Surpassing heartache

Too long we have been on this road together;
you and I

we passed on another
on a cold winter night

we walked with awkward feet
colliding first into each other

too long have we been on this road together
but tell me how do we surpass

all the heartache that is there
with just a simple photograph

of you in a museum
smiling at a complex painting

folding into your hands
all the errors of my past.

birth and baptism

you sing about baptism before birth
how glorious, it is
the water

Freedom is restricted

close your mouth
put tape over its corners

tie your legs together
with a stone, send it down a lake

put your hands to other use
than typing on a keyboard

avert your eyes
from areas marked with "caution"

cut all buddings of feather
growing between your shoulders

this is natural, a redefinition
of you being free to be restricted too.

Eyes

Hazel, like warm honey
these are the eyes I was given to look
I sought: the sun, the reflection of leaves, sunsets

Blue, like the ocean
these were the eyes I looked into
he sought: ice, skies, dusk

it was a matter of where
the eyes fell, for with the same shape
we still see with different colored eyes

despite the hammer

tedious cold, end of summer
a common, textbook image flies
despite the hammer

heat and cold

how to do deflect from cold?
try a sheet made of wool

how do you deflect from heat?
try a bit of water for better measure

how do you keep a heart warm?
try small things

how do you keep a heart cold?
try the wrong statements

Bethlehem, a visit

Bethlehem,
here, He was born- a child
there, His Mother breast-fed him, on the road
while our mothers recluse to homes, in comfort.

Stick incense

Reminder of an India I have never seen
with my very eyes, the smoke rising slowly toward the ceiling
reminds me of an India I have never seen live
but heard in a northerner's Urdu wordings
a delicate Delhi accent, a Punjabi poet rising
like smoke out of ashes.

a burial service for the King

Here lies the silent music
of the mourners, piling like rice

waiting for a resurrection
in a wasteland

here like the silent music
of the mourners, with flowers

holding petals, shredded out
yellow, red, pink and gradation of hope

for the King lies in a shroud
made with musk and linen

wrapped, Lord of the universe
maker, human, seeker of peace

here lies the silent music
of the mourners, us among them,

in black and dark blue
roughened and bruised

mourning the tapping
of a morning on the windows of resurrection.

Palm Sunday

He enters Jerusalem
like a soft breeze, on a donkey
we weep the walls that keep falling for him

What do you make on your scale?

Hair falls, wrinkled forehead
I say it is the age
he says, don't compare
what do you make on your own scale,when you leave out grace?

read your book, without hurt

You read the scripture that states
"never hurt your brother"
to clear your mind out

oblivious to the fact that there is a knife
you stabbed in his back
without duly noting

what you say can and will be used
to turn your story around
to the direction no one had wanted

to begin with, start again
where you left off,
a knife dug deep deftly

not to remove things you planted
without hurt
that is bridged over

like an end of a disaster
or a destiny carved in bones
this is how you treat failure

an instance of regret
is a moment that will fleetingly
pass, like everything does

you read the Scripture
with a clean conscience
don't then hurt your brother.

Reconnecting to the spirit

it is a process, your hands on the mat
kneeling, stretching to make way for the energy
to connect into you the dots, for the spirit
 a heart beating under your hands.