Winter Blues

Onions, eggs, bananas, vitamin D, thyrin, prozac,
Trash, mailbox, bills, iron drops, broccoli, spinach.
2000 steps today, 20000 in a month,
80 kg today, 55 kg- probably never.

Pap smear, flu shots - all clear, all done.
5 year plans, dreams, ambitions- shhh, stick to just for today
Tomorrow may never come.
Cuddles, kisses, story time, he'll say "Mommy I love you" in no time.

Keep walking, keep breathing,
Say to yourself "I Love You Me".
Get up now, start again
Wait it out, winter will be over soon it seems.

Lake Lines

Be handsome be pretty,
Be intelligent be witty
Be the master of all that you wanted to be -
The life of the party,
Sweeping everyone off their feet,
Cutting through each phrase and words,
The one that aches and breaks hearts with embarrassing invisible bleeding,
And bar-b-qs a few with blind burns just for the fun of it.

Everyone looks dumb in front you
It's been a while you conquered another soul,
The world is ready for another invasion
Hearts to be burnt alive or be slaughtered for your calling-
To celebrate the coronation of your coming into your true being.

I am on a rescue mission
A few drinks on the terrace my companion.
My sun baked skin heals with my curbed appetite
for men, meat and everything that walks on their feet.

I suck the energy of happy summer ducklings -
mastering swimming, crash landing every time without a single injury,
floating without a drop of water soaking their wings.

The heavyweight happiness climbs on my shoulder and punches me on my face,
It almost trips over the edge of the pier to the green mossy bed of the placid blue lake-Drowning, climbing up and walking back to the woods where it came from.

I bury my memories in the lake,
The lake takes my confessions and offers me silence in exchange,
Seals off the secrets and keeps them safe.
The sleepless nights and caffeinated mornings does the rest.
I'm too tired to remember what all that I have been saying ever meant.

Let's Talk

There are no more stories to tell each other,
no new stories to build together.
No conversation to begin or end
without raising your blood pressure.

Your consistent complaints helps me grow new skin
Each time it gets thicker, tougher, harder to cut through,
Invisible and invincible - an armor your words bang on and deflect
Shoots right back to where it hurts you the most.

Old wounds and bad bloods evolve,
Our tired old bodies call for ceasefire of duels,
Breakdowns and incessant tears produce no more heat for any makeup sex,
Just quiet turns towards two opposite corners of the mattress

Slowly moving into separate bedrooms,
Different work schedules, pick-ups, drop offs
and perhaps hopes for a calm, peaceful ending
and a smooth transition to a new beginning.

I'm draped in 6 yards of fabric, It wraps around my body that I hated when it grew, Attracting unwanted hands that crawled all over it,

Hands that I could chop off if it touched me again, if only someone believed what they did to me then. I love all these fabrics that wraps around my body, I own them, cherish them, desire them, I handpicked each of them, I worked for them, I admire those who admire them more than my body. My body transforms into them, As these fabrics transformed in the intricate fingers of men who touched them delicately, Designed them to perfection, Crafted with backbreaking sweat and love, Men who loved their women and the woman in them. I like it better when I wrap around you the way a saree wraps around me, My whole 6 yards on your 6 ft body, Soft music in the background, No phone calls from your mum or voice msg to interrupt, No complaints or honks from curious onlookers, Just bliss like sunshine glowing on the snows of Calgary in our backyard, When I'm baked in the sun, And the sobriety of miles of mountains that brings happy tears out of me. I would happily weave through your hair to put you to sleep, I'll be the perfect host to your friends - my enemies, Crack jokes, fight over remote control, resist your desire to make love in the middle of the night, Watch crime patrol and slurp on tall dark men, I'll say prayers and blow air all over you but let's not do all that I know you want me to. I know you love my body and all of me, My whims, my mood swings, my breasts, my hips, My skin that melts on your tall hard grip. Burns I cause you, insults I infer, wounds of my words that tears through your heart. I see through your thick glasses Your yearnings, protests, submission, defense. Your poker face doesn't fool me I can see your eyes undo the drapes off me. The world isn't just, I cry out when I can, In cubbies in the bathroom, Or in chat room with friends. My body was taken away from me I want it back And not just to drape it with hundred of yards of fabric I have stacked

By the time you are here 

I'd probably be gone.

In the mean time we will have visited our memories the thousandth time 

And have known by then - they've lost their appeal.

We will have produced children and figured out that blood clots don't work like glue. 

We would have realized we waited too long to figure out what we wanted

to do with our lives and what togetherness ever meant to us.

The tax breaks and joint accounts will have lost their convenience.

We will have discovered that we need faceless men and women in our bed to desire each other,

the distractions will have become our usual routines and we desire less and less. 

Our conversation will be limited to asking each other the pick up and drop off schedules,

The fights will have become infrequent so are the complaints.

Each day will begin and end with just five texts or less,

with replies of yes, no, I'll let you know, ok, bye and take care.

We will be making excuses to not sleep in the same bed for days, months, and then years.

And we will surely know it is time to end it 

when we will want to fall in love and succeed with someone else all over again.

Obituary

You are not here or anywhere,
Not a call away,
Not in any better place or worse than what it was.
You didn't perish in the soil,
You didn't turn into ashes,
You didn't carve a stone in your name and claim a piece of land.

The glass you didn't empty still bears the mark of your last sip,
The ashtray carries burn from the cigarettes you forgot to smoke,
The books you wrote and read stacked in the shelves,
Your photographs, handwritings, edits and editorials archived and dusted everyday.
Your words are recited in gatherings in fond memories of colleagues relieved no one would fuss about their mistakes,
Your doctors no longer worry about not giving hopes
Or frustrated that you'd never quit smoking and you just won't listen.
You were never afraid, never to be tamed or disciplined in any way.
You are no longer a child, a lover, a friend or a father.

I sip a drink before bedtime,
Rewind our discussions about date of births as births of deaths and
Everything that I learned with you,
Unfolding the pains of life you tried so hard to hide from me and failed,
I trained myself to carry on with my 9-5 life in the mean time,
as a mother, a wife, a lover and a friend as well.
The myth and mystery of death invade my days and nights again and again,
I escape in highs in my four walls and in tunnels of memories I make.
It would have been so much better
If we could chat away another evening like old times,
Wishing I didn't hang up so soon.
We've had this discussion- how it all ends,
As if to prepare ourselves all this time for this day
And despite all that and all the years that passed or will pass it hurts no less.

It's not bcoz we live in two continents,
the time zones are just a couple of hours away.
It's not bcoz we're too busy for small talks,
But the daily chores takes hours from the day.

We haven't been high together for quite a few years
But the memory of those sounds plays again and again.

This isn't the end of what we began
It's just that Time ticks hours and days.
I know you are just a call away
I know we'll pick up right where we were.

I may forget to wish you on your days
But I know we don't need these anyways.

I'm too embarrassed to tell you how I am,
I'm fighting my old battles all by myself.

I'm just too tired at the end of the day,
The traffic, commute burns me out everyday.
Although I hide behind my complacent face
I know you'll hear me through right away.

I used to accept my denying self
But these days I face my anger and fear.
The heartburns are over, the angers are shelfed
The fears no longer haunt me my dear.

I'll come see you around one day
I hope we'll pick up right where we were.