Swing up, swing down,

Swing high, swing low!

From mango tree

Or guava tree branches,

The swing rope tautened

While the wooden seat steadied.

The legs kicked up

Into the clouds

And folded back

To pull into position

For the next kick.

Effervescent joy bubbled up

And echoes of raucous laughter

Carried back between swings

Up into the skies.

From the height,

The world could be seen,

From top to bottom, 

As if from bird’s-eye-view.

The air became thinner

At the high point

Of the trajectory

When the swing swung

Back and forth like a pendulum.

A child in infantile chortle

And a hard-bitten  yet jolly adult

Could both feel the abandon

Of tetherless freedom

And undescribed ecstasy.

All the cares of the world were shed

Until the swinging became slower,

Legs became weaker

Till they reached placid ground

And met with mundane realism.

When did grey clouds appear

Suddenly to blot out my sunshine?

The leaden sky loomed

Above my light-filled thoughts

And my gladness wavered

To fill me with morbid thoughts.

Why did my moods change

When images crowd in

To misshape my feelings,

To color my emotions,

And to play hide-and-seek

Through the portals of my mind?

My window panes, 

Often streaked with crystalline drops

Of yesterday’s rains,

Made me witness the changes

In the outside world

In perplex reactions.

And should I change too?

Why can’t  my rainbows 

Stay iridescent always

To make all my days

Sunny and bright?

Tears are not mere salty drops

Shed from bloodshot eyes.

They are squeezed out

From broken hearts

And lacerated lives.

Often unnoticed

And hidden from knowing eyes,

They go uncherished.

Yet, they are precious-

Priceless pearls pulsating

With every heart beat

Of living hearts.

They tell the tales

Of moments in life;

They tell the tales

Of excruciating poignancy.

I cannot ask;

I will not ask.

Denial mortified me!

I can only take

What is freely given.

I am not moss; 

I am not vine. 

I do not cling; 

I do not burden.

I am just me!

Winter stays reluctant to leave

 And spring waits in the shadows; 

The frozen grass is stubbornly stiff

And the sleeping buds refuse to open.

Regrets stay buried

Frozen under the ice

Hesitant to be taken out

To thaw and to correct.

What right do I have

To bury my regrets

To start a new life,

Pristine and unblemished?

In the avenue of dreams,

I sauntered, weaving my way,

Giving desires color

With my secret thoughts.

Days and years passed

And patience had its limits;

Yet, I added frills and whistles,

Etching with my own fingers.

Heart kept yearning;

Dreams kept growing.

Landscape extended;

Dreamscape expanded.

Among shimmering stars,

Dreams fan out like rockets

To wink out, in the sky,

One by one, in an ephemeral show.

But we are the dreamers; 

We do not forsake any,

But lasso in all of them

And see reality in our dreams!

Winter entered stealthily

When he left abruptly

And leached all colors 

From my todays and tomorrows

Leaving a landscape

Of white and black

And shades of gray.

The road ahead lay

In undulating patterns

Of slate and pewter grays

Of frozen and melted ice,

Scattered in swathes

The white of snow.

White trunks of birches,

Speckled with black,

Crowded on both sides

In geometric precision

Of perpendiculars

Curving away,

In a perspective drawing

Of charcoal and pencil,

To converge into

A darkening tunnel,

Into the unknown tomorrows.