, 

I want to never put you down, escape into you, make you my world, weep and laugh only with you,

I've picked you unbeknownst that you would become my pivotal guide to loving-dom,
You are the habit, you are the salve, you are the perspiration of dreams, you are the way and the means,
And each time I touch you, I will love you once more, even when you are yellowed and old,

I'll pass this love down to generations ahead, it will always be remembered.....
that in your words,
I lived

He said he loved everything about her,

Then he took a chisel and got to work...

A Pair of Pariahs

You are on me. the salt of your sweat, the nectar of your lips,
The shapes of your fingers, now blooming upon my hips,
The voice like embers warming up the cold-damp of my mind,
The dull echo of your flesh and your bones, draped over mine,
Like love letters hidden between old clothes, I unfold them once more,
I revisit your light though my dark, I find again my customized spark,
It isn't so much that I miss you, not so much that I need you,
not even the most unvarnished truth that I love you,
only that I am a storm, a blizzard, a hurricane on the horizon,
until I meet you again - and the fracas that unmade comes undone...

Sometimes

Sometimes, our love is gently leaning chest to chest, heartbeats nestled together, shallow breaths,
as my fingers trace out a new unit of human anatomy, a name for the spot where my head rests,
Sometimes, our love is sitting two feet apart, my legs crossed tight, yours wide open,
while our eyes make love, consuming each other hungrily, dry mouths bearing witness,
Sometimes, our love is raking landscapes, seeking a space to ensconce you between my thighs,
For a chance to plunder your mouth with mine, for a place to become your illicit bride,
Sometimes, our love is the thunderclouds in your chest, the storm in your throat,
when it's someone else taking me home, or drinking tea with me loveless-ly,
Sometimes, our love is waking up weeping, at the blinding beauty of a dream that is you,
not believing till we meet, that you exist, and if the air really vibrates between us,
Sometimes, our love is telling ourselves and each other that we belong together,
and then weeping inconsolably as we pretend to have lives with irreverent others
Sometimes, our love is the unperturbed silence of hours, constructing mazes of embraces,
other times, it's raucous dismantling of two lives' worth of secrets, vexations and lacerations
Sometimes, our love is the way I wish you had hurt me, so that I could be angry,
so that I could hate you just a little, so that your absence didn't mean that I forget how to breathe
Sometimes....

Double-helixed hearts

They ask me to break it up, to cut you off,

As if you were an errant thread, escaped from the weave of my sleeve,

They'll know when they see the broken ribs and the stitched up chest, 

What you are and always will be, to me....

Plan B

These moments of togetherness, 

We're on borrowed time,

Let's steal the sun love, 

hold on to this night forever....

Panoramic Rhapsody

That afternoon it started, as soon as the doors closed behind them,
Frantic they perspired, quite inspired, pushing fabric past the topography of two writhing bodies,
New in their togetherness, but intimately familiar, like fingers plucking at a harp only they play,
The sound of hunger, is as soft as that of satin tossed at a cold, tiled floor,
The taste of heaven, laced upon those supple lips, the bristly beard on the pink of a neck,
The raw sound of mounting ecstasy, spiraling shadows of a two-headed being,
The trance, the dance, the shivering, shuddering, the wildly pleasurable gyrating,
The open mouths, the urgent breathing, the flushed skin, fingernails tearing,
By night it began, as soon as the sun drowned in its own fire,
She lay by his side, un-beautifully reposing, frazzled hair, sweat-matted to her forehead,
Her face nestled against his chest, lips parted, supine breaths leaving the sloping breast,
Even as she jittery-ly flung out her limbs in her dreams, possessed she seems,
he held her close, as if she was his zoetic heart cradled in his arms,
And she said she was not the crying type, had never been.
Yeah, tell that to the blades of his shoulder where she grappled,
As terrified sobs rippled through her ribs, dreading their parting,
For fear of all the places inside that would break, if this ever ceased to be,
As the morning rubbed its eyes, stretched out and smiled, they both were changed,
Emblazoned minds, braided melancholy, engorged hearts, never to be separately whole again.

