SriGobbledygook

Was it his mask that had briefly slipped,  Or, a hand that he'd genially gripped?  Was it some packet of milk, fruit, or flour?  The pill he took at the appointed hour?  Might the cousin have been turned away?  The test advanced by a decisive day?  Might he've been in another doctor's care?  What or who else could he beware? Whirl after whirl, so many a pull and push,  Till along the axis came the ambush; Words, so familiar as to leave her lonely,  An unknown voice squawking "if only". To pass on, could any time ever be right?  Yet, if only he'd dodged this parasite...  No longer home, he dwells in her heart,  If only she'd not been miles apart...

After the many gasps came the siren,  Then, he clutched at hope in the muted air; The hospital seeming beyond horizon,  At his door, unbeckoned, did lurk despair.  Yes, several thousands have recovered,  So many more than those that were felled; Yet, reason, amid angst, he discovered,  Finds fears and doubts not to be dispelled.  After all, there is no hint of a sure cure,  Not enough oxygen in the air or a cylinder; Whisked away on thought trips so dour, Again and again, he saw wood, ash, cinder.  For he could, he turned to the Divine,  Tried to chant, only to recall, redact, resay; How'd his wife and sons cut the line?  Why had that cursed virus so lost its way?

The light sticks scurry around,  In disarray or in sheer obedience; You're drawn to a faint sound,  And ponder its muddling cadence.  Then, the sticks stop and stare, Daring you to read their formation; Could you, you'd look elsewhere,  Yet the daze preempts desperation.  You see, trace, and recognize,  Aware of a stutter in the usual flow; What a chance to philosophize,  On life measured in numbers aglow!  Yet, the numbers command, Call you to think and act sans ado; Gently you squeeze her hand,  Thank the Lord that's all you need do. 

The clock had not yet hollered, Nor could he hear the chirp of any bird, As his sleepless night doddered, He sought an anchor, a thought, a word. On the nearby table, a dim glow, The laptop had nothing new to show; Swipe, scroll, search, skim, spew, Much broken, what could a phone glue? He tried to think of an apt song, But, his every pick seemed so wrong; Voices, tune, and lyrics so alien, Yet, what was the selection criterion? From his bed, he eyed his stash, The stuff seemed dead: a pile of ash; The old cigar, the sleek cigarette, Neither promised thrall, thrill, or threat! The world seemed a sick smog, He'd no urge to find a better analogue; Could he have been more alone? He hadn't even an addiction his own!

Haven't we always been so zealous, In extolling some who've lived before us? Outsized, larger-than-life memorials, Our mnemonics in mortar for their ideals. Theirs is the path we wish to tread, Theirs are the words we hold so very sacred, And we preserve them for posterity, Standing them in every hamlet, town, and city. Every heirloom commands a price, More often than not a supreme sacrifice; And so, the lesser lives we do mine, As we exalt a human to the immortal line. Yet, might not a personage deified, If awake, look around, and be truly petrified? Might not a saintly king shed tears, Having robbed so many of their healthy years?

Every line he wrote was too true, A cliche scupper that defied any rescue; Shadows moved seemingly to hide, Any sign of life that he might have eyed. Luck, indeed, was a cruel trickster, Who oft spurred him and left him astir; All he wished to do was to write, Only that he'd been denied new insight! He vowed he'd find himself luck, What might be a better bait than the buck? He only had to run down the street, Was not the Casino luck's own retreat? His pockets empty, he rolled dice, He would may be try twice, at most thrice! At first, luck didn't bite and he lost, But to entice luck, mustn't one bear a fair cost? At the counter, he handed his card, And entered his PIN, having thought hard; As he waited to get back on luck's trail, The lucky bastard only saw his transaction fail!

It is indeed Summer's own scent, A riddle puckery sour and richly sweet, A whisper that becomes ambient, The herald of that most decadent treat. Then, you picture the lineament, The familial form of that fabled kind, A holi of hues that is so radiant, Oh, the vivid imaginings of your mind! To resist would be to no avail, Why not trace the scent to its source? And so you set out on its trail, No more than an eager trot indoors! What to look for, you do know: A sunset streaking across a deep green; It's no fruit, the Raspuri Mango, It's a loving gift Spring hides in the scene!

