3. I am afraid of thunder
Sesame oil is the essence.
Although the ignorant know that it is in the sesame seed,
They do not understand the way, effect, and becoming.
- Chogyam Trungpa
For long while a smile is coming to me
like the butterfly
it flutters to lips
but I am still afraid of thunder
What will happen when thunder
awakens me?
The pathways are disappearing
and in the undergrowth, shadows of Pipal trees
there’s a thousands deaths waiting
on every branch
never a nightingale!
Oh, shall I clap my hands
and see how they scatter away my fear?
Fly away, come away with the sound
of the clap of my hands!
I am the vulture preying on the bird
of love
I am dipping my fingers into its broken feathers
searching for vermin to scatter them
into the holes of snakes
Oh look at you, a half broken branch
about to fall!
You are an illusion in my hallucination
- but I knew this for a long time now -
you are selfless selfishness!
I have learned that from your company
I have discovered how you are my myth
I cannot leave you
Because your love is sweet honey
on my lips
your nectar, the nectar
dripping into my neck
its from the lotus
it comes from Udaipur
oh do not leave me!
The pen on my desk
its inscriptions and strokes
I will not write!
Just shelter me and hide me
in the eye of a needle
in the threads of things I have left alone
***
4. Amberiod flower
The birds warble their glad songs.
Spring blossoms in the treetops.
- Louis Nordstrom.
A long time ago, I
but then my amberoid flowers
oh my sari
it was the fragrance I send you
through the cracks in the walls
hoping to cover
the distance towards you
***
5. You are mehandi, the henna of Full Moon's Day
How much more so when perpetually diseased
By the manifold evils of desire?
- Shantideva
I have discovered my feet
and after walking almost half of the way
to where you are
Oh what is that strange!
And now on the road to red lotuses
where my heels had treaded
there are blossoms between my toes
red Valentine for good luck!
I adore my feet
they have faces
What is this, your fingers
are you stroking
touching
feeling my faces?
My dost lovely friend
you are mehandi, the henna
to decorate my feet
I draw flowers for you on my feet.
Vasant spring is already here!
the sun is shining
take off your sweater, my love!
shishir is when ice fall from the heavens
greeshm summer is green
and on my shoulders
I am ready for running
just put a finger tip on a toe
and write your name onto it
my journey is flashing pink
more red than ever
- my journey towards you
***
6. Tickle and dance
The trees and also the great woods
All are made splendid in the 10 directions
– Edward Conze
This is not a river, so it doesn’t need
the mountain to shoulder against
it is a lake! The sweet Lake Udaipur!
The honey lake in the lap of the marusthal desert
it’s kokh womb never gets dry
it never goes from here to menopause
no, no my dost lover! My lover!
You can’t lit the pyre with or on it
neither on my sari pallu’s end
that’s reserved for my children
to play on
to tickle me on
- hear them laughing and dancing
Look! Oh look! I am not dried up water reservoir
I am the lake, my womb is the water
This world is inside me!
***
7 -Cuppan chuppi- Hide-and-seek
In the sea of my mind the words as waves have risen
In recollection of the Great Queen
- Chockyam Trungpa
Lake! O dear Lake! Play Cuppan chuppi
hide-and-seek with me!
I turn and run away from Udaipur
I hide myself behind a coconut tree
Where is that girl?
where she is?
where is my playmate?
oh this is—chooooooo!
Time passes by, days.
I have forgotten to show myself, forgotten it!
like I have forgotton the way in which I
had come to you first
my dear lake! My dear lake!
you changed your sari’s colour!
You wear no veil!
Why is there a teardrop in your eye?
Is it because of me?
Where is that girl?
where she is?
where is my playmate?
oh this is—chooooooo!
Will they come look for me?
I am sitting in the shrub of thorns
***
8. Hands on shoulders
I go to Kasi’s city now
To set the wheel of law in motion
– Bhikku Nanamoli
Rivers run and can meet each other
but sakhiyan friends never meet again in life
after their marriages, when they have left
with their love ones
they never come back
Come, put your hand on my shoulder
I’ll keep mine on yours.
Come let us gossip, that neighbouring girl
she fell in love
between the earthen walls
separating the fields
let us weave the thread of gossip
as long as the threads of memories