Uncut Poetry

Hale, Fall & Spring (of you & I)

Sat, 13 Jun 2026 20:00:00 +0500

I love this poem because it condenses the thoughts which partners who separate from each other might have of the other. It's subtle, often the first flush of love, often the first separation. When you know the highs of love, but have not known how the valleys are to be navigated: and you think the first bump, the first infraction, a fight, a being-away-from-one's-sight could actually be enough cause for anything-to-happen. We are in a tumult of love and have not reached its calm yet. And every ripple on its surface makes us question its depth. That's why it often takes years of togetherness and a multitude of experiences for people to figure out the truth of their relationships. I will never forget the film where a happy family is holidaying in the Alps, and then there is an avalanche, the man runs away rapidly without thought of his wife or kids. I think even more then the wife it was the husband who surprised himself with his action. Because the truth is - as always - when things happen, it reveals more about us as individuals than of the state of our union. If it always has been a facade, a relationship is bound to collapse under its weight. If it's a mutual revelation, it's time for reflection (of course), but also reexamination, recalibration, redemption or / and repentance. It's ironical that a couple which is together for eternity often finds is bonds brittle enough to not even withstand the most basic onslaught on its foundation. What ensues - whatever form it might take - is not a tragedy but a realization. Depths then are discovered as profundity or merely as depthless crevasses. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the progression of love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Cinematic Angelical Upbeat Ambient by Musiclfiles Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Cinematic-angelical-upbeat-ambient Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Walking into the Morning's Wisdom

Sat, 06 Jun 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Summers in Kolkata slide rather than blister, which is what happens when I visit Jhunjhunu. Both are experiences. There's no hiding place here because the humidity is omnipresent - but a shaded tree is enough to save you from the dry heat in Rajasthan. And then I go to a Delhi - where nothing can save you except an airconditioned room, because what does not melt you burns you down. There's very little that's romantic about an Indian summer, except for a strange immersion. Much more than an attitude of mind-over-matter, it is an alignment which can save you - of deciding not to escape but just to be one with what the universe offers. It's surprising how quickly our bodies can get distracted from discomfort. The important thing is to be alone in this battle inside, so we are not influenced by the opinions and incessant cribbing of others. And since this seeps into other things, I'm very careful about whom I go out for all experiences. Then I have the luxury of my flawed reactions - to let my emotions flow untouched by anything other than my own proclivities and prejudices. I cannot overstate the pleasure of letting a morning sweep over us with all its intimations of fresh possibilities. Possibly nothing has changed in life's continuum, but there is still an incredible sense of renewal which can only sweep over us if we are alone with our feelings, untouched by anybody else's aura. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the magic of mornings -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - This World (Instrumental) by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/this-world-instrumental Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay - Let Me Sit Beside You Quietly

Sat, 30 May 2026 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. A colleague committed suicide today. 7 am. He woke up early, took a bath, did his pujo, and then hung himself from a fan. His wife discovered him when she didn't see him in the pujo ghar. I'd met him the day before getting into office, and asked him how he was doing. He was cheerful. I asked him to drop by for a cup of coffee. Another colleague did two meetings with him. Another one said good bye to him at 7 in the evening. Just another ordinary day. Last year his wife had come to me with their son and talked of how there was something which had snapped inside him. He wanted to resign. There was immense pressure, and he had an unsympathetic and cruel boss, who went unrelentingly after him. It was often ugly. And the pressure was getting to him. And he was doing frightened office-talk even in his sleep. I and my HR colleague got him aligned with a good psychiatrist. And in a few months, he was as near normal as possible. Till today. Do we all have breaking points? However strong we might think we are. That point where our heart breaks and our mind splits. And a strange duality emerges, of moving ordinarily in an ordinary life, but carrying a soul in turmoil. Didn't he have anybody he could talk to - with full vulnerability, unfettered by judgement? What was that last thought, before he took that decisive step? Didn't he think of the wreckage he would leave behind? Is suicide then, intrinsically, a sad amalgam of despair and selfishness? But more than anything, I'm angry at bosses who let go without constraint on hapless subordinates, without the sensitivity of the overwhelming effect their position has on those whose livelihood depends on them. I only wish I had stopped for that coffee when I'd met him. Maybe he would have opened up. Maybe things would have been different. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on ways of dying -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Lonesome by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Lonesome Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Home Which is You

