Writing

My first love.
My better half.
My greatest romance,
I met you perhaps
When I was 6 or 7.
You took me to a forest
And made me it's Princess.
Sitting on that Madurai terrace
With its interesting
Nooks and crannies.
I could understand
All the animalSpeak
And they understood me.
Under that darkening sky,
I was alone;
And yet not at all.
Lost in the sounds and sights and smells
Of the forest;
In finding you,
I found myself that day,
When I was 6 or 7.
I started writing!
"I am the Princess of the forest...."
I won't go further, don't worry,
Into the strange pathways
Of the 6 or 7-years old forest.

As expected,
The romance of the first years
Is unbelievable, isn't it?
My autocorrect typed in - "unreliable".
Freudian slip, that?
Romancing you,
I poured poetry and my soul
Into a zillion pages.
Well, at least a fifty of them.
Into a thick diary,
Which saw its early death
In one of the many passages,
Through rented houses
That middle class Indian families
Go through like a pack of cards.
Childhood gone too early,
I didn't know to grieve my diary.
I replaced the romance
With expectations,
As expected.

You stayed with me,
As I wandered through Life.
Even as I took you
For granted.
We met under the night sky sometimes
With the stars and the moon
And the solitary plane.
We met,
When I searched everywhere
For my specs,
And then found them in my pocket!
We met,
When I felt like it,
When I got sad,
When I wanted to impress someone,
or make them laugh.
When excitement filled the air,
Or perhaps melancholy.
You taught me humour,
And looking closely.
You taught me to do Life,
While I made you wait.

I decided,
That I wanted marriage.
I planned much
For all its trappings.
Complete with a house,
Garden, children and dogs,
Dimming lights for romantic evenings,
And bean bags for rainy days.
Red oxide flooring and earthern ware,
As local as possible,
For that is sustainable. ..
But dreams were also made up of:
Vacations in Bhutan and Srilanka
For I wanted to understand neighbours.
Foreign to myself slowly,
And you as well.

Somewhere,
Along the way,
I don't know where,
All of a sudden,
I found you gone.
And panicked.
You then came and went
As you pleased.
I threw tantrums
Kicked and screamed
Till I was blue.
Kicked some more,
Screamed some more,
Cried a whole lot more...
You seemed to soften
And said, "look closely"
And much to my chagrin,
Went away again!
Paths dried up,
Garden withered,
Poof!
The castle in the air,
Became one with it.
Dark all around,
Dimming lights be damned!
The rest of that story,
As they say is history.
Or Herstory,
Of losing and finding herself.

Flash forward to present.
I am sitting with you,
You still inspire me
To be my best.
You say,
"All I want is,
Your attention.
Your presence.
Be with me.
Whatever follows,
Follows."
Watching,
An innocuous mug
In an innocuous bathroom,
Get filled with water,
The sound,
Changing as the mug
Gets from empty to full-
When I am with you,
I am no longer innocuous.

I redo,
My vows with you.
I want nothing,
Out of you.
I want nothing,
Because of you.
I would much rather
Have these moments
Of sitting with you
And having you
Do Life, do me,
In my most private moments.
I would much rather
Just have you along,
For the conversation
And company,
As I get squished in a crowded bus,
Or am triggered by a commercial ad,
Feeling loved amongst friends,
Or like a worm after a shouting match,
Satisfied after a successful workshop,
Not getting enough FB likes!
Or getting too much,
Of unwanted counsel....
I just want you to be.
Through it all.

Garbage everywhere,
Overflowing bins too small
To hold,
the world's unresolved emotions.
When I feel too small,
And inadequate...
Or too big, grandiose --
Or anybody in between,
Spewing out garbage-
Nonetheless,
You hold me
Through it all.
Making life art
Making new meaning,
Making over,
Making love,
You make me art.