Total, Active, Dead, and Recovered, So much said, and in not many a word: Numbers, colours, arrows, charts, More for the mind than for the hearts. The hosts are tracked by an app, Their streets marked on the city map: That's as much as we need know, Whom not to meet, and where not to go. The walker, hitchhiker, stowaway, Huddled in camps along the highway, Forced to live on pity and charity, Were they right to be cynical of parity? Surely, it's not that we don't care, We do share, donate all we can spare; Yet, only so much can we do, say, Each, it seems, must survive as they may. It's only the many we hope to save, A thought that we must take to our grave; But, n o time soon, we do so pray, As we watch for an ebb in the curve today.

A flimsy rag across the face, A little loose and a little out of place, There, his armour was complete, And he was all set to walk the street. Stepping edgily out of the door, He recalled his tiny list for the store: Rice and flour, and oil and herbs, Only the essentials unbarred by curbs. He soon found himself not alone, Not in company, yet not on one's own: Masked beings rushing to and fro, Grazing him by, unable to stop or slow. What was it, a metre or was it two, Were they to be apart only in a queue? Might someone mind if he did ask, Every stranger, stranger in their mask.

Vicious, insidious, ravenous, And so very surely out to get us, Death, finding face and feet, A trick not to be put off by a treat. A friend home from a trip, That colleague with a firm grip, The stranger you didn't see, Pray, who might Death now be? Must you have held the door? Who might have done so before? And that neighbour in the lift, Was he bearing the ghastly gift? Death is illness beyond a pill, Yet, would you die or would you kill? What if you could still choose, Avert either fate, retreat yet not lose? Panic, it's hope for tomorrow, Fear and flee Death that does follow; We must hide, for we're sought, Is not what's outlived but outfought?

What might I possibly say to you, Who've had to bid a dear one goodbye without reply? Aid, abrade, what may words do, Sounds from a now that's evoked an unchanging why? Words, wise, unwise, all so crude - Caws and bawls of a reason seeking to answer; To speak seems to be to intrude, Your timeless reverie, a sure source of succour. Words, a sloppy prod, a nervy query, My sole means to try and divine how you are coping; Might a word, though duly dreary, Find you swathed in a memory, yet as ever hoping? Words, all that I can hope to bring, Knowing fully well that they must and will fail, Feeble calls of days in the offing, When, beyond chaos, only the old love may prevail.

He’s on the dribble again, Each court-side in their own mind; Will he dunk, lay up, feign? This is live, believe me, no rewind. He has it beyond the arc, Mamba slides through the melee, Fouled, he’s at the mark, You bet it’s a three-point play!   Oh, he slinks round Shaq, It’s yet another pick-and-roll! An assist behind his back, A triple double, a team field-goal! He’s taken on the big guy, And ducks under arm and net, A twist and he lobs it high, Off the glass and in the bucket. Up and under one more block, Death too feels his rival’s dismay; Never out of time on the clock, He fades away never to fade away…

Is it what we choose to show, Or, is it what we choose to see? Yet, could we any better know, Could we hope to any better be? We want to be loved, and how! - A bond for the lifetime we survey; Yet, we want not an ever now, Dream as we do of many a future day. By and by, nothing's the same, Neither we, nor our love for or from; Who might we possibly blame, What sad tune, hum, strum, and drum? To love, is it to pet a likeness, An ossified crumb of a sweet past? Might we never ever confess, Our inmost image that's been recast? Or, to love, could we renew, Our bond with every change in us? They were, each one we knew, But an approximation of the ambiguous!

It was a familiar blare, Cymbal and bugle and drum, Ensuring all were aware, Of the fiat to be at the forum. A new name, a new day, One more alleged agent of hell; Aye, nay, not hers to say, Muted, for she may cast a spell. Wood was got in carts, Cast around a stake skybound; The maven of evil arts, Shackled, was led up the mound. Her case was briefly read: ‘She read and wrote, hid books; And an evil life she led, So many idols in so many nooks! ‘The King offered pardon, But she’d not confess, implore; Now, here she must burn, Per the purging laws of yore.’ There was much murmur, As all discussed her deserts, In silence they did concur, And the flames rose in spurts. ‘Come on, take a punt’, Later, cried a dealer, hoarse, ‘Predict the witch hunt, The next name in law’s course!’

Knowing not how nor why, It had moved across the sky, Before stopping, very low, Hiding a town in its shadow. It was some cosmic spawn, A grey cloud endlessly drawn; Was it night, or was it day? None could now hope to say. The Sun sought the seen, All the blue, grey, and green, The lake, the hill, the tree, Was He where He was to be? The stars too felt a lack, For none did now wink back; The Full Moon dismayed, Prayed, and briefly overstayed. Beneath, folks looked on, Would it now rain or be gone? Without time, sans light, Despair fighting their fright. The cloud couldnʼt rain, Would the flood ever drain? Too bulky for the breeze, It held itself just over trees. Those living in the town, Both unknown and of renown, Would doubtless soon die, Either all at once, or by and by? The cloud couldnʼt rain, Yet, had it forever to remain , Eye the dead, dying, ill, Aid and a bet death, if not kill?

On his finger, a smudge of ink, An author now, he cannot but beam; Hopes, fears, so much to think, He’s willed his future, per his dream. He’s lent his power, of course, He cannot possibly worry every day! And is it not wise to outsource, To those so beyond all selfish sway? For him, do the leaders speak, As for everyone they’ve been chosen by; For him, do they serve and seek, The future, the we implied in their every I . They legislate on God and tax, Define the cess, as also sin and excess; True servants, they let him relax, Even give convictions all must profess! Wait, what’s the true causal link? Who's it that rules, who does represent? On their fingers, a smudge of ink, Could there be a more potent reagent?

He wasn't sure about rebirth, But, felt he wasn't all new; What with life's story on Earth, Was there an original view? Even the calendar repeated, Planets stuck to schedule, Might not thoughts in a head, Follow this periodic rule? Maybe he too had a likeness, In the ages that had been? Perhaps a pauper, a princess, Or, even a dullard unkeen? If the other had a biography, Couldn't he know more? Pursuing the plausible theory, He read like never before. He bought so many books, In so many a language! And found similar outlooks, Yet, no spitting image. Frustrated, in page after page, He turned to old dramas; What could you find on stage, Life in inverted commas? With zest, he read a soliloquy, Enjoying its quaint diction; A known, his own idiosyncrasy, He found himself in fiction!

In distinctive ethnic garb, Far removed from the everyday, He could only hear a barb, Spying the glass in the hallway. Mindful again of his aim, He set to stretch the long line, Amid echoes of the Name, Awaiting a peek of the Divine. Entering each mega portal, Chanting hymns from memory, He felt a whit less mortal, Words denied to his each worry. As he crossed the threshold, Amidst lamps, the idol gleamed; A silence suddenly took hold, He had nothing to say, it seemed. To plead much, he'd come, And had even more to confess ; In the sanctum sanctorum, Muted, had he left God to guess?

He found without much fuss, The package bearing his name; Its size certainly was a plus, Was it a toy, a puzzle, a game? Having saved the gift wrap, He set out to examine the box, But didn't break into a clap, For, the lid showed typical clocks. The wrap was too pleasing, For the gift to be so very obvious; Couldn't Santa be teasing? And lo, he was once more curious. In the box were wooden parts, Fuselage, engines, wings, and tail, Stickers for flank and nose arts, A passenger jet on a miniature scale. He dowelled parts together, Hoping to soon taxi the jumbo jet; Was the maker denied timber? The engines seemed small for the set! Yes, the aircraft wouldn't fly, But had to seem as though it could; It was a flaw plain to any eye, He'd have to hide the craft for good. Wait, but why would he hide it, Not box the plane that can't depart? Indeed, the craft was exquisite, He cherished the woodwork apart.

'Just be honest!', we do aver, For, is not truth freedom forever? Yes, light is true, so the dark, But, what of life, that roving spark? Truth is freedom from illusion, As illusion is freedom from reality; Our truths - what a profusion! - Are abridged likenesses of the verity. Our truths are but abstract, To get which, we do add, subtract; Tenet, theory, each a dialect, Words giving our truth its aspect. Constants in life, they are few, The rest, like us, ephemerally true; True, false - time parts the two, Swapping them, naming them anew.