After a very long time.

Untitled. (So far)

What I might write in a language, which is this-
Not:
Meaningful, authentic and pro-people
Is still mine.
Because I can tell you my truth,
The truth of praying at a Gurudwara
When kirtan (I see it has already failed me)
spills on to red, velvet carpets.
Or when the Ganga in Varanasi stinks of
The dead.
And yet flows with patience
Uncanny to rivers.

I will tell you some truth,
If not the whole truth,
About being a child, a girl,
A woman, a man
Who slept comfortably,
While city lights burned bright
Sometimes so bright,
They burnt cities,
But they did not wake us
From our unsteady slumber.

I can tell you the truth
About a people that are bitter
Because someone swept their history
Under the colossal rug of more terror
And I can tell you truthfully
That if you believe meaning is
What makes poetry and drama
And music,
Then I have an iota of meaning,
Maybe a whole universe of it.
Even if you cannot hear me,
You can.
Even if you cannot hear me,
You can.