Fare thee well

These empty spaces, these lonely hours, these thirsty places in the darkened corners of my heart,
They make me want to leave I tell you, they make me want to shut these doors, damage control,
This place settles into me like the cigarette smoke, that so prettily did unfurl from the curve of your lips, now on me stale and nauseating,

I hate that I feel like this without you, like the bulging purple of veins of a neck that's being throttled,
I hate that I live to catch the fragments, like a junkie trying to purloin from a malevolent drug lord,
I hate that I feel like curling up and dying, because my senses are fading, eyes closing, heart slowing,

My heart feels wrinkled, like fingers that have soaked in water far too long, from leaking pain in a the colour of rain,
My fingers are trembling, like lips that have been crying for days and days, for they cannot reach out and touch you,
My lips are parched, like the cracked soles of my dust laden feet, for the lack of your desire-drenched mouth on mine,
My feet are swaying, like hair strands caught in the frigid winter wind, for they cannot carry my body over to yours,

And although I wonder if this love will be my undoing, I fear it will, I know it could, I trust it shall,
I cannot get off this train, I cannot break this ligature, I cannot shut this door... I will always lead you in,
look wide-eyed when your body meets my embrace, as your mouth whispers entreaties to mine,
as your electric soul ripples through my core, as your heart blankets the shuddering closets of mine,
So, here I am, here I will be, here shall I lie, debilitated, until once more you find me.

Gypsy Soul Sister

Wild child, life free..
Rise may you each day, meeting roads not paved but cobbled with tiles of adventure,
Find may you one who loves each curl on your head and every kink inside your mind,
Wide-eyed, may you live in wonder, hands in the air, tracing the lace of the clouds in the sky,
Smile may you, white teeth flashing, at the zaniness of every blip along the way,
Open may your heart be, ever the welcoming doors, to the love that is all around you,
Sashay may you, never hurried, especially when losing you way is means to finding yourself,
Tread may you lightly, wisps of footprints in your wake, never bleeding for the need to belong,
Dream may you with abandon, fearlessly and hopefully, weave them gently into a gilded future,
Ache may you for that which flavors your ardent mind, your fervid soul, yet never with futile despair,
Rage may you against the battle-wounds of love that has turned to war, never lay down your arms,
Meander may you through every new journey. breath baited and wings unfolding for fight,
Soar may you through open skies of boundless possibilities and countless exploits, unbridled by strife,
Wild child, live free.....
.... love hard, dream big, dance, sway to your own intoxicating drumbeat.....

Te amo mi amor

It's easy to say 'I love you', isn't it?
It's easy to let the moment play in your hair, like the wind, cool and comforting,
It's easy to gush and swell with magnanimity, in a single luxurious expulsion of breath,
It's easy to swish those words in your mouth, like a full-bodied wine, deep-red and heady,
........
How about what it's like to watch your face so closely, your heartbeat flutters inside of my wrist,
How about the pink tidal wave inside me, effervescent champagne-flush rising, at the briefest touch,
How about what it's like to hold on to the seconds with you as they slip like the moon into the morning,
How about the gutting hurt I can hear in the first syllable of your heavy footstep, out the door,
How about the time warp we slip into slipping into each other, the world dissolving like salt in water,
How about fingers and palms, bones and muscles, curves and edges match groove to groove, lock to key,
How about that voice of yours that trickles tenderly through my head, rain through drought-dried land,
How about the plundering torpedo through my heart, my entire viable universe in another's careless arms,
.........
How about that love? I hope you know, I know you know, 'I love you' just doesn't begin to cover it.....

Legends of Long Gone

I wonder what they would say about us, you and me, after our time, 

would they say we were friends? Would they deem us mere strangers?

would they assume us in between... two disconnected oars of a wretched boat?

