Daily (w)rite

Wordle for

Writing short stories is what I have wanted to do for quite some time. But it is a difficult genre to master, and I am not entirely persuaded it is the right genre for me and what I have to say. While the writing comes easy, I am not so sure it flows as well as some of my poems.

Here is a prose-poem kind of vignette I had done some time back. I call it “Hell Found Me” :

Hell found me. I knew it would, sooner or later, but did not know it would be quite so soon. I had become quite an artist down the years I spent here. But now I am caught.

It is here that I have to stay, chained for all time, in the middle of this mindless desert, acres of salt, and little else. The cracks left by the wind on this never-ending salty stretch are mirrored by the raw cracks on my feet. Someday the cracks on my bleached bones will mirror them. First the birds, and then of course, the sun, will have their turn. It is a long wait.

But today as I lie scorching, I am flesh and blood. I can feel the heat under my bare body and the pain from the many cuts made on it to attract vultures. For years I have traveled these lands where no man dare make his home, where there is no soil for a blade of grass. Only salt, white, grey or dirty, meets the eyes, no matter how many miles one walks.

This was my home. I was a wanderer and this entire spread belonged to me, for it was I who would guide the trader who risked his life walking into this wasteland of salt. In exchange for things that took my fancy, an amulet, a carved box, or a piece of embroidered cloth, I would offer to lead him to the best place, where the salt was pure, pristine, and so white it hurt the eye. I would guide him in and out in a day, he would not get lost in this salty desert. He would come once, twice, many times, and grow my hoard in the caves I stowed them in.

Unknown to him, it was not his possessions I was after, it was his flesh. Ah, human flesh! Salty as the air I breathe, smelling of salt as the water I drink, and warm, so warm. No animal flesh can compete, and I should know, I have tasted most I could catch. I have hunted in jungles, and I have hunted beside farms. Crippled at birth, I knew no mother and the only herd I was ever part of was a group of beggars by day and thugs by night. I have loved human blood since then, it quenched my thirst and killed the dull ache in my belly. Most nights I went hungry. There were rats to catch of course, but rats can be quick.

Besides, hunting men is far more rewarding. They are more intelligent. It needs great cunning. I earned the trust of many, and when I decided the time was ripe, my meal never knew what hit him. I hate struggles. I do not like wasting precious energy in this desert, and trust is the perfect weapon. I would always ask them, on what was to be their last trip, to bring me some good wine. I would, as always, be quiet; I do not know much of talk, and it does not amuse me. They would be merry, and drink more than I. Most of them died in their sleep, dreaming happy dreams, which ended with a quick, firm, blow to the head. It is as good a way to go as any.

But as with all good plans, mine had a flaw. News of my unseen hoard grew with each small merchant that gave me a trinket. Then, you came, the robber in the guise of a merchant. And when the robber met the hunter, the robber won. You are now a speck in the distance, carrying away all the trophies of my hunt. They do not mean much to me, and you are welcome. I am chained outside my cave, from where I can see all the bones I tore flesh from, and I am content.

As birds tear at mine, I shall think of the poison I smeared on all my treasure and how you will be writhing in agony soon. You know, I have begun to like my hell. The way I see it, it is just a few vultures having a good meal, and I do not grudge them that.

For some reason I have always wanted to turn this into a poem. Today I got an idea how. I was on Sharon Bakar’s blog when I saw this intriguing link to Wordles, a free software that lets you create word clouds of whatever text you choose to feed in.

This is the link to the Wordle I created from the text of the vignette here. (Click it to see a bigger image). I like the way all sorts of unlikely words join up in the Wordle: “chained, hunted birds”, “years drink”, “scorching treasure”, “walking pristine”….I know random poetry generators can give you much the same kind of unlikely word combinations, but I like to see the Wordle do it so visually.

Writing about the Sun and the Sunflower

I turn so you are in my eyes and I in yours.
You stay far, for to come close
would singe me
and I would be as ashes
to your flame.

From the distance you send me
warmth, color
and all that is life and love.
You give me sustenance and I give
you one more reason to burn
so we may live and love far apart:
you, the Sun,
and I, the sunflower.

Okay now, this is the third time I am writing based on Rick’s writing prompts. He is a generous soul who is contributing his paintings and creating a wonderful artist’s community around him. My anger is totally directed at myself: why am I bursting out in poems, when all I am trying to write is prose? I love poetry, don’t mistake me, even love writing about it, but  I simply don’t think writing poetry is doing any good to me at this juncture.

Well, since I have written it out, here it is. I dedicate it to Naomi, for whatever it is worth. (I apologize in advance, Naomi, in case you do not like it…:), and I hope the birth is easy)

I call it “Ripe with the Fullness of Waiting”

Ripe with the Fullness of Waiting

Our kiss was as lightning:
it joined the sun
and the earth,
in molten fire,
in blinding light.

Our love made more painful
by the slow mating
of our kindred souls,
fragile, numinous, bright,
has long settled in my womb,
taken a life of its own,
a beating heart.

I gather myself now,
wrung of thought and
drenched in longing
for those feet
that kick me from within,
I want to feel
that skin, so tender,
so soft with loving,
on my cheek.

I am ripe
with the fullness of waiting,
ready for that stab of pain,
for that timeless moment
when our love will no longer
be a feeling,
ethereal, unbodied,
but a treasured face
our hands can touch.

I have been writing about books every now and then, books I am reading, books I wish to read.

Back when I was a student, and sometimes did not know where the next meal would come from, I would still buy books. Books sold by weight on Indian pavements, because in those days in India they wasted nothing, and I could not afford shiny new books.

But now, when I can afford to buy any book I might possibly want, used books still call to me.

I tried to write about this love affair (in prose, mind you!) but I can’t help it, I think each books speaks to me in verse, in words which are garbled prayer and temptation,  so here goes (sigh, again, “a poem”!!!! Rick, you are laughing, aren’t you?)

Thumbed, dog-eared,
cover torn in places
names written, forgotten
crossed out, passed on.

I come with a tang
of lazy afternoons,
of mildewed bookshelves
falling apart,
of cheap colognes
on a young man
looking for a start,
of pungent desires
shakily denied,
salted airs in a
pickle factory where
I almost died,
of this dusty pavement
where I am to be sold
made into packets, bags,
my story untold.

Come pick me up
take me with you
and you shall know
of whispered confessions,
innuendos, half-written
poems, and shattered
dreams, as I talk
to you and you listen
with your eyes closed and
an open heart.

For my best secrets
were not printed
on my body
but written
into my soul
by all these years
I spent waiting,
waiting for you,
my love.

Ok, when I had started writing this blog, I had more or less made up my mind.

No poems. None of that rhymy stuff, I am not writing poems on this blog.

But then, I suppose in a weird way I posted my first poem here cos someone else asked me to post some of my work. I don’t know if I would have showed you one of my poems if you’d asked in real life, Rick.

But that is what is wrong (or right) with the internet. It makes people faceless. And it takes less courage to do things you don’t want to do in front of people if your audience ( like Lofter, Kwj, Annie girl, Whisperedsweet, Tomachfive, who have all left their comments on poems) is faceless.

So. Anyway. Rick posted a Thursday prompt last week, and I have been wanting to write about it. I love poems, but I have been wanting to write prose, ok?

But then again, what came out while writing this morning was a poem, again!

I am calling it “Play with me“

Play with me

Talking to you is like walking naked in the eastern breeze
I feel your touch in places I had never known existed.
Would you play with me, be my sun on this stretch of grass?

Let the call of the eagle hold the season in trance
while sunbeams play and dance to a silent song.

Close your eyes in an orange haze of touch and skin,
as clouds tease each other on the breath of May
and blackbirds play this summer noon.

Play with my feet, as I raise them one by one
play, play on the legs, play where they join,
play with my breasts, they wait upturned, plant your seed
in my waiting womb, play with me as that smile plays
on your mouth, let it play on my body, my earthen skin.

I am talking to you now, walking naked in the eastern breeze,
your smile touching me in places I had never known existed.

When it comes to poetry, I admit I am a little cynical. I write poems, but they are not really things I’d rather put up on a blog.

Rick Mobbs, who is an artist by profession, but a painter and poet at heart has asked me more than once to share with him the fiction I have been writing. Uh, I thought, why not poetry? Maybe go the whole hog and make a complete fool of myself?

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I love this Italian song on YouTube by Giorgia, can’t get it out of my head—- one of those delightful, hummy little numbers. It is all about Love and the various things lovers do, feel, think and compromise on, but all in a song that somehow makes even the most unpleasant things poetic.

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