Bidding adieu (OctPoWriMo)

(From Pexel)

Day 31

Prompt: Goodbye train

Form: Song

City life proved too much for him
He is leaving, going back to the life he knew
He’s going back to find what’s left of his world
He’ll take the midnight train back home
To the place where his heart belongs

He has finally decided to take the last train home
He’s had enough, doesn’t want to roam.

He hopes she will be waiting for him
Waiting at the station to take him in her arms
He had left her crying by the tracks
Now as he packs his bags he can feel tears pricking his eyes
All he wants is to be back in her arms.

He has finally decided to take the last train home
He’s had enough, doesn’t want to roam.

But she is not there when he alights at the station
Has moved to another country to chase her dreams
She got tired of the endless wait
Of keeping her aspirations on hold
She didn’t want her wings clipped anymore.

He has finally decided to take the last train home
He’s had enough, doesn’t want to roam.

There’s a slow train coming into the station
He boards it with a heavy heart
He no more cares for the destination
It’s a train that is going nowhere
He has no ticket nor does he care

He now has no place which he can call home
He can’t stay anywhere, he is destined to roam.

This is my last poem for the October Poetry Writing Month. Thank you so much for your presence here. I greatly appreciate your visits and comments.

Happy Halloween to all!! 🎃🎃👻👻

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Journaling (OctPoWriMo)

Day 30

Prompt: Diary

Form: Free verse

A whiff of mothballs takes me
to the dusty ephemera
that surprisingly did not
crumble under the pressure of time
as I look into the potpourri of my teenage memories
a cavalcade of emotions rampage all over me
bemused and bewildered I watch
corpses of defunct passion tumble out in a spuddle
the ferocious angst that ignited my soul then
is now just an ember; flaring up occasionally
the social activist’s dogged haunting
has kept my conscience alive
scattered in between the cobwebs
of spidery scrawls of scribbles
are the posies of verses inscribed in calligraphy;
kenspeckle for their earnestness
the apparition of my younger idealistic self
looms large, accusation writ large on its countenance
my moral compass is intact; only I have traded idealism for pragmatism
a whiff of something burning brings me back to the now
as I rush to the kitchen
the glimpse from the bedroom window gladdens my heart
sitting in the balcony
my teenage girl pours her heart in her journal.

Lost love (OctPoWriMo)

(From Pexel)

Day 29

Prompt: Paris

Form: Rapholic verse

The cup that cheers (OctPoWriMo)

Day 28

Prompt: Tea

Form: Free verse

Soother of jangled nerves
peace broker par excellence
rejuvenator incomparable
deal maker, irrespective of the size of the deal
world unifier,  conversation starter.

never finicky about how it is served
equally at home in a snooty fine porcelain cup,
a glass, a steel container
or an earthy earthen cup
nor bothered about accompaniments
shining on its own and graciously sharing limelight
with dainty sandwiches, cakes or pedestrian samosa and bhajiya*
warming hearts and hands together.

most versatile and chameleon like
changing colours according to surroundings
heavenly in its pristine avatar with no add ons
perfect pairing with milk or cream
sweet enough without sugar
but welcoming both sugar and sweeteners
suitably changing self to suit different tastes.

in good times, in bad times
for celebrations, at mournings
in a meeting, on a road trip
to welcome guests, to bid farewells
on rainy days, on cold wintry days
in the summer heat, in the humidity
all weather and all time favourite.

Warming, cooling, calming, uniting
tiny curled leaves unfurl gracefully under heat
fruity, smoky or musky aroma
manna for a parched soul.

*Samosa: south Asian savoury snack. Fried white flour pastry filled with spicy potatoes.

*Bhajiya: vegetable fritters

I must have written and discarded at least six poems on this topic. As is obvious, I am an ardent tea lover. This is more of a stream of consciousness write. Please overlook mistakes and repetitions.

Presupposition (OctPoWriMo & dVerse)

(From Pinterest)

Day 27

Prompt: Expectation/ Expecting

Form: Duodora

Expectations
following everywhere
sneaky assumption
a noxious beldam
pushing and prodding
trying to fit a round peg in a square
presumptuousness putting me in place!

Expectations
silly finger wagging
sinister whispers
sibilant murmurs
sabre a rattling
misapprehended mostly, all the times
prefer to walk chosen path at my pace.

Written for dVerse. Today’s host Li says: Today’s challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to write a poem speaking to a human attribute that is particularly irritating to you — and it must have a Halloween or Samhain theme to it.

Story time (OctPoWriMo)

Day 26

Prompt: Speaking and listening

Form: Free verse

As winter chill creeps stealthily 
into the pleasant autumn nights

it is time for cosy evenings
of hot cocoa and story times

children dressed in warm flannels clamour for an engaging tale

granny sits draped in a pashmina shawl surrounded by eager eared young ones

she loves retelling the forgotten fables
going back in the time of kings and queens

when another hearer quietly patters in
glasses and  warm woollies on

ever ready and an avid listener
ears cocked, head tilted to one side

seeing the quorum of future story tellers complete
with a satisfied gleam in her eyes

granny begins spinning a yarn
“Once upon a time in ancient India….”

https://lifeafter50forwomen.com/2021/10/25/what-do-you-see-105-october-25-2021/

Night fears (a haibun)

(From Pexel)

My tired eyes refuse sleep with reluctance, like an alcoholic refuses that last drink. Fear keeps my eyelids pinned open. Somewhere, drifting between extreme sleepiness and the need to be awake, I doze off. Only to wake up with a jerk. Groggy and disoriented, I walk up to his room. His CGM* reads 53. In panic I search hurriedly for the glucometer and the testing kit, fear making me butter-fingered. The commotion makes him stir. He looks up, gives me a lopsided smile and goes back to sleep. With trembling hands I take another reading…it reads 78. I sink to the floor shaking with relief.
It is 3.00 am and sleep has bid me goodbye. I sit in the balcony waiting for dawn. Most nights are uneventful, some cause this drama. But fear has become a part of the night routine. The threat of hypoglycemia can do that.

Moon my namesake** smiles
as I give her company
I hide my heartache

Written for dVerse. Today’s host Frank says: Let’s feel the spooky sensation of this coming Halloween/Samhain! Let’s celebrate that emotion of dread. Let’s write our haibun that states or references fear.

*CGM: Constant Glucose Monitor. Used to monitor glucose levels of diabetics, especially type 1. ( My fourteen year old son is Type 1 diabetic.)

**namesake: Punam in hindi language means the full moon.

Filling my cup (OctPoWriMo)

Day 25

Prompt: Cup

Form; Free verse

Every morning as sunshine pours into my home
the nearby mango tree waves cheerily
sitting in my chosen spot in the balcony
I pour fresh brewed tea in my favourite cup
feeling warmed inside and out
I feel the golden and amber seeping into my cracks.

The moonlight is a salve for my achy soul
bathing my being luxuriantly
the soothing scent of tuberose welcomes me
as I pour my heart on a pristine sheet
words flow seamlessly
my cup of contentment runneth over.

Things that weigh me down (OctPoWriMo)

Day 24

Prompt: Millstone

Form: Monorhyme

Expectations, others as well as mine
put a spanner in my flight
fears, rational or irrational
grip me and relentlessly bite
dichotomy between reality and perception
of all my efforts makes light
obsession with an orderly house
keeps me forever tense and uptight
guilt and remorse nibble at my soul
never letting it soar like a kite
failed relationships bother me
frustrated, I every now and then gripe
grief engulfs me all of a sudden
leaving me feeling heavy; chest tight
negativity all around swallows me
my heart withers caught in the blight
failure’s shadow looms large occasionally
making me with remembered ignominy writhe
lack of empathy and compassion everywhere
I keep wondering about this world’s plight
weighed down by all this, it is no wonder
I don’t see at the end of tunnel any light.

Lost and found

 by an exact spot in the sky,
I witness a shift of light,
breaking where no sun shines

Why am I traveling
where really there is no road
the forest road was shut many moons ago

in gangrene hues, over a pyramid
in the desert, life is distilled;
I fear water

It’s so easy to get lost and disappear,
into the  nothingness of despair
I feel relief at the abandonment

where the wind and dust travel easily along my skin,
leaving trails of of the journey thus far
I am ready for something called home.

Written for dVerse. Today’s host Laura says: Select ONE of the above ‘lost poems’ (or one of your own finding where something or someone is lost ) and re-write is as a ‘Found poem’. It does not have to be as rigid as an erasure poem for you can add in some of your own words or even reorder it.

I have used the following poem. The phrases/lines used by me are in bold.

(Lost By Way of Tchin-Tabarden by Susan Rich

Republic of Niger

Nomads are said to know their way by an exact spot in the sky,

the touch of sand to their fingers, granules on the tongue.

But sometimes a system breaks down. I witness a shift of light,

study the irregular shadings of dunes. Why am I traveling

this road to Zinder, where really there is no road? No service station

at this check point, just one commercant hawking Fanta

in gangrene hues. C’est formidable! he gestures — staring ahead

over a pyramid of foreign orange juice.

In the desert life is distilled to an angle of wind, camel droppings,

salted food. How long has this man been here, how long

can I stay contemplating a route home?

It’s so easy to get lost and disappear, die of thirst and longing

as the Sultan’s three wives did last year. Found in their Mercedes,

the chauffeur at the wheel, how did they fail to return home

to Ágadez, retrace a landscape they’d always believed?

No cross-streets, no broken yellow lines; I feel relief at the abandonment

of my own geography. I know there’s no surveyor but want to imagine

the aerial map that will send me above flame trees, snaking

through knots of basalt. I’ll mark the exact site for a lean-to

where the wind and dust travel easily along my skin,

and I’m no longer satiated by the scent of gasoline. I’ll arrive there

out of balance, untaught; ready for something called home.)