Shall we leave a note love? Shall we leave the world this legacy of ours?

or....

Will the stars know how we traced our shared future into their glittering dust?

Will these barren streets testify our forbidden trysts, just beyond their corners?

Will this desolate bed resound to echo the rhythm of our frenzied dancing?

Will the dust motes carry word through sun beams, of the hurt in their width's distance?

Will the waters gush loquaciously, of feet, yours and mine, yours and mine, sinking into the sand?

Will the drawn curtains reminisce how my body was cocooned in yours, my tears on your cheek?

Will every second that kept us apart clash with every second that brought us together....

for the right to testify the fervor, the right to the aphorism of our oneness, the right to call us lovers?

Or...

will they think us friends, deem us strangers, or suspend us in between, oars thrown into the sea?

Trojan Heart

So here is the thing, This love is not a master plan, it is not disaster proof, nor has a panic room,
there are no fire escapes or convenient back doors,
This love is an absolute, or another word that means a definitive of definitives,
I didn't chart this course we set sail on, only to my compass you have always been the North Star,
I didn't look at the dog-eared, puckered map closely, only lines the years have etched on you playfully,
I didn't draw out the papers, bullet proofed, with the rules, the boundaries and the crafty loopholes,
I didn't mull over you and me, until I saw your brown wide-eyes in the depths of my first cup of tea,
I didn't consider the gravity of your existence, until the trees back home whispered your voice to me,
I didn't make too much of your touch, until the warm, summer-rain washed down the deepest-deep of me,
So no, this wasn't the plan, this wasn't the deftly calculated move,
all I know is this, there was an anarchy within me, passionately endorsed by every vital  atom,
And it overthrew the governance of any logic, giving countenance to the paroxysm-driven exultation that is YOU. 

Never say bye

It takes me back you know, to a faraway kitchen, in the village of fireflies and paddy fields,
Where the drunken old bard of a river, gurgles and tumbles, maniacal, beside the sober rubber trees, 

On an archaic wood fire, a spice-laden broth simmers, producing billows of charcoal smoke,

Flushed with the tongue-tingling essence of curry, ginger, dry roasted coconut,

Of garlic, cloves and cinnamon sticks, of shallots and of coriander-cumin mists, 

So dressed up, the smoke rises, cloaking her charred-wooden perspiration with flourish, 

Perched in the stalemate of the tiled roof, she spots the yellowed square of dusk-en glow,
Lighting up the browned abyss of the ceiling, the window glitteres, beckoning,
Unsuprisingly, the smoke meets only glass, withered hopes of passage into light, dissolve in silken threads,
Wisps of its former self, floating, thwarted and broken, into the deep beyond the cobwebbed door,
In that memory, I see the beauty of heartbreaking longing, of silent depair, of doggone tiredness,
the dried flower, the shadow of a vibrant life, tucked between crumbling pages,
the creaky boat, with the aching oars, that have no hope against the storm,
the wings of the butterfly, devastatingly wiped out by the rescuing fingers' touch,
the lonesome White owl, unheedingly hooting at the cloaked, elusive moon,
the old brass key, in a heavily lined hand, bereft hopes of meeting its only lock,
the hardy tear, that fought will and worth, to escape the melancholy of the eye,
The narcissistic candle, burning itself to a smouldering puddle, all for the flamboyant flame,
There is something to be said for the hopeless love, for love-drunk hope, for the marriage of both,
There's something to be said for the tenderils of scent, in the withered leather of a watch strap,
Of the yellowed pages of a children's book, slouching at their aged spine,
Of the washed out, bleached-blue, well-worn, threadbare of a slept-in shirt,

A hopeful nostril longingly wanders the surface of all that i have left of you,
Unwrapping, once more, the faint and fleeting frangance, of charred-wood smoke.

