Profusely perspiring rapidly blinking, at that outdoor delicatessen by the backdrop of cemetery, his back to one headstone, between flowered vases, Mister facing Miss sits.
Speaking thoughts stealing glances, half as much anxious and isn’t half showing but for her hypersensitive olfaction, Miss attends that call and half hushedly speaks.
‘Dear, I’d rather he’s embalmed’
by Ahimaaz of Hyderabad
A heart shaped
white cloud
slowly turns red.
A zooming black bird
pierces through it.
A love story--
beginning or end?
by K. Balachandran of Thiruvananthapuram
Staying back after sunset is prohibited in this ruined ancient city. The place is cursed, they say. Haunted. The winds here are fraught with tona.
It’s a gimmick, of course, to draw tourists. There was nothing special about this place. Nothing out of ordinary.
Except the monkeys and the langurs of Bhangarh, who have been sitting together under a large banyan tree all day, as if spellbound.
by Mohit Parikh of Jaipur
by Vineet 'the Troubadour' Kaul of Ahmedabad
High tech city grows,
trampling the green fields.
A farmer with hand made locks
tries to sell me one.
I say, No, and see
a sadness without words.
by K. Balachandran of Thiruvananthapuram
A lady dying from cancer, learning Hindi to throw her last moments in a cultivated passion.
Deviations of hard work are potent, but do they reduce fear? What use is Hindi in the face of death?
She talks about how ‘Dhoop Khana’, or eating the sun, in Hindi means sun-bathing. She notes the alphabet's beauty, chuckles in the novelty of its pronunciation.
Is life different with Hindi? Is it more poetic?
by Tanuj Solanki of Bombay
The carotid burst; blood mixed in haste with the soapy water. Charlotte was standing by the window, defiant, stunned. Then it came, death, and the itch went away forever.
"A moi, ma chere amie!"
The dagger in his chest rose and fell one last time.
She smiled cruelly. So did history, for the idea that Marat's scabbed and stabbed bust could replace crucifixes, that death could turn him into a God, escaped her.
by Tanuj Solanki of Bombay
The zhag-zhuk of the helicopter sounds. I get up. I start running under it, chasing it. What is left of the village runs with me. Fatima too. I am glad she survived. I look up again. I stumble. We stumble. We run. We cry out to the Americans, as if they can hear us. Ashfaq has tears in his eyes. They fall to the sodden ground. Is he looking above for his drowned children?
Then, two bags of rice fall. Just two.
by Tanuj Solanki of Bombay
and I turned.
All I had was a yellowed
vision, vivid;
like a desert
captured at noon
with a single black tree
at its center,
it blinked--
by Shriram Sivaramakrishnan of Chennai
don't call me names Form said, undulating
strip me, make me whole
Place asked where?
here...now...now moaned Time
the depths climaxed
to become I
by Shashidhar
of Thissur
