Ammamma

Post ruby reds and crushing pain

Born like countless, countlessly over and again

While most today glorify the possibility

Unlike yesteryears when it meant a chance

When the sun hit noon that fateful day

She had cooked and cleaned and fed the many

And in her room she bore mom

Only to rest a while and carry on all over again

By the sum of her actions she is flawed

She remains my symbol of resilience

Mired in helplessness and hopelessness

She still taught mom to teach me to walk

Unlike most I know, Mom has never glorified

Of being a mom, or how her biology is great

She taught me to value a fallen leaf

That shall feed the seed to spring new greens

An estranged devaki of sorts 

Ammamma was Yashoda

Yet I am no Krishna, nor a shade of him

Yet they stood like mountains, 

Steeling my resolve, easing my pain

Taught me to teach, taught me to see

Kept me alive, kept me sane

Chakka Sambar

The sambar is ready, Chakka sambar

And Raju loves it no other way

Dosas or rice, not idlis for sure

And his heart melts and remembers it

Ammama's hand making it

My amma has tried, my baiko has tried

And I have roamed the countryside

Yet the essence of Ammama's Chakka sambar

Retains it prime position forever and on

Lotus root, mutton liver, pizza,

 tambda and pandhra rassa

Kokam kadi, rasam, seared seer fish

Squid rings, prawns, crabs, not chicken

Nothing seems to compensate

It's her perfect blend of parippus and puli

And gently cooked chakka slices

Maybe its her hand, at this point who knows

For she seems to be the only key

After 3 PM from Holy Family

When Joseph uncle would let me alight

Into the waiting arms of my ammamma

She would tell me, Raju vegam Vaa, Samabar indakitund.

Ammamma was the magic of life

She was the magic of Sambar,

Chakka Sambar

When it rains, It pours woe

Auburn hills, splitter splatter

Midst of greens, and running water

Washing the woe, so gently yet

By the cliffs, drenching the hawk's nest

Eroding the forever stones

Only to remind them, to be forever gone

Once the stream was done with them

A few thousand years, at most

I shiver as the drench hits my spine

As my kurti sticks to me, while the wind howls

It is Khandala, mid July, everywhere is, mid July

Now those days have long faded

For long my heart's grief has masqueraded

Only to be eroded, to despair, and rue

While I find no meanings in hills and boughs

Where was I, when I was to be me

Maybe I was too much in control of grief

As this cold rain hits my resentful face

I have nothing to show it, only my solemn solitude

And it's hopeless embrace.

Gems in the light, or lack thereof of either

What are rubies and sapphires?

Only gemstones, plain corundum

Slathered on sheets or stones with epoxy

Grinding metals and cutting and polishing.

One may question their value

Clear versus coarse to opaque

Some made in fire, others born of it

Some in graphite blocks, others in mud

Yet they are the same

To me they are just corundum

Like most, mediocrity bound fools

Trying to hold value in their errands as tools

Pity, ah yes, Pity 

That I do not possess for such insolent 

In their wake, they are only gravel

In the absence of light, and there is so much.

Turbid Murkiness of Life

At neoprene's behest, unbeknownst to sanity

I let the asphalt rub, mightily, uncalled for

At the ditch, post the lamps, broken posts

I found me tumbled, amongst the tumbleweed

Soberiety arrives, waits a few hours, leaves

In it I earn, yearn to forget, what I do to

Post ball and chain, it is back, me, my insanity

Instantly, drunken dancing, driving

Crashing into woods, words, worlds, wants

Always clashing, there is no remorse

Then

Soberiety arrives, waits a few hours, leaves

In it I earn, yearn to forget, what I do to