Sat, 23 May 2026 20:00:00 +0500

A home is a person. I think I realized this a long time back. I loved all the homes I've stayed with my parents. Every time my dad changed jobs, and consequently cities and homes. And then in his final assignment in pristine Tribeni, on the outskirts of Calcutta, he kept getting promotions and we kept changing homes. The last one was a colonial bungalow with an acre worth of gardens, and a view from the terrace of the river. It faced west, and I've witnessed the best sunsets of the world while tucked into a comfortable wicker chair, a cuppa tea in my hand, just watching the skies change colours through a thousand shades in front of my eyes. My mum has innate artistry, and in her heydays kept our homes immaculately appointed. The art and artifacts she'd picked up from her travels was displayed with an innante sense of aesthetics. Everything was squeaky clean and there was hell to pay if anything was found askew or a smite missed whilst dusting. And then I visited homes of some of my best friends. Messy, stuff thrown all over randomly, kitschy stuff fighting for attention with expensive mantelpieces, odours wafting from the kitchen. We could loll on the sofa, run in the drawing room and use any chair as wickets for an indoor match of cricket. And nobody cared when the balls hit frames and marks were left on the wall. This was lived-in, this was fun, and very quickly became the final definition for me of a home! I could sense the strange dichotomy I could not understand at a subliminal level. I was too young. So I spoke to my mum about it. How it was such fun being in that auburn disheveled house, and I could be 'myself', whatever that meant at that age. And in our house, there were so many rules - everything was restricted - running, throwing, jumping, shouting. She was silent for a bit, and then smiled and said. "Done. Go ahead. Do whatever you feel like. No issues." And gave me a hug. I was ultra-excited and invited all my friends home for the next raucous bout of indoor cricket. My friend entered the drawing room where I had shifted the sofa sets and the center table to create the 'pitch'. He looked around with his mouth open, in absolute awe, and then said something which turned everything upside down in my head. "Dekh, tera ghar mandir hai. Yahan baith kar shanti milti hai. Khelne ki doosri jagah hai na, mera ghar hai na. Yahan baith ke kitna acha lagta hai." ("Hey listen, your home is a temple. There is so much serenity here. There are other places to play, why play here? Let's sit down, I just feel doing that.") And I understood. Homes were people, their personalities, their beings, their inner selves finding expression on the walls, the decor, the sheets, the furniture, the conduct. And that was the day I learnt to immerse myself in all the homes I visited. Because the people I loved were as much their homes as they were the people I dearly loved. They were inseparable. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the places we find homes -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - A Sad Toy Story by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/a-sad-toy-story Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Naked, My Love

Sat, 16 May 2026 20:00:00 +0500

We complicate relationships because we deny simplicity or simple ways of loving or - maybe - the simple solutions to complex things. Every relationship starts with a clean slate. Pure, unencumbered. Then it gets layered. One incident at a time, one feeling expressed at a time, and often (more vitally), one feeling unexpressed at a time. And the grooves get cut and get deeper, sharper, as the unresolved creates acid and bile and sarcasm and anger. Love doesn't disappear, it gets buried deeper and deeper into crevasses which can't be seen, brought out when needed, indeed, often forgotten but embedded as bitter nature. The tragedy is not that it happenes. We are humans. We have mind-fades, we are fools, we have unreasonable expectations. That is our charm and our curse. We never see a good thing for what it is, we take what is good for granted, we mess up, big time. Unfortunately realization is slow, redemption is complex. Until it is not. We stop making statements and start asking questions. We stop having expectations, and see the beauty of what exists. We stop comparing and fall in love again with what we had fallen in love with in the first place. And we allow each other to grow into our inner beauty - by making it easy and pellucid and non-judgemental. We begin by believing that the worst he does is not personal. We begin by realizing that you are not the center of his very existence, and neither is he of yours. You are moon and the Venus - maybe Neptune also - but definitely not the solar system. Because we have needs beyond each other - she could have a travel best friend, he could have a coffee best friend, another who he loves gossiping with, another with whom he discusses office politics. That's why we are in this world, that's why we have the bounty of so many people in our lives. They all add something and make us complete and fulfilled and beautiful. Neither of us has the right to deny that freedom to the other. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on relationships and how we navigate them -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - This world instrumental by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/this-world-instrumental Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

