PARADOX

Time. Marches on;
tasting the blood of hikers,
who would not─
reach the summit.

*

Red clover.
I walk under the black
moon to light─
the fire.

*

Meet me
sometime, in the half way
house, I have forgotten
my name.

Satish Verma

Superstitions

An empty chair in a
muffled day, starts
a self-import and
falters on steps.

You need the fear, to
strike back, when the
tracer distribution
returns with a ghost.

The discount will substract
from the truth. I will
find the zero at the
end of lies.

Will I concede to the
barter? Let me first taste
the bitterness of victory,
become drunk on your hate.

Satish Verma

Ritualism

A rose.
Atonement for-
all the thorns.

*

I will gather─
all the poems. For anointing
your memory.

*

Where the sun
hides, I will paint a
field of marigolds.

Satish Verma

Rivalry

Unable to conceive.
The theme had not arrived─
near the mouth.
It was agonizingly close,
Before and after the storm.
A dharma had failed.

Law of the land:
first a sprint,
then a strained voice.
You lend your voice to
a surrogate throat.
The audience roared.

Star by star, you walk
in dust. The search goes to
find the unknown, who takes
a big stride and leaves
gaint foot-prints
in dark.

Satish Verma

A nightmare

The system aborts.
(Multiple organs failure)
A deviant art
of dying pompously.

I wish, I was on a ─
moving floor, sailing
without a walk, looking at
the camouflaged ceiling.

The shrill voice of a whistle─
blower, mimics an opera.
I will snatch the words,
raw, from your lips.

It was here, in absence.
Your poesy, matter-of-factly.
Can you raise your voice
against the fall of the thing.

Satish Verma

MALIGNANCY

A cameo─
after the chemo.
Are you sure, it was a tumor.

*

A black hole
in my bones, gulping
all the pain.

*

You were buried
alive in the wall of patches.
Stitch by stich.

Satish Verma

AT THE END

The ultimate, unsung─
spreads out
and sails to oblivion.

I wanted to become
you, in desperation,
clinging to a swan song.

The great wall─
of silence, built on sand
still stands in hurricane.

Questions mate─
behind the curtain.
The truth, stands naked on stage.

Nothing to declare
now, I collect the pebbles
of childhood, hidden

from your eyes.
Locking the door behind,
I walk out to liberation.

Satish Verma

SECRET DEALS

It insults the─
primitivism. Hypothermia, you
become cold-blooded.

*

Fractured limbs.
How will you climb the
mound of questions?

*

Gray night.
Between black and white
the ashen moon.

Satish Verma

Power Lines

The numbers were going up
and hallowed men were no─
more saints.

You find that your shirt
was stained. Now
you talk
to strangers. fear creeps─
under the skin.

You come near each other in─
dark. Reverting yourself

Against the wall of water as
high as your ego. Epidural abscess─
a silence of unknown.

Now, every hour you die. Light
abducts the dreams. Nothing to-
talk about the blitzkrieg.

Satish Verma

Moonless Night

Hauling up
the debris of your life
in failing light.

*

Bending like grass.
Standing like a solid rock─
where did you reach?

*

The fatal night─
to remove the downy velvet
from your sharp antlers.

Satish Verma

Spotlessly

It was the day of
dead patriarch.
I was fondling an echidna.

The home was
carried away in the─
storm. Must find a broom.

On the remains─
of a burned-out soul.
A hope sits on the altar.

A piano drenched in rain─
will not sing in the gale.
The sky will collapse─

one day, I will bring
back the bluebird,
for a revenge.

Satish Verma

UNFORGIVING

Festival of─
earthen lamps.
Separating the grain from chaff.

*

Pigeons will─
not be let out to fly.
It is going to be a moonless night.

*

The skin has peeled off.
Time to move on.
The bared trees.

Satish Verma

CAPSIZED BOAT

A dynast in the storm-razed
polity will ask─
for a pardon.

By choice there was
no suicide. You will
eat the clouds one day.

Taking the brunt, ─
living near the sea of
people, a window goes shut.

Curtly, with
levitation, the wind
twists, one and everybody.

An owl tattoo, will
tell it all. The hurricane
has reached your door.

Aftermath was a
conspiracy of silence.
Every one was speaking of landfall.

Satish Verma

BARRELING

The limbs had the raw strength.
They were learning
to walk on the water.

The silver axe
will hack off the neck
after the daunting recovery.

In gestational surrogacy,
you don’t want
the incisors.

To kill a wanderer,
you need a howling─
wind, fledged.

A shoebox contains
the handprints of a skeleton
and liquid eyes.

The hunger has a blue
desire. A savage bite
will bring out the space.

Satish Verma

Bruised Spots

After the deluge: dark,
where the river,
meets the sea-
a city becomes a ghost.

*

The narrator,
went to sleep,
A story moved on.

*

A replica
steps out from the black
water, white
as the moon.

Satish Verma

THE ESSENTIAL

Night was all black.
I could not find my
hands / half-dead─

velvety ribs. I want
to rub the spikes and─
toe the line of hurricane.

