Secret stories

When I longed to hear your untold stories,

You preferred to maintain silence.

And when life unfolded its secrets

I had no other choice but to remain silent.

रिश्ते

गुलज़ार साहिब ने कहा है 'हाथ छूटे भी तो रिश्ते नहीं छूटा करते'.
पर उन रिश्तों का क्या जो हाथ थामने से पहले ही छूट जाते हैं ?
उनका क्या जहाँ थामे हाथ बेड़ियों से प्रतीत होते हैं?
और शायद कुछ  रिश्ते ऐसे भी होते हैं जो कभी हाथों के मोहताज नहीं होते.

Sharing

There is no dearth of those who can give us a listening ear,

It is just that we need to be ready to share with them.

Yesterday I discovered two of them, ‘myself’ and my ‘laptop’.

Sharing helps a lot.

......थमी है ज़िन्दगी

यूं बन्जर मरुस्थल सी थमी है ज़िन्दगी


न कोई राह नज़र आती, न किसी मंजिल का निशाँ

न इस अन्धकार से है प्यार, न उस उजाले का इंतज़ार

न पतझड़ की पीड़ा है सताती, न सावन की फुहारें ही सुहाती

बेटुक, मौन, बस आसमान को ताकती ये ज़िन्दगी.

यूं बन्जर मरुस्थल सी थमी है ज़िन्दगी........बस थमी है ज़िन्दगी

So I know now

The wind is still hot here
But I know now,
No soothing breeze can sweep me off to another world.

The moonlit rainy night

What a night it was,
The rain came at a time
when I started enjoying my walk under the moonlit sky,
and before I could express my desire to get drenched ceaselessly,
the moon brought me back to reality.
Back to my own stories, to my own world.

वो शब्द और वो लम्हे

हर शब्द को अपना बना कर संजोया था मैंने
हर लम्हे को सपना बना कर पिरोया था मैंने.
मोतियों की माला यों टूट कर बिखरी
न कोई सपना रहा और न ही कोई अपना  

Another story

small pond,
frog's eyes moving with clouds
another story

Ego

Those harsh words
came in a soothing tone.
You noticed my ego

Insecurity

Read some name
marked in the list,
Insecurity leads to guilt

Listen........

When I will have nothing to talk about,
and no stories to share,
Will you be ready to listen to the silence.

Here I am

I am running away as
I am scared to share my words with you.
I am afraid to tell that I always longed for those listening ears.

I am running away as
I am scared of turning the fond memories into blots and scars.
I am afraid I still think of the bygone days.

I am running away as
I am scared to answer the thousand inquisitive eyes.
I am afraid I still want your pretense to remain invisible.

I am running away as
I am scared to spell out the long persisting anguish.
I am afraid I still don’t want to shatter your ego.

So here I am,

Moving away in search of a place
Where there won’t be any space for my fears
I will no more be running away and
My words will no long halt at the tip of my tongue.

The Inconvinient wall

Thus it was named as the inconvenient wall.
The wall of my ‘discomforts’ and your ‘desires,’
My ‘own meanings’ and your ‘perceptions’
My ‘conditions’ and your ‘conditioning’.
I wonder if it is truly a wall or
The sole search for our own spaces.

Love and Eternity

Tree asked the little bird to go to sleep
As it feared that the bird might fly away...
never to come back again.
But the little bird said,
‘My dear tree, forget sleep, I won’t even close my eyes,
for I can’t afford to lose sight of you...
not even for fraction of a second.’

Again in the Silence

Again in the silence,
I am looking for solitude,
And what are you looking for?
I am sure you are waiting for the truth to be uttered,
The truth behind long persisting silence.