Monday, June 19, 2017

Fearful Fall

Fearful Fall

Trepidations, palpitations

Streaming free fall

Clairvoyant consciousness

Carrying me down

Where hellish depth ends

Bottomless pits begin.

To the edge of fear

Where fright is naked before night

The darkness begins to foam and swirl

Smoky fetid demon breath.


I catch a break, some serial lifeguard god

Catches my fall for a heartbeat.

Desperation halts heartbeat.

I stall for time! Even the nightmare pauses

Its rerun reel. Grins. Begins.


The precipice yawns, its maws 

Reopens, ghastly recurring infinite loop,

Too late, screams echo down the spiral

Bottomless chasm open into unending chasms

The never ending loop of reliving all lives.


Indeterminate minutiae specks the in-between.

I turn searchlights on my soul, supra scanning 

For pellucid design. Senselessness is throwing an orgy

Party down the back end street where lamps flicker

And shop lights show ghost ships sailing nigh

Blinking bright halos of angels treading nightmares’

Unabridged waters.


I torch my seared eyes, tired x-rayed meatballs

Till the inevitable mired lighthouse turns its 

Gloating evil eye, revolving upon mine.

Mordor has many names

And Mordor, has multitudinous eyes.

Mordor is mosaic visioned

Mirrored million times.


I have been flash frozen

Flying in flagrante delicto

Into hell’s downward descent.

Now waiting, cowering in terror

Of some unavoidable hit list, where

My futile birth portends my death. 


For death dealing mercenaries

Blind visionaries piloting planes

And prophetic madmen, who utter death threats 

Issuing warrants and license

Pontius Pilates who wash their hands of blood

With an easy elegance, offer me up as kill

On first, last and limitless strikes.

No escape except the imminent present.

No future but as star of Methuselah

Older than our creation date. 


Watch on, warriors Gods of multitudinous arenas

Angels in arms, nightmare of Gods infamous permit, 

Our cohabitation in halls of abomination.

Lions lie with lambs, jackals prowl, where rabbits hide in snake holes.


Kill human reality

With such chilling dreams.

© Amrita Valan 2017
References to Mordor from JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings

Dark light

The Sun swings easy

On his chariot through 

the skies, sure and steadfast blessing, 

Provident light trickles through my skin, 

Seeps into my eyes, infiltrates brain cells, 

Burning bright.


Have you ever imagined God's burning bush?

Speaking to you, crooning songs of a universe?

White fire in the wind-borne mind, the Messiahs 

Drive through movie theatres in reverse.

There's no end to pain, there's always rain

There's always light, trailing dark robes of

Monad night.


Wonder why darkness is not a thing itself?

Why darkness is not mere absence of light?

It is what holds all light within itself,

Releasing Nihil into the mighty night.

Black is not a colour, nor monochrome,

But the entire palette suppressed.

White fire is liberation of infinite spectrums,

Every unforgettable joy and impossible regret.


The Sun won't hide its quantum drive

Its energy drives and rides our solarium,

An invitation "Be alive! “Be golden white!”

A being radiant, gathered by darkness

In the end, then, to sultry darkness

The grace of brilliance lend.


© Amrita Valan 2017


Saturday, June 17, 2017

They Never Said...Goodbye, So Arrivederci


They Never Said… Goodbye, So Arrivederci


They never said farewell

Arrivederci always, till…

Please come back again.

My gold autumn leaves

Shake,

Twist a crisp sigh

And make it into a song,

A paean.


Your leisurely footfall,

Soft swish of her organza sari

rustles in the faraway hall.

My memory vault glitters,

Sunshine preserves of 

Tranquil limpid clarity.

I recall how we bumped

Noses under the table

Playing "chor-police"

Thief and Inspector

Such perfect accomplices 

In hide and seek of blazing

Life and all-consuming death.

Of those glorious meals

Where all hands helped

Make a joyous love offering.

Cook me some soul food 

Again.


Play that deserted harmonium

Desolate upon floor’s indifferent bier, 

Gathering dust of abandonment,

Under grandma’s dressing table.

Black and shapely ebony, varnished 

Brass handles. Gleaming dreams of

Yesterday.


I lust for the life forces

Forged by intimacy.

I turn the rusted wheels of time

Backwards again.


Unite our voices

One more time,

In a choir,

In a tribute,

In a moment.


Let us bring alive the nightingale's

Pensive longings,

That revives dateless ages,

Let us live in timelessness,

Set us free of mortal cages.


Faceless angels, beautiful spirits

Free forever now to roam worlds 

Unknown to Men...

Dreaming about 

Days of magic,

Names move my tongue

Inviolate potent spells,

Good luck charms,

Never say goodbye, 

Arrivederci my talismans,

We will meet again.


Utterance is a yearning,

A shuddering relief, till 

They return, 

Oh! Fulfil me again.


© Amrita Valan 2017


Thursday, June 15, 2017

Skin and bones

Skin and bone dolls

Flesh formed

Lie cold blue veined

Still life form.

We are alive is a wonder

When all life is

Acceleration towards endings

Each beginning is a fast track

Culminating in arrival.

Well, I wonder

How joy must be produced

Squeezed out forcefully

From the reluctant teats of life.

Which seems a purpose

Utterly futile,

If all we do,

Is move through time.


But my gaze hazes

Over the distance

I see little dolls scampering,

Scurrying about,

Anxious precious urgency.

Boredom is an art form,

Real life is not,

A movement through time

At all.

It's a movement through

Acts.

Each infinitesimal moment

Holding potential,

To do.


Doing is the passage

And passport

Actions adding up

To rich accumulation.

The numbers are endless

Without moderation

If we give it up,

Slow clap Time!

Like rich illusion,

And only perceive

Our movement

Through actions.

Joys rich enough

To squander

Time to be bought

And brought asunder.

There are no end times

For a life of action.

Even death shall become

A progression.

© Amrita Valan 2017


Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Lilac Cemetery

Weekly Challenge SLOP (Serious Lovers of Poetry)

 Lilac Cemetery 

Let me sleep tonight my beautiful
Topside down
While you recline quiet and still
Underneath the dirt
Velvet blanket in between
Your certain death
And my insipid life.

Velvet alluring lilac salute
To final sleep
How the mossy gloves come off
When we wade too deep
Six feet under the dirt my beautiful
While I warm your marble epitaph with my
lurid thoughts.

Silken and serene their fetid covering
Who knows what dreams beneath
Are breeding?
The sky high blue lies
Come crashing down on me.
Prettier than  lilac fields of memory.

Prettier than you
Dearer than all
Is my beautiful one
Locked up in her obdurate vault.


© Amrita Valan 2017


Like you always will

Like You Always Will, Remembering my Eighteenth Year 


Return tonight like you always will

Fellowships of a kind,

Eighteen years that bind

A girl into late womanhood

Wed the heart and mind.


No, I'm not blind, I see 

Where this is going

I know we're both

One of a kind.

And it never ends,


Like it always will, when 

The heart can't heal the mind.

Eighteenth year, rain leaves 

Behind some kind puddles

And some tawdry trash

Littered lots and empty thoughts.


The anniversaries of angels

With clipped wings.

I'm going dark side on you

Fair Adelaide no more,

Spruce up your magic wand

And summon me anew.


I have nothing left to give

I have nothing to forgive

Annihilate me, I'll self-destruct

It's all the same to me.

My children perhaps of a lesser

God

But human beings, they can be,

Angels embodied nigh, I trust 

They'll find their own kind.


When eighteen, I pray for them,

Fighters be, confidently keep counsel,

Keep it together, let them be. 

Don't be left stranded at crossroads

Branded by faux destiny.


Return to me again, so,

Like you always will,

Sweet melancholy music

You hurt me still.


© Amrita Valan 2017


Thursday, May 25, 2017

Double Jeopardy

Double Jeopardy 

Friday's Aphorism Prompt on SLOP

Fluttering eyelashes

Shrug off grief

Metallic cascades of glitter,

Mascara down sordid cheeks.

The sodden stuff of life

Weighing down the mind,

Heavy straws pulled,

Wrong choices,

Strong passions,

Avenues of double jeopardy.

There's no tracing back

The crazy garden path

Let me make the best of

The worst of it.

Pluck a crimson flower

Where my heart bleeds,

He loves me,

He loves me not.

Opaque future

That even Time

Has forgot.


Promises I will not miss

In my heart weighs heavy water,

Frothy blood splattered areoles

Hiding vacuums of unease.

Confidence faked, eyes slant up, reflecting

Sunshine, perfect decorum feigned,

Smile please.

© Amrita Valan 2017


Tuesday, May 23, 2017

A World That Is

A World That Is


The world on this

Hot summer evening

Is a searing bordello,

A nomad's land,

A war zone,

A slaughterhouse,

A field seeping tears,

Blood, bones rancid sweat,

Defeat and despair.


Far too many die in vain

To fulfil heinous, 

Murderous purpose.

The Government

Swats us flies for sport

Letting loose hellhounds,

Hackles raised on an

Unsuspecting populace.

It's all dumb charades

And masquerades,

It's all charnel houses,

Unholy massacres in fancy dress.

Dressed up in righteous garbs of

Liberators, on rescue missions from

Arcane arks, Jihad, KKK or IRA

Petty terrorism, corpses piled sky-high

For highest stakes.

In a world of fake, sponsored news

Death's fatal encounters are real,

The rest, prepaid or misled views. 

In the world of propaganda, smoke and 

Mirrors, the slaughter of innocents,

The children is real.

In a world of Crony capitalism,

Vote bank fostering, red herrings

The rape of women, their enslavement

Is  real.

Only the cause, only the realpolitik

Fabricated. Backroom deals. 

Unreal.

Fantastic claims, fabulous conspiracies

Clouded causes, deathly effects.

As the bodies lie scattered in dreaming comas,

I am more than afraid that their deaths

Have not really been, in vain, 

As tweeted, as proclaimed. 

In grave tragic tones, by eminent men.

Somewhere in a petty private caucus, a

Selfish cause served; a mercenary aim gained.

More truly wicked than you or I can imagine.

Higher up than you or I can contemplate

For some phantasmagorical mythic beasts

Deadly horsemen of the apocalypse,

Corpses are tumblers, logical numbers

Clicking us into slotted fates, 

Positions allotted, for their 

End game.

© Amrita Valan 2017




Monday, May 22, 2017

Mother

Mother


Mother is my first friend

My first love

My first guide

My first lady

She, who held my hand

To cross the street

Who made each meal,

every bedtime,

A gentle treat.


Mother

Is my frail soul now,

Trying to guide two sons,

To the right path,

The living brilliance,

Breathing radiance

That is life,

If lived truly

From the heart.


Mother is frail and

Her soul needs mine,

To sustain her strength

To live, to abide,

With pain and misery

That age and sickness brings.


I am sickened to my heart

That the relief she seeks,

The Gods with who she fervently pleads

Do not listen, hear, or heed. 

When she prostrates her head

To each deity, every idol, 

All the divine pictures mounted 

on the walls of her homestead.


I must be strong though tears come,

It was mother…

Who named me “Amrita.”

The indestructible one.

Ma, I bow my soul to be the arrow

On your heart string.

May God use me my mother, 

To alleviate your suffering.



© Amrita Valan 2017