Confessions of a boy

Those were days of struggle ; each leaf added to the tree. I waited each night, outside the trembling hut, waiting to see a lonely traveller in need of food or accommodation. “A man can sleep outside”, I remembered my mother’s voice when I initially started sleeping out, shaking and screaming at night in fear. That me doesn’t exist anymore. Of course, that mother too. Living alone, I had to fend for myself alone, but living-in all my life, I didn’t know the kind of work other men did. All I knew was to take care of the house and surroundings, to weave baskets out of wires, and to knit baby clothes. “What woman would like you?” my old mother would ask during her last days. I’d sit there like a good daughter-in-law, listening to the taunts at her husband’s home. Sadly, they expected me to bring a wife home. How do I tell them, that I’d rather be married off?

What does my rain smell like?

Newborn leaves,
Baby winds,
Luscious mud beds,
Vinyl whispers,
Two dancing feet,
Cooing bird heads,
Nuzzling cold noses,
Trippy skies,
And
Greens.

©nandinipradeep

Myrrha

“When it rains it is broad daylight in my mind, Krsna, even in the dead of night. “

In another day he was your man, standing on a brick,
A lotus that bloomed out of the mud—
But so miry is love that it made a God out of your man and a seeker of alms out of the woman.
Irony is when he is lost upon references and she revered in each thought.

“Long have I admired her, dear man, O but how, Krsna, have I become her without knowing it.”

I have waited on bricks in vain, I have written love in a thousand hymns, all upon a name,
I have fallen without bleeding, I have wept without tears,
I have bathed his shadow with the best words lest he fears,
I have drawn colors out of winter,
I have stolen swaras out of the winds,
I have made ragas out of my womb,
I have tuned each drop of my blood to play his lyre.

“But listen, Krsna, not he, only she could tell me about the future—”

Not the God, but the barefooted lover.
Not the ranks but the cracked, blood-dried heels know the way out of this vyuha,

“But how would you know, Krsna, you only know how to destroy in order to make anew,
She created the universe out of your broken bits,
Even a toenail would become a shell, each shell an ocean.”

©nandinipradeep

Skhizein Phrēn

Find me in an ocean falling for pearls;

Drowning for memories, falling for pearls ..

Build me an ocean yonder that sea..

Build me all that I’ve left unseen..

Find me the memories, garish and gay;

Deranged in misery, arranged in may.

©

Thalia / Abundance

Every twig, every leaf 
Shall rise from the Dead;
Even Destiny shall only behold.
Death shall have no word over Life-
Heaven shall only be a tree,
A twig, a leaf.
Words shall resurrect Words
Of yore ‘n nigh.
Night shall reunite with the Night
And Life shall have the final Word.

Elven Desires – The Night

Elven folks might know
That nights don’t always
End like this.

Forever and Ever
Winding like a stairwell
Straight from infinity
And yon.

©

Triste Infiniment

 

You and I, we’re infinite;

Hence it is fated that we’d never meet.

Parallel in universes 

Parted by mindsets,

United by tristesse infinie. 

©

T/N : Triste Infiniment : Infinitely Sad ; Tristesse infinie: Infinite sadness / melancholy

I was born from the ashes of you

I was born from the ashes of you

Time and again, I burst into flames

Just like how you did once.

I am your memory enclosed in history.

That history which stands alone.

Lovesick, and puny desires of teenage days stranded

In some faraway shore.

You and me, at this far end of the world,

We stand alone;

Together.

©

Bunshin, 分身

They say the you in me hides behind the I that they can see.

How can I kill me and make you the only me?

For I am not me, they say.

For centuries, we have remained shadows of each other,

Constantly contemplating: “Is it you or I?”

Centuries more were spent on deciding

Who is the Ophelia and who the Sita is.

Can we exist together in two different worlds?

Or do we take turns?

 

Bunshin, he called us.

We were shunned, neglected and looked down upon.

Anomalies, as we were, and against nature.

Those were our tags.

Were we proud?

Maybe not.

Maybe.

Yes.

We were.

分身

 

And like that we walked across the veins and forests.

Bathed in blood, we swam out of the arteries.

Murderers, they called us.

But we said.

“Bunshin.”

“分身”

 

Linked by Karma, we were now tied through our souls.

Knotted a thousand times around your neck

As you hang dead from the ceiling of your cave.

We ate your flesh and drank your blood.

That does not make you Christ

And nor are we your disciples.

We are your slayers; that is the truth.

 

Marching towards our kingdom, we roared.

Bunshin!

分身!

Taking our revenge as we climbed to the throne,

We reached up to the man who ruled and asked him:

“Do you know who we are?”

“No”, he trembled.

“We were once violated by your words and deeds.

You called us lesser mortals.

So we decided to become gods for you.

So that you would know what it means to be less,

And not more.

You gave us our name

To deride us,

But we used it to unmake you.

We truly became our alter egos

To seek our soul’s revenge

We became Bunshin.

分身.”

©
P.S. I have been asked a number of times about the meaning of Bunshin so here it is: Bunshin means a doppelganger, so to say. But here, it’s more like a doppelganger of the soul. Or at least that’s what I was imagining. The rest is up to your mind. Thank you! 🙂