wisps of morning mist
dance in the beams
of car headlights

grey road,white paint
deserted flyovers,
closed shops

streetlight posts
stand tall
in mute resignation

equally spaced
in a neat row,but
never quite close enough

taking a turn now,
at the corner
of a gully

a chai-wala,
in blue striped muffler,
opens his stall

and on a cycle,
aluminium cans rattle
as a milkman sails past.

kochi

we're sitting here,
under this coconut tree
our own cosy harbour

watching quiet ripples
form in
night silver waters,

that stretch across
and open out
into the ocean

where dim lights
betray the silhouette
of a sleepy ship far away

water flows gently,
time laps at our feet
in easy waves.

Thomas Mathew

mathew
an old man
wrinkled face

grey shocks
of hair grew
out of his ears,

ears that knew
the sound of each note
so well

mathew,
the old man
the piano-tuner

he'd come to class
in an old grey suit
and wooden case

the day he'd come
hushed whispers
of his arrival

mathew
unscrewed pianos
unlocked a magical world

little fingers
pressing a key
ting

toy hammers
for every note
we'd giggle

mathew
repair man
piano tuner

we were kids
in awe of him
his piano-playing

he rarely spoke
only smiled
crinkled kind eyes

mathew
eighty years old
brown leather slippers

i wondered
in my
10 year old mind

about his family
his life
his piano-tuning

mathew
sudden hoarse coughs
forehead lines

i looked forward
to his visits,
childish curiousness

matthew
now no more,
leaves behind

the music ,
all the pianos
he brought life to.

katpadi

at the station ,
platform no.2,
on a winter morning

sitting on a bench
eating vada
waiting for the train

a crow,
head tilted
looks hopefully at me

people talk,
in low murmurs
that abruptly pause

at the three noted alert
announcements,that are
all too famliar

a big rat
scurries over
steely tracks and rail-rubble ,

grey and brown stones
that will soon
blur in motion.

its so much easier
to ignore the fact
that there's something here

and stay where we are
cuz we're both too scared
to accept it

too scared
of what might follow
you dont have to say it

though its been
here for so long
lets just pretend

and convince ourselves
that it wouldnt have worked
any other way.