I wish ...

I wish I had 400 nostrils
If I had a bad cold
I could still smell baked bread
From the local oven

I wish I had 400 ears
So that the sea breeze
Could whoosh through them
From one ear
To the next

I wish I had 400 pairs of hands
One pair to wash my bums
Everyday
A fresh pair of hands

My lover
Who hears me,
Sighs
She seeks 400 days of silence

Dr N and Dr B's pet

A dog
Has made my swing
His home

It is thin
And resembles a fox
That's why we call him, foxy

I feed him milk from a saucepan
Sometimes popcorn
Sometimes mango cheese cake

It tries to play with me
But weariness takes over

Eyes shut
In the middle of the summer heat

He listens to my scratched record
Of Monteverdi
And moves its tail in slow harmony

One way to live

Before falling asleep
He sipped his rum with warm water
Switched on the music player

What would it be?
Verdi's Requiem?
Handel's Messiah?
Or just a good shag?

This was his way
To purify the brain
Of the thrash
It put up with during the day

Her life was a simple statistic

Her life was a simple statistic
Rs 750 for a single session
Rs 600 for the regulars
Rs 500 for oral
No twosomes, no threesomes

Life was uncomplicated

She sought solace in prayers
Every Tuesday
For which she walked miles
In chaste clothes
Barefoot
After swigging a bottle of whiskey
Along with tandoori chicken

To muster courage
In order to say sorry
To her god

Best Gizmo of the Decade Award goes to ...

The greatest technology
On this planet
Has been invented by the Maldhari community
Who created the virda
Shallow wells
In the Thar Desert
That store rain-water
Separating potable drinking water from salt water

The drummer

A man
With no special talent
Loves to drum his ancestral drum

He drums all the time
Always, he is drumming

While breathing
While eating
While sweeping the streets
With a broom
While sleeping
While dreaming (which he rarely does)

He drums
His ancient drum

One day
Under the full moon
He bathes
He sees a pretty girl with mogra in her pig-tails
He falls in love
She is everything

Secretly
Their eyes meet
Till the meetings multiply

She can't drum
Man trains her
He tries
She tries
And tries
And cries

One day she runs away
From his drum beats
It is too noisy
Her parents say: it tarnishes the family reputation
Her neighbours say: it is diabolical

Man is distraught
He sits beside the river
He sweeps
He weeps

He decides to forsake his drum
He throws the ancestral drum into the river

Life plods on

A new day
Many months
Perhaps years

Man is lonely
Very very lonely
He is old
Very very old
He has swept the street
He is tired
Very very tired

He sits on the bank
To wash his feet in the river water
He sees a fish
Many many fishes

The fishes see him
One smiles
All smile
He plays with one, he plays with all
He is happy
His heart beats

Is it really his heart beat?
No

It's a drum beat
It's many drums that beat
The drums beat, together

The man looks

The fishes are drumming
The fishes are dancing
The fishes invite him
He jumps into the water

And drums happily ever after

Three shorts

1.
When my mother
Went to school
She was the only girl student

Mother carried her books, slate, drinking water
Plus her own jute sack
With which she could sit on the cold floor
With dignity



2.
He
Was the richest man
In the world
And he was very very happy

So happy
That he had forgotten
How to cry



3.
The baby wiped her mouth
And hungrily asked her mother
Why does daddy have nipples
If I cannot suckle milk from them