This light like love

Sat, 09 May 2026 20:00:00 +0500

To awaken every morning is to reward oneself. The day is desperate for us to discover it, to unravel its mysteries and find its surprises. We do not have to fly or be special. We merely need to be excited. Then we can see birds with new eyes, and feel the air on our skin. We can sit quietly, sip a cup, gaze out of the window, and know this is what it is to be alive. An ordinary life. Many things could happen, maybe nothing. We might go to office, a normal walk in the park, or spend time with a friend. Or maybe fall in love. It could all happen just now. All this in one mere life. To see the universe in the very fact of our own day. To know that things pass even as they happen. To know we can be anybody, anywhere, anytime, and find ourselves to be sundrop and stardust and moonglow. All in one solitary life of breaths. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how life is richer if it is slowed down-

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Motivational soft piano meets cello by Horst Hoffman Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/motivational-soft-piano-meets-cello Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Before Beauty Takes Its Toll

Sat, 02 May 2026 20:00:00 +0500

There's so much in this world to be unhappy about. The reasons are endless. And we can fallow in the silky self-indulgence of not being in control and letting circumstances take their toll on us. It's an irony of humankind that in the positioning of action and result, we bring in destiny as a critical component, and instead of letting it be a possible catalyst, we seek to substitute action with it. By further combining it with religious suppositions, we give laziness an exalted position. And lose out on life. We face life with slumped shoulders - and a severe indulgence in self-pity. We go to temples to first cajole god, then bribe the poor unsuspecting deity, and finally to confront and demand. We seek to find happiness as if it's a commodity waiting to be excavated and distributed - as if it is in short supply hence rationed by celestial diktat. In all these years if I have learnt anything it is the simple challenge which life throws at each one of us - to use it to the hilt, to challenge it, to confront it, to squeeze it of its last giving life-affirming juice. We are the stewards and guardians of our own destiny. Only after we've done our work does the magic of any stardust - which we often mistake as god's indulgence - falls on us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the trajectories life takes -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Last Breath at Dusk by Sunil B Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/last -breath-at-dusk Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Poem as a Gift for a Girl With No Confidence in Herself

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Don't we all know people who are gold - talented, beautiful, attractive - but who deep inside are uncertain about themselves. They doubt their abilities, and for ever (and ever) they look at every decision they take with trepidation, and consider themselves inadequate. And nothing one says to them, nothing, convinces them that they are talented and just fine the way they are. Until something magical happens. Maybe a poem, maybe a person with insight, maybe a sentence, maybe a song, an art piece - anything which splits something open inside them, and lets out the feelings lying prisoner. They are able to again look at the mirror and see themselves afresh, not with disgust or inadequacy, but as someone just right, just right to fit into the skin they inhabit, gorgeous because they are flawed, and happy to be who they are. Is this transformation easy? No. Will it happen in a jiffy? Possibly not. But when the touch of alchemy comes by, in whatever form, and whatever length of time it might take, it could transform the person. And then it is a resurrection, a rekindling, a reawakening. And the gold always discernible to others, is the person they recognize as themselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how we blossom into the person we truly are -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Oil by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/oil Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Closer to Death. Nearer to God.

Sat, 18 Apr 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Haruki Murakami said "Death is not the opposite of life but a part of it." Loss is an inevitable part of life. It could be the loss of a pet, the end of a relationship or loss of a loved one, the loss of a friend, the loss of a child, the loss of a parent or even our health. No matter the kind of loss, it is never easy. It leaves a yawning crevasse inside our soul. Even if we recover, it's an unfilled pause to our life, a hiatus which often remains one. At such times, to have someone beside us, someone who does not bring words, but just presence, a hardened softness, cool as breeze, with a depth that is not gravitas but air, someone who tells us that all relationships are sand, and finally sand in the wind. As Rob Liano said - "The sorrow we feel when we lose a loved one is the price we pay to have had them in our lives.” If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on death and the ways we move on -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Way to Kataka by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/the-way-to-kataka Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Marriage Made Me a Philosopher

