I… Who I am?
I belong to past, I live in present
And will exist in future.
Yesterday born, today lives,
And will survive till end of time.


I am as bright as self-respect,
Yet darker than the ego.
I stand tall with pride of my achievements,
Yet slouch with my secret crimes hidden deep.


I am the most formidable, yet so vulnerable,
I am brilliant as diamond, yet as dark as coal,
I am robust and yet so fragile,
I am tyrant at times yet a drudge,
I am an autocrat, yet suppressed as slave.


I live in ambience of desires,
Yet my heart still so chastened.
I am as virgin as love,
Yet as sinful as lust.


I am tempting, yet so repelling,
I am lovable, yet so much hated,
I am respected, yet so envied,
I am sharply defined, yet so unexplained,
I am simple, yet so complicated.


I am as unfolded as an open book,
Yet so much draped by mystic robe.
I am the aura of sacred angel,
Yet have supreme power of evil.


I am rejuvenated, yet keep lingering on,
I am the Renaissance; yet live in Dark Age,
I am antique, yet so newfangled,
I am liberal, yet so orthodox,
I am free, yet tied as a prisoner.


I am awake and alert,
Yet so intoxicated and bewitched.
I am bright as the burning fire,
Yet so fuelled out in depth.


I am the energy, yet so exhausted myself,
I am steadfast rock, yet so much eroded,
I am vibrant, yet so pale,
I am a smile, yet a trickle of tear,
I am still, yet run with pace of time.


I am alive in the sweet memories,
Yet so forgotten and overlooked.
I am as rhyming as a poem,
Yet so cliché like a journal.


I am lucid, yet so dry.
I am vital, yet a corpse,
I am the creator, yet so ruined myself,
I am a romantic fiction, yet a ruthless fact,
I am a century, yet gliding like a moment.


I am the water quenching others,
Yet so thirsty and craving.
I am ceased with everlasting orgasm,
Yet so parched with longing desires.


I am famous, yet so notorious,
I am the Supreme truth, yet so spurious,
I am the deity myself, yet a demon,
I am intuitive, yet so disillusioned,
I am clear, yet so mystic.


I…I… and I,
The whole world revolves around I
I am cosmic, I am occult,
I am the penance, I am the pleasure,
I am the solitude, I am the crowd,
I am a spectator, I am a critic.


I…I… and I,
Everything starts from I and ends on I
I create, I destroy,
I am the mother, yet a brutal killer,
I am the pleader, I am the judge,
I am the culprit; I am the defending lawyer,
I pass sentence against myself,
I hang myself till death
And like a Phoenix,
I rise again from my own ashes.


I… I… and the mighty I stand tall again
To create, to destroy,
To give birth, and to kill brutally,
To plead, and to judge,
To commit crime and defend again,
To burn into ashes and rise again…

This Too Shall Pass...

Sun emerges in the east horizon,
And in my bed I sleep cozy.
It gets brighter, and is above my head,
I get up and relish bed tea and still feel lazy.


World around me is busy with daily chores,
Meeting the deadlines, rushing to the workplace.
While I have a majestic bath pampering the soap bubbles,
Get back to bed to feel warm and think what could be a better place?


Cozy bed gives me back the warmth I left,
And then I stand before the mirror gazing at myself.
I bend down to get my numerous face creams to gel on my face,
I rise and focus on the mirror again and find someone else.


I ignore and seek myself again in the mirror,
Cleansing, toning, moisturizing processes end.
Instead of opening the books smelling still so new,
I get online to check out my social networking sites.


Going through my own profile I feel like a stranger,
But I still ignore and go on surfing.
“90% internet buffs are depressed people” says a survey,
And I still ignore and open up messenger to start chatting.


I talk to many people, some disguised and some real,
They ask me numerous questions and I opt to be true.
Some like me some don’t, and I still don’t care,
I should log out & open a book; the watch gives me a cue.


I open the book and stare at the statutory words,
And think why did I choose to be a lawyer?
A millions of people ask me the same,
And I snap back with attitude saying, “may be coz I m a good liar!”


Is that all I qualify for being a lawyer? Am I really a liar??
From the sun to the mirror scream out the truth to me.
So am I a liar or an ignorant or a novice or total stranger,
I turn pages and the letters dance to form a question mark in front of me.


The question is the same but I always change,
I run back to the mirror and see myself again.
It’s not me I say to myself when I see a new face,
It’s not pretty; it’s not ugly but wrapped with chains.
One chain ties my brain another my ears,
One clutches my tongue but leave the eyes open to scrutiny the pain.
The pain opens my inner eye and I see my aura getting murky,
But I search for my heart and it’s bruised fighting against the chains.


Then I search for my soul and see it in two pieces,
One is tied in chains and other escapes.
The free soul travels down the memory lane,
Sails from today back to the two wonderful decades.
I see my soul in a teenager who knew nothing but to chase,
Sometimes love, sometimes success, sometimes fame.
I see my soul travel back in another decade,
I had no opinion of my own but knew only to follow a trail.


I see my soul in 6 months old toddler smiling always,
Sitting on grand pa’s lap and observing every vision.
And then the soul comes back to the present,
The silver crescent soul glows like a fire and burn me all over again.