Inamorato

Sex? Yes I'm familiar with the concept,

But I've barely walked in the room and your fingers part, as though to make way for the skin they want to touch,

But oh, when we kissed we unraveled, unbecoming and becoming, like two rivers in the mouth of the ocean, 

But when we are just bodies stitched together with the thread of need, your eyes still sought mine, 

But we find each other, in crowds and in our private spaces, like roots seek beads of water hidden in stone,

But my mouth knows the lines of your body, all of them, lips mold to your shapes, the hard and the soft of you, 

But your tongue is laced with the heroin of me, like a true addict, taking hit after perilous hit, twirling in the Russian roulette,

But when we move together, we are lighting and thunder; electricity deliciously rippling through water,
But when you are in the depths of me, I surrender, the saffron-red evening sun diving into the open-armed horizon,
But in the music of our urgent whispers of our bodies, I've forgotten the name I've been known by, the number on my street stile,
But I know the auroral scar on the chest of your heart, the callouses on the soles of your feet and the bottom of your soul...through fear, toil and sleep,
But I, you, you and I, we are a symphony, we are melodies of smiles and simpers, whispers and moans, of thoughts and dreams, of hurts and bleeds, of life and life,
But  even when you have left, your love warms the sheets, even as my heart and hopes leave pinned to your shirtsleeves,
But in the ebbing of our pulse, we smile into the curves of each other, we are triumphant, we are ecstatic, we are bathed in sweet sweat and the noiseless sounds of each other's names,
So, no, this isn't sex, not as in just-sex sex, not as in making-love sex, not as in pick-me-up sex....
'US' is a collective noun....

A Song to the Stone

After all, who looks at the primitive rock closely? Who loves him deeply?

when flowers burst forth, dancing, swirling, a palette of provocative perfumes,

when the sprightly spring of nectar-sweet water, gurgles, gushes and merrily sways.

when the vixen sky, distracts with her changing hues, russet-gold to lilac-blue,

when the fruits are bountiful, luscious, juicy,succulent and inviting, is it fair to anyone else?

where the bountiful boughs sigh and moan, as the wind makes love to its emerald leaves,

where the songbird croons with notes of longing to the storm clouds voluptuous with rain, 

where the earth is supple, fertile and virtuous, and bursting forth with buds of life,

After all who looks at the rock, who for his part kept his stony silence,

He submits himself to the rain as she washes over him, eroding bits of him to her lover the earth,

He heroically stands the wind and the storm, to shelter the oblivious delicate of the rose bud's lips, 

He martyrs himself at the altar of the root, breaks down to feed the salt that sugars the fruit, 

But I love him, this rock, this aggregation of time and earth and all encompassing knowing,

I see in him,his nature to take the blistering cold or the callousing heat, 

I see in him all the muted colours he wears, testimony to the centuries cocooned within,

I see in him, how in saying nothing he has absorbed all the magic of the universe,

one thing though, how do you move a rock with just a heart?

The embezzlement of love

I'm a thief, for I steal, without remorse and out of greedy need,

I steal the darkened contours of gazes from your eyes,

I steal the upside down smiles from the corners of Your mystic mouth,

I steal irridiscent thoughts from the cobbled lanes of Your convoluted mind 

I rob the milling crowds of your prepossessing parlance,
I rob the fragrant wind of the chance graze against Your skin,
I rob the stars of your eloquent dreams of their shimmering beauty,
I pillage the rich scent of Your intoxicating sweat, off Your delicious neck,
I pillage the teardrop from Your eye, that elopes with the lines of my mouth,
I pillage the warm breath that You've left In the hollowed darkness of me,
I'm greedy, needy, hungry maybe, also wallowing, sailing, soaring easy,
You, who have no fear of my frightful, all consuming passion,
You who are of the sands of lands and beds of seas,
You who have the impeccable scars and tousled miseries,
I have nothing to give You, nothing to earn You, nothing at all in my heart to house You
I am a thief, and I steal, I rob and I pillage, Your heart, Your body and Your wonderful mind
Knowing, despairing and dreading all the while, You are not mine, never mine.