Sat, 11 Apr 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Marriage: it was the end of all illusions and the beginning of philosophy: marriage was a lesson in impermanence - not an idea, a daily unfolding. To remain calm in storms not of my making. Dinner is late. Plans change. Cushions are moved. I nod, smile, adapt. an ardent disciple of Aurelius. Closet space shrinks mysteriously. my belongings become philosophical concepts. Arguments teach a truth: words are insufficient. “Where do you want to eat?” “Anywhere.” (Anywhere is wrong.) And I discover the absurd as Camus sighs in his grave. I broach the thesis: “Let’s watch a movie.” I receive the antithesis: “Let’s talk.” And confront the synthesis: talk about why no movie is being watched. “What did I do wrong?” “I don’t know.” But something is wrong. And thus begins a lifelong inquiry into metaphysics - what can truly be known? I examine questions of existentialism: what gives life meaning? Choice? Duty? Love? I lay in bed, see the fan whirl, and ask - what is love, bereft of drama? what is self, when it must bend? what is happiness, when it must be shared? What, indeed, is life, when it seeks surrender, but masquerades as gift. Essay: I sometimes feel that a philosopher dissects the deeper meanings of life, only to figure out that it is meaningless. And invariably, it has to do with human interaction, thought, foibles, decisions, reactions. And within the rigour of its investigation and compulsions is the real time change which humans wrought on each other. Marriage is the ultimate test of change and resilience. Crafted inside the crucible of love, it continuously tests the human power to forbear, resist, surrender and claim victory in survival. A less cynical view would view the wedded journey as a partnership which keeps on recalibrating itself until it hits a rhythm and a seamless marching cadence. In actuality it is a flawed construct, with a societal burden of "till death do us part". Which of course provides a longevity to breeding, rearing and mutual survival, but comes up wanting in providing universal succour. We are complex creatures. Feeling, hurt, chemistry, comfort, vulnerability, ego, belief, residual memory, remembrance, all swirl inside us like a Milky Way seeking their pre-eminence. And invariably coming up short when sought singularly. Luckily we are social creatures , necessarily living in a world which won't exist if not for cohabitation and coexistence. Thus ironically, the most successful marriages are the ones which recognise this need and build an ecosystem of relationships rather than one rooted in ownership, bound in jealousy, and closeted in insecurity. And just this musing is what makes a simple man transition into philosophy. Unknowingly, a man walks into marriage a simple human being and walks out wiser. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on marriage and its consequences -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rising Sun by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/rising-sun Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Long Now of Us

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 20:00:00 +0500

I sometimes feel we would be better people if we were slaves to love. Not to work for it, not to fantasize about it, not try to record of its wonder - but just to ease into its trust and surrender. Because the secret of love's power is not its ability to sway but its strength to render vulnerability as an essential ingredient. It's contrarian in concept - showing your weakness to strengthen your relationship - but that is how love gifts nesting space. We are allowed to show our worst, safe in the belief that we will be accepted, advised, admonished but adored. And in that paradox lies the crux of our ability to survive the worst of what life invariably throws at us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the beautiful paradoxes of love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - About Moments by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/about-moments Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Child Mulling on Life Beside the Sea

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 20:00:00 +0500

The whole process of growing up has an inevitability- and a tragedy - attached to it. A child grows up believing - trusting everything and everyone. An innocence which is endearing - and often encouraged, possibly because of it's anachronism and the fact that an atavistic urge inside us reaches out to something which makes us remember days when we were less cynical, less pessimistic, less prone to mistrust. But how fast realities catch up. Our desire, nay, our encouragements for children to grow up to be 'good' human beings, bumps into reality checks. The advice is then tempered with small counsel like - be practical, don't be an innocent, you have to look out for yourself because who else will. In a wildly confusing world, our children end up being human beings who are copycats of others- self absorbed, confused, unreconciled and ultimately neurotic. Innocence - moribund or ignored - seeks its own burial grounds. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the sea and what it does to you -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sea Waves Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/sea-waves Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Art of Living

Sat, 21 Mar 2026 20:00:00 +0500

I spent three days in Kochi, immersed in the art biennale. And wandering through the lanes, warehouses, waterways, and cafes of the city. The city was alive with art - representations of life, adn its anguish and joy. And hundreds of people from all over immersed in art, as something they now saw as they went to school or office.

I recorded small pieces as I viewed the art, and have put them up here, unedited.

They have the sound of the sea, the cadences of life as it passed even as its representation lay splattered in colour or metal in front of me. I loved doing this live recording of thoughts passing through my mind - sometimes shallow, sometimes deep. But all very me.

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sailing through the wide sea by Musiclfiles Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/sailing through the sea Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Memories of Peppermint Mocha

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 20:00:00 +0500

It's a startling thought, that someday sometime, there's that final time - and never again - when you will meet someone, hold someone, say that word, share that laughter. Then how do we know that it is not also the final time when we leave with a sharp word, a fight ending in tears, a time which leaves someone in despair, that final moment when the last memory is of pain given and anguish taken. Life's profundities are often written in the simplest ways - to be kind, grateful, to listen, to respond gently. Our last memory has to be the one which we can live with without guilt or pain. Then we can revisit everything which we loved about the one who has left us with gentleness, towards that memory, towards ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how time takes people away from us -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Falling Star by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/falling-star Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lunatics in Search of Peace

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Animals hunt to fill their stomachs. Humans do so for power and greed. And when they possess weapons of destruction, they think themselves to be invincible. It's easy to say it's primordial, part of the ancient blood running in our veins, but it's also civilizational. Of having - or not having - a spiritual foundation, a religion which teaches inclusion and diversity, and not harp on a supreme monotheism. The urge to convert, failing which to conquer, is the legacy of our flawed religious leaders, who were products of their time, and constructed manuals chocobloc with their fears, flaws and aneurysms of the times. And they forced humanity to see divine in the monstrous. And the moral underpinnings of every endeavour thus became vitiated and compromised. And when men gave into their basest inclinations to acquire and rule, to preen and show, all hell broke loose. Under the guise of righteousness, they found justification to bring destruction, mayhem, deaths. Alas, that is the legacy we will leave behind on this earth, which some day or the other we are bound to destroy - the proverbial cutting the branch on which we sit. Because with hubris comes the suicidal instinct, of so-called glory above all else, justification above logic, of allowing ourselves to be destroyed as collateral damage just to prove a point of our invincibility. A simple fact. There's never going to be peace on this earth. Men, religion and hubris will justify every vile crime done against humankind on this earth. Till we are all wiped off. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the miseries and damage of war -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Evacuation by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/evacuation Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Ironies of Love

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Words are all what we have, to conjoin or to distance each other, what can make the difference between making a bridge to cross differences, or to find dissonance to deepen chasms. Who are we if not the stray remark which hurt or the heartfelt apology which redeemed. Love finds its bedrock in the glad word: beyond the body pheromones is the reality of the feeling, the thought enunciated in ways which lays bare the truths of a person. We are known (and too often judged) by what we say, because that is what mirrors our innermost beings, because that is what gets people to recognize what we feel, what we think, what the truths of our being are. What else is there? How else can we tell someone we agree with them, that what we think is what is, that we can think the way we can think, that the depths in our beings is greater than what is ostensibly visible. That we like someone, that we sense a chemistry, that, yes, we may be in love. But love, ah. That can have its own language. Because so much of our relationship is not only what is said, but also how it is said. The innocuous remark with a particular tone, an expressionless declaration, a stray sentence, a throwaway statement, a simple reply laden with feeling. Yes. The language of expression and silence and adoration which comes out of a person's very being - in the eyes, in touch, in the presence and in the absence. How, only too often, in love, words fail, but even then the message gets conveyed. Because, sometimes - only sometimes - wordlessness is the most powerful language possible. Being in love does put paradoxes into perspective, and well. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the slow charm of love -

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It Takes Time for Love to Find Comfort

Sat, 21 Feb 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Relationships take time. Even 'love at first sight' is a construct only, finding immediate challenge in the crucible of real life. I know couples who have gone around for years, but find they scarcely know each other within the first week of married life. The interesting dynamic is the setup provided by love. It could work in two dynamically different directions. It could make you accept what really comes your way with generosity and a desire to work through the unexpected discoveries in a person. The other extreme would be the crashing of expectations, and understating that what-you-thought-&-what-you-got were such such incredibly different things - to be jettisoned immediately. Such does life give - and we choose to give away. We need to understand that ties are always brittle to begin with. There's trust to be built, there's vulnerability to be shown, there are defeats to be accepted along with victories which need to be celebrated. In our attempt to be what