The naked eye, a-roving
will search for the moon
as the superstorm was─

poised for a landfall.
To receive the wrath─
the ants will find the─

watermark and move to
higher grounds. The sea
throws up the secret of unknown.

Satish Verma

AFTER LEAVING THE HOME

Superstorm
outside. Inside a deep
ocean, thoughtless.

*

You want to know
the boundaries of scent.
A musk deer wonders.

*

After the death─
of hurricane, would you
come to see my hibiscus?

Satish Verma

Nothing Left To Hide

Your skin was involved─
in recent string of shadows, throwing
the white shrouds on unknown
faces. The visibility
becomes a threat, plying like a black river
via stone links.

Your muscles twitch and
convulse. An invisible hand
writes the judgement. A silent
November looms large.
I will wait for the snow to
fall silently on the sun-dial.

Like silent shedding of petals
counting the dew drops on grass.
A tree of bones walks
from death to death. Me standing
on crossroads, on the moon’s path
trying to learn the mistakes.

Satish Verma

Slanting The Picture

This road
does not lead to my home.
Do I ask the lake?
*
Tonight, the moon
shows a wrinkled face
and depression.
*
An untitled
poem, will find a blank
page of life.

Satish Verma

Ironbound

Last night a dream,
died in infancy, when you
were drawing a circle
of pain in rainbows.

The hurt of blind alleys,
and the rebounding image
of burnt-out candles in night.
The full moon will only enhance─

the burns. I do not want to talk
about the divine will of making
a baby, out of willing or unwilling
surrender. Lines are blurred.

You want to ask the moon─
Are you convinced, it was not
a rape? A butterfly is snuffed out
in your palm, you do not know.

Satish Verma

What Went Wrong?

In twilight,
the noose tightens─
and shadows start walking
towards you; to reclaim
your anonymity─
and declare in deadpan manner:
the author is dead.

Your smallness goes
on sale. You are subjected
to scrutiny by the small print, but
the truth escapes from lidless eyes.

A private punishment.
There was blood on the knife.
Why did you write a
sanguinary poem for your savior today?

Satish Verma

STRANGELY

In blood sport
you forget to die, disintegrating
though, cell by cell.

What an ambience─
of human nature?
You drag the carcass─

of mutations whole life.
Now, selling the virginity
for charity?

You build a castle─
of mud bricks as a tribute
to undying love─

for the poverty
of the saint, who had jumped
into the river.

Satish Verma

A Spiritual Rage

The neck pain was singled
out. Roll yourself down―
from the hills. The
figures were crying.

You cannot dismiss
the infamous past tense.
The butchered birthday―
of freedom of speech.

The underpaid stone cutters
of the quarry, and the
golddiggers crowding the street.
Whom will you give your hand?

In glass, the progeny-
grows, away from home,
from inheritance.
I stare in disbelief, unblinking.

Satish Verma

What Went Wrong?

In twilight,
the noose tightens─
and shadows start walking
towards you; to reclaim
your anonymity─
and declare in deadpan manner:
the author is dead.

Your smallness goes
on sale. You are subjected
to scrutiny by the small print, but
the truth escapes from lidless eyes.

A private punishment.
There was blood on the knife.
Why did you write a
sanguinary poem for your savior today?

Satish Verma

STRANGELY

In blood sport
you forget to die, disintegrating
though, cell by cell.

What an ambience─
of human nature?
You drag the carcass─

of mutations whole life.
Now, selling the virginity
for charity?

You build a castle─
of mud bricks as a tribute
to undying love─

for the poverty
of the saint, who had jumped
into the river.

Satish Verma

In Search Of Truth

It was blue and
red. The rape.
What would you do in dark?

*

The bullet was
embedded in the spine.
Still you are walking,
straight!

*

You have become
a face, of terror.
Your eyes, eyes
tell it all.

Satish Verma

A Spiritual Rage

The neck pain was singled
out. Roll yourself down―
from the hills. The
figures were crying.

You cannot dismiss
the infamous past tense.
The butchered birthday―
of freedom of speech.

The underpaid stone cutters
of the quarry, and the
golddiggers crowding the street.
Whom will you give your hand?

In glass, the progeny-
grows, away from home,
from inheritance.
I stare in disbelief, unblinking.

Satish Verma

What A Life?

Why, why we keep on
weighing each other?
You were an anchor;
I was a feather.

*

The land fall!
There was no noise.
Tornado had come like
a revelation!

*

After the break,
you count the rings-
in heart wood.
A condensed torture!

Satish Verma

AGAINST THE ROCKS

You were obliged
to watch the curse
on the caterpillar,
forced to fly.

It was a stunning spectacle.
The walnut tree scooping
to gather,
the gold of black berries.

Speak up my lord. Did you live
in the ghetto to know the
truth of thatched roofs? Were
you afraid of huge mansions?

It was not your heart; a
borrowed sample of imitiative
poetry. I will still go for
the rhythm of unspoken words.

Satish Verma