knives

should it take a knife
To show us apart
Don’t confuse my intentions
Into love for you and
Love for me
But if it gives rest
To aching jaws
Let it tear the skin
till we both know
how kisses work
with a little help
from antiseptic
that with you time is
forgetting and healing

and it will wax lyrical
the blade in contact
with the skin at the edge
of a sharp feeling
your love is
the poetry of the future as
the future of poetry


so the knife to
produce from the hollow
Resin for the bow



I’ll let your conquering
Anytime you want
And I’ll keep
Coming back for more

If it takes a knife
To cut out
The intercoursing throb
Let yours be the hand

But I should be the one
That speaks to it keeps it
And makes it speak as I want
Let mine be the words
That survive the rapture

in the animal kingdom

Baba ramdev’s unceremonious eviction from his fast compels the responsible citizen to once again watch national news at primetime and spend a noxious Sunday evening lamenting another travesty of democracy in the India of his dreams. But the burden of responsibility that has been thrust upon the public-minded individual will not be tolerated a second more what with him being saddled with onerous chores pursuant to joining the selfsame government whose grave execrations on the ramlila maidan reopens old wounds and reignites once more the original fire.
But nuff said. What left me nonplussed in telegrabs of a teargas smoggy campaign tent was the person of a doggie among the listless supporters, like all of them fleeing the scene under duress, albeit with more alacrity than the most casual of baba’s supporters would care to show. So I put this question to the indignant masses. Would canines make better satyagrahis? Also more significantly, are the dogs of the world at last uniting. Are they massing to come to our aid like the phantom hordes from return of the king. Was the one i saw the mongrel herald.
But coming back to my question, will our leaders prefer dealing with dawgs given that there is no chance the four-legged things would ever resort to hunger strikes. That ain't there style at all or am i mistaken. The generic politicians themselves have one that falls somewhere between that of a sabretoothed tiger in a lifeguard's jacket and a shark in vestry white. What is important is that the battle will be a tooth for tooth one and therefore easy to follow. Unlike now when one side says we aren't opening our mouths and the other replies talk to the hand. Of course it spoils sunday's entertainment if one party thinks they are in a silent film and the other believes they are the celebrity bigg boss.
the idea behind democracy that makes it more fun than the other social experiments is that it is a seriously engaging format. baatein banao mat aur bigarne ki to bhul hi jao, batein karo.


Government requires a kind of decisiveness which I would never be able to bring to the job. I revel in a she-loves-me-she-loves-me-not ambiguity.


bubba roach

what use is it
surviving a nuke
when you have one
foot in the grave
and your murder
leaves behind
a nice smell
that effectively
smothers the rebuke
spouses exchange
over a messy affair


dilli, wallah

in delhi
a bomb could blow
and take me
away from you
in delhi
a bomb could
take you
away from me
in delhi though
we shall not hide
in delhi we’ll walk
head over heels
and tired toes taut
every night
in the dark
an inner light
and the places in
your body

one way or the other

As if it wasn’t enough
That I should have left
No more than a scratch
And been happy that
After all I had nothing
To do with the marks that
give away your age
Or for that matter
With your ageing
The convenient scheme
To leave you with
no more of me than
I can carry away
and take no more from you
than I was leaving behind

since I am not sure ive looked
under your skin the idea was
to pretend there wasn’t any
pressing need for a parting gift

for when it ends there is
only a victim and a villain
on the run so incriminating
will be any gifts from me
to you or from you to me

I turn to my diary
To at least put down in words
What the time with you
Has meant to me
But have mercy on me
What love is this
That you won’t beg
That I change my mind
And even in thoughts
Not talk of leaving

What was all that
being romantic
any time of day
of your choosing
suddenly pulling down
a canopy of clouds
and wooing me to
join you outside
or at night like magic
clearing the streets
whipping the breeze and
flirting with me for my sleep

however
theres nothing you’ve taken
that I haven’t wanted to give
yet there comes a day
when I will have to
empty my pockets
on the table and ask you
to do the same and any
buttons of mine I find in
the loose change I shall
have to keep for myself
and some coins maybe
for the tickets

gone are the days shirtless
I could roam the streets
And know that in those moments
even youve loved me truly
Although I know
it was all promiscuity
because I have seen your
ruins of romances past
and know that all youve done
is taken a chance with me
and couldn’t care if I returned
your love or never made to go

if I kicked you or
called you a whore
as many might
have done before

you struggle with your unending life
and only worry what if one day
there are no more lovers left

you will be found many
many times more


this is a premature farewell note to calcutta. the city of my father. but not my forefathers. she is therefore not a mother of any sort but for the two of us a lover. she was young enough when my father first arrived here and the mua remains quite impudent today as i think about my depth of feeling for it. it isn't easy as i discovered. because i cannot help but think that there will be a time when i will be gone but the city will still be here. still someones darling. but i think it is time i was on my way away from this city. a life lived for the love of one whose love i can be never sure i have is a future that doesn't appeal to me. really to claim that she is mine only mine is foolish no, but what other love do i know; to say that her love has set me free will be less controversial. but it is true. how presumptuous would it be for me to say calcutta is my mehbooba. like so many before let me just also agree that im smitten. and i will have to leave. because for myself it can never be said for certain that this is where i was to come ashore, that my destiny is here. all i know is that i will have the city to my left as i swim to the sea.

a day earlier

Forever a hot day
And if not a cool day
Either a chilly day
Or a dank day
To make you want a crisp day
but always some creature in season
Making what it will of the long day

There are your days
And then there are days
Also the big days and days
you couldn’t care
there are so many it’s tough to tell
what morning makes what day

I can remember running
Round and around
Morning past day and some more
After school the lessons could wait
Everyday till I was told
childhood’s over now go home
and I obeyed

In the cover of darkness
I’ve come back to recover
Small treasures hidden
in nooks kept for me
by myself though some
secret places are long forgotten

such are the lost days
and now i befriend the night
different from the day
but not separate
and sometimes tired but
not slept we look for the day



and i thought to myself. jose saramago who. must be another latin american mystic fool. filling reams on mindbending drugs. good no doubt. but on mindbending drugs. however if there is such a thing as on my word, then let me say that ive been made to eat them and for all that they are worth nonetheless i say hail joselito (hopefully that translates little jose :+p). but small memories took me right back. its done like a childrens book. childrens crayon drawings on the cover and gaps between lines like in the books from our childhood. big font. and a wise old man talking about the good old days.

my brown-eyed girl im sorry for the la dee dah and other revolutionary ideas

What dominic
Strauss-kahn
I can what
Rajnikant I can
Im superman
Peter parker
I’m bruce wayne
Im still only
Trying in vain
The power
That will burn
Through your clothes
And get into your pants
Is not mine but yours
And only now I understand
Lets see how long
This lasts
I’m also a dog
A pup in your hands
I only have one
But love is how
You call my name
Im everywhere and
where you’re not
im there but I
shouldn’t have gone at all
it’s my faults
makes me a superhero
look at that gumption
for a mistake I’ve made
and proud because
I’ve heard what you
Had to say and
Il remake out of rubble
A house of faith
Where my seed will
Grow into rose bushes
I will remain
Forever in the petals
Which are yours
Forever yours but
So is the thorn
My careful hands
My hands to make
My heart burst

also


Let’s talk now
About something else
Let’s keep doing it
Changing the topic
Wherever the talk may turn
It will come back
to where it started
Till we realize best
would’ve been silence

I’m a pony in this city
A limping foundling
That pays no heed
To the flow of traffic
The mothers panic
And the girls shriek
It will be up to men
To do something
They discuss education
Rehabilitation and
relief and a useful
future in the service of kids
no wonder some of us
are afraid of pity and
little believe in charity
seeing the price one has
to pay for it
maybe some are grateful
I’m only a horse
and not the wind

they offer me a roof
I escape from the chimney


Hunterman jim corbett was of the opinion that it was more likely for an abandoned waif to come to harm among men than in the jungle. Well he didn’t completely say that but his emphatic avowal of the way of the jungle as a just and humane business automatically juxtaposes that picture with that of our disemboweled lebensraum to leave us with no doubt as to which world is in more need of the benefit of the doubt.
Now the only difference between wild and order is, freedom, where the opposite ends are not abundance and total lack but rather the extreme varieties, unencumbered and disciplined. But really with men it’s been there done that when it comes to freedom of the uninhibited kind. That was the state of nature for you. The state of nature is the country englishmen and much of their european cousins inhabited before the arrival of one hobbes. That was some time in the 1600s. Hobbes demonstrated that it was a capital decision to have seceded from that state and live in splendid isolation; it had already come to pass, he was only telling them about it so that they could behave themselves and follow the script. But anyway that state only entirely predisposes one to shopkeeping. Later our man darwin would come along and say that ours is also after all the animal story and truly there had always been much chaos at hand to dismiss him out of hand.
The social contract was the enshrinement of the common cause with subclauses dealing with mutual differences. But trust humans to be pedantic. Animals quite do the same thing and get by admirably without caucuses and corporations. That is what corbett means when he speaks of the unspoken law of the jungle. I would imagine we would have done a lot better for all that talking.


For unless you are a child at heart thou shalt not enter the kingdom of heaven.
Better still a babe in the woods. Even paris hilton wouldn’t mind that.


please see-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG8Ect3Xn7w&feature=related

would einstein get bose dk

are you serious dk bose. Before someone files a public interest suit notice the truly democratic intelligence failure. One that all can live with. It comes with a sense of humour. This has cocked a snook at the censors.
But Ive always wondered whether some kind of censorship wasn’t such a bad thing. Truth be told even the most depraved art would not have the heart to kill. So the debate over the studious elision of the danger conveyed by art becomes moot.
But there is notional danger and clear and present danger. As apart as they are in any physical space they beg the same defences at all times for mental peace. The threat in the abstract meets a wall in censorship.
It can’t be denied that art does inspire all kinds of emotions that can become difficult to deal with in aggregate. If censorship is rather an acknowledgement of the fact that people have things to hide and an instrument which enforces that need then I agree that we do have a lot to conceal.
For example if any sizeable number of people in a population have a problem with screwing in public then the authorities might conclude that the same set would very much mind merry exhibitionism on tv. Well that is an argument.
Now if there was only one art and only one way of expressing it then as a concession to what is ultimately such a useful thing the powers-that-be could have allowed its pursuit despite prudish inconveniences. Like you see there is an urgent need for energy and that’s why the japs signed onto nuclear power. We know the dangers, they knew all the while. But that is a necessary evil. Hence allowed.
The fact that art is not subjects it to censorship. Because it is always seen as serving a higher end. But the higher end cannot appear to be an impulse contrary to quotidian orderliness. Here i think that art qua art has nothing to do with controversy and I’m sure that if it came to us in its own words it would say so much.
The problem lies elsewhere. The artist is a man, the censor is a man, both are god’s children and that’s about all either knows; if the one is in denial the other becomes the defender of the faith because how can two people have the same point of view. In such situations to say a second thing is to invite a riposte. But that is what art has set out to do. There is truth in art but it certainly is not the whole truth. Art is an opinion. It needs a critic for clarity and a censor it needs for celebrity. Censors don't deserve a second thought. So imagine our glee when run dkb pulls a fast one on the scissormeisters. No bloodshed, mission accomplished. It has announced the era of the smart rebel in bollywood. no?
All the same to the toil of the artist long suppressed and the artwork that received its burial at the censor’s table bhaag bhaag dk bose dk bose dk bose bhaag bhaag dk bose dk bhaag

where the city meets the sky

Hear now then
That you come to me
Drenched to the bone
I’ve longed for you
On days like this

When your firework is thunder
And you are rowdy like
Banging windows and breaking glass
When I’ve given up hope and fallen asleep
It makes me shed the rancour I’ve slept with
To see you so joyously so prodigally raining
In the dark morning and I see that all this while
I've been planning an escape needlessly

In shades of melancholy you are pouring
After the hot days of nil moisture
And I realize it’s your infinite grace
That I’m neither forever wet nor
Constantly thirsty and here I have
Spat on you as if you were
A burnt worn tire in the desert
And made up my mind to leave you

You love me in infinite ways
And make it interesting
Disappearing behind the dunes
You return with a storm
Just as I’m about finished
Packing my last things



That city is yours
This city is mine
Mine is small and within me
Within this girth of yours
I find you in small measures
But when the surge of greatness
Is what I ask to feel
You visit mine with all that’s yours
In visions of dams bursting and
The waters sweeping in

The big Calcutta and
The little Calcutta
are the same city



Most blameless are you of the times
I have gone out and there has
Been no sign of you
or your liveried footmen
who’d hold up an umbrella for me
in evident sympathy while promising
they couldn’t have any news for me
Those have been the many ages
Here is one before me
And I don’t know if at all
mine has been the longer wait
as i wonder how fast you've had to run
When you so sweep me off my feet



i've never been very particularly fond of rain. but now i'l fain admit that it is all i wait for. the waiting for seems important in this case because i think constant rains will upset the apple cart. but what is one to do in this heat. it is almost a cliche so much so i hate it myself when any conversation of late turns to the topic of our horrible weather. because suddenly one day it will rain like heavens only knows and then what the fuck are you talking about. for me more than consciously waiting for the rainy day i sincerely hope that the rainy day stays once it's here. earlier i'd like the overcast sky; right now i don't mind the actual raining. in one hundred years it rains for a little over four years. although i vaguely remember macondo otherwise described as a stifling hot place i think that all that rain is a little extreme. i personally would have hated it. in the book i write it's never going to rain that long. in fact it's going to rain often but never constantly. in between when the hero is a child there has to be enough space between showers for the fields to dry and football to happen. later when there is a lot of sighing and burning followed by melancholy and ennui of love it should rain whenever it gets too tedious. it will rain at the right time so as to take full advantage of what the empyrean can offer in terms of light and ambience and be rain of a refreshing kind. i'l not be too particular about the volume of it but by evening or next morning whichever is earlier the field should be ready to play. then again if the lovers should have bunked work let the river come in and the flood be a real nuisance outside while inside uninterrupted love goes to work. in that case my rains will have to accommodate both things. that is a lot of expectation from rain, even in the imagination; but the traffic is not all one direction if you ask me. to earnest rain i provide love and football and although it can choose only one it doesn't seem a very giant leap in my mind to be able to want both at the same time so i'd wish it would do exactly that.