I feel the heat, I cry in pain, tears sizzle on my cheeks,
And I open my eyes expecting a scarred face.
The chains seem to melt away and I feel lighter and free,
My heart heals and I look over to my new face.
Glowing like the teenager and smiling like the toddler,
The inner eye is still open and I see my aura getting bright again.
Then I seek for my soul and it still struggles,
To unchain its own half and to unite again.


The tryst begins which heat up inside,
And still the question remains, why I am still alive?
The moment the soul unites itself the question will be cracked,
And the stagnant life will flow again revived.
After writing 666 words the question still remains,
What I’m thinking or what I m trying to say?
But then the golden words of Solomon echo,
In my solitude, “This too shall pass…”

When the soul of house spoke to me…

“WRAP up those cassettes, take this box and dump them,” said my mother. I picked up the cassettes one by one and started keeping them in the box. “We don’t have this much of time for this; anyways they’re of no use any more. You have already got a huge collection of CDs, we don’t need these cassettes anymore,” said mother losing her patience at my pace. I couldn’t help adoring each cassette as it took so many years for me to make this collection. With every audiocassette I had a special memory; every song had accompanied me in some or the other moment of my life.

I somehow managed to wrap them up. We were almost done with the packing of small stuffs; only things that were left were the old furniture. We were reconstructing our house so had to move to another flat (which was quite… or say too small as compared to our majestic house of sixteen rooms to accommodate anything more than we could need to survive) till our new house was constructed.

I’ve had been travelling a lot after my graduation. It was so easy for me to pack my stuff then as I always knew I was going to come back to my nest after stretching my wings for a while. When my family and I would make plans for our new house, we would easily scrape many things of our house. “We would not keep this table, this will ruin the décor,” I would say. “Even this bed will be very difficult to move so it’ll be better we sell this off,” my father would say. But bringing these plans in action was far more difficult than I thought.

The bed on which I slept for past 22 years was of my grandfather and it was impossible for me to part from it. It was almost 80-85 years old, but still sturdy. Being the only daughter of the family I was very close to my grandfather. Till the time I learnt to walk, my days would pass just sitting on his lap. He was almost 85 years old when I was born, and being a religious person, he would spend most of his time chanting mantras. I still remember his huge maharaja chair was placed near the corner window of our hall, from where the sunrays would fall on us. Whenever the cool breeze would touch me he would wrap me in his shawl. I would sit on his lap all day and he would chant the mantras. And when I started walking, my only play was to walk from his chair in the corner of the hall to the kitchen and see mom working in the kitchen, and then again walk back to him. It would be a great task for me to walk till the kitchen door. I would return to his chair with a victorious smile and expect a smile of appreciation from him, and he would smile and pick me up to his lap again to comfort me after completion of my big task.

I couldn’t part with it either, we still have the chair and whenever I feel lonely I sit on the chair, as it gives me the feeling of being a toddler again and warmth of his lap and the strength of his embrace, which never let me fall off from the chair. It’s no more that strong neither my heart is to let it go. I was lost in all the memories, when I realized it was evening. I had to hurry up. We were done with moving all the stuff to the new place. After that I came to the house one last time before its demolition.

I have memory attached to every room of the house. Till my 8^th grade I had my study in the second floor. But with time it was wearing so I moved my stuff to the 1^st floor. There was spiral staircase from my bedroom to my study room. My friends would call it a secret chamber, as the door to the stairs was small and could easily be ignored. I had made this room with a traditional décor and doors with gothic glass a complete mess. I covered the glass with my paintings and the walls with all newspaper and magazine cuttings (including posters of Hollywood & Bollywood hunks!). It was a room which was manifest of everything I did in my teens, walls were soaked by my conversations and confessions and the ceiling was saturated with my dreams that still float somewhere there.

I would sit relaxing in a small balcony resembling a jharokha attached to my room, listening to the majestic ‘Raag Dhrupad’ in twilight, or sometimes staring in the depth of the darkness of the midnight along with ‘Raag Lalit’, and ‘Winds of Love’ by Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia, when a bud of love bloomed in my heart for the first time.

I took the chair and the bed along with me but I couldn’t keep the rooms, the walls, the gothic glass doors, the floor on which I learnt to walk and the ceiling, which protected me.

I desperately wanted a new house as the old one was wearing and I couldn’t add anything to it. Whenever I would visit my friends I would compare the convenience in their house with our old, wearing house and would insist to rebuild it. Finally we were going to have a new house but I still wonder will I get the same warmth in the new house? I will get new rooms to decorate but will I get the same warm vibes from them?

I broke down when this thought came to my mind, but someone whispered in my ears, “Even house has a soul, the soul needs a fit body so the soul of the house too needs a new structure.” I felt relieved and composed. I bid my farewell to the house and stepped out. I still wonder who whispered in my ears, was it my grandfather’s soul… but it was not a familiar voice, may be the soul of the house itself consoled me. Now I am sure, even though the structure will change but the soul of my house will be the same. But one question still haunts me, that when this new house will get old again, will my grandchildren or great grandchildren will have the same emotions as I have?