तो हुआ यूँ कि एक दिन हम उनसे जाने अनजाने में एक सुनसान रोड पे फुटपाथ को एक तरफ़ से छेकती चाय की टपरी पे यूँ अमूमन आ मिले।
पहले वो भी थोड़ा झेंप गई
और मैं भी मौन हो भावों को भखला गया
फिर पैरों की बेचैनी और सर पे भरी दोपहरी ने
एक मायावी जाल बुना,
उस जाल के धागों पर पथ-पग पग-पथ करते करते
हम दोनों ने एक छाया का साथ चुना।
अब इस बारी
छाया ने अपनी चाल चली।
ख़ुद को वो थोड़ा-थोड़ा
हर पल सूरज को सौंप चली।
अब साँसों में बेचैनी थी और सर पर वही दोपहरी थी।
कुछ फुसफुसाहटों और कुछ कहा क्या को छुपाती
हम्मम में डूबी हुई चुस्कियों और बढ़ी हुई धड़कनों
का कारण बने धुएँ के बीच उसने आख़िर पूछ लिया
“कैसे हो?”

-

Is there a way
To come out of this
And to dream of a time
Where the mind doesn’t have to
Tire itself out every time
It goes to sleep?
A time where I don’t have to
Burn the already burnt
Tar coated lips?
To have a night
Where I don’t wake up abruptly
Covered in sweat that smells like blood
And heart that’s beating so fast
That it would detach itself
And run away from my body
As soon as I let it go.
To have a day
where I don’t drown myself endlessly
In numbness wrapped in a brown paper
And in distractions available
On a click of a finger.

-

You hold my hand
And say nothing
You don’t event look at me
but I know that you notice
The slightest change in me.
How I rest my fingers under your hands
How my heart races
With every brush of your skin,
How I wish to say a thousand words
And yet not a single whisper is heard
Even then, you give a nod every time
I let out a sigh or tilt my head
As if you understood the thought
That crossed my mind.
We stay there
With our breaths
And silence.

-

बस भाग रहा हूँ,
कभी ख़ुद से
कभी ख़ुद के जज़्बातों से
कभी जज़्बातों से भरे सवालों से
कभी सवालों में उलझे इंसानों से
कभी इंसानों से मिलते एहसासों से
कभी एहसासों में लिपटे ख़यालों से
कभी ख़यालों को खोखला करती मिसालों से
कभी मिसालों से बंधी प्रेरणाओं से
कभी प्रेरणाओं में छुपे अकेलेपन से
बस भाग रहा हूँ
कभी ख़ुद से
कभी संसार से

-

The empathy that I have always felt for people who can’t write, who don’t write has come back to me but not in the same form.

-

In a loop of
Good or bad
I struggle, knowingly
Thinking the bad
Will turn to good
Or maybe the good
Will match my expectations
But the oil dipped tobacco
Does not provide
The expected relief.
And smoke filled lungs
Do not falter
Other than the
Occasional heavy breathings
And I keep going
From one to another
Puff with eyes
Hazier than paper
That I burn.
And the loop
Continues.

— A love Poem

-

तेज़ी से ईंट-दर-ईंट खँगाले जा रहे हो
मेरे गिरे मकान से, उजाले जा रहे हो

इतनी बेग़ैरत तो नहीं होती हैं ख़ुशियाँ
मरे मन का बोझ क्यूँ सँभाले जा रहे हो

मैं उठ के निरा बैठता बिस्तर-ए-मर्ग से
जो आश्ना मुझसे कहते, साले जा रहे हो

मैं जो था वो जल के राख हो चुका कभी का
तो क्यूँ शय्या पर शक्कर डाले जा रहे हो

वो आएगा जनाज़े पे एहतिराम करने
मिर्जयाँ भला कैसा भ्रम पाले जा रहे हो

-

A Letter Without A Quote— % &Hey Nish,

To be honest, when I thought about writing a letter a while ago, I didn’t know that I’d be writing to you. I wanted to write something on reading and writing but as my fingers had a go at the keyboard they stopped only after Nish. I haven’t written to you in a while, and I don’t really have the intention to write one even now.

Yet, I am not able to stop myself from putting word after word. I am not able to stop myself from thinking about what to tell you. Shall I tell you everything that has happened between the last letter and this one? Or shall I only tell you about the despair that has engulfed me like a liana? I must tell you something. Otherwise, this letter will not have a point. Unlike my life, I wish this letter serves a purpose.— % &So, let’s talk about why I didn’t want to write to you, shall we? After all, I was the one who proclaimed I would never stop writing to you. But here we are. I didn’t want to write to you because I wanted to write a letter to someone else. And that could be anyone. I wanted to feel reciprocated. Someone who would not just listen but say things that would comfort my heart. Things that would make me feel safe. Someone who could make all kinds of pain go away just by their words. As I’m tired. Tired and all bled out from the knife that love has become. I don’t want love to be a knife anymore. I want it to be a flower. A sunset. A hand that’s warm and soft. A memory so beautiful that it never changes even after umpteen revisits. But that’s not possible with you. After all, you’re nothing but an imagination sprouted from a broken heart. And that’s why I didn’t wish to write to you.
— % &Yet, I’m still writing to you, which only implies that I haven’t found anyone. Yes, I haven’t. I thought I did but I was wrong on the reciprocation part. In fact, it didn’t just happen once; it’s been quite repetitive. People have stopped listening. Even I have stopped listening. However unpleasant it may be, I can’t deny the truth. I even don’t know when I stopped listening and started hearing. I don’t know when I became the person who wants to turn every topic and every story about himself, anyhow. I wasn’t like this, was I? Maybe this is because the writer who wanted to listen to people and turn everything, he has heard into stories is slowly dying an unnatural death. Or maybe I’m suffering from a satanic hunger for being heard. And when the hunger overpowers my body, I sit back and write to you.

An ex-listener,
Rish— % &

-

As the cigarette rests in between 
my fingers and then lips, 
I stare at the poised yellow dots 
Not far away in the sky.
They’re not stars, 
the colour gives it away, 
Or fairy lights.
Too big for that, in fact.
“What are they?” I ponder
And as I breathe out my death, 
I remember the new skyscraper
They’re building 
in the middle of the city
And the cranes they put up.
The bulbs in the sky 
make sense now.
While I inhale the remedy 
For my shaking hands and 
Wandering mind
I look at the half-done 
Two story building on my left street. 
It’s still the same since I moved here.
Not even a brick, as I remember
Has been added to it. 
“Will they demolish it?” I wonder
And move for another puff,
A loud thud knocks down 
The building on the street
And the cigarette in the creek.

-

Before I met you
I was water.
Now it feels like
I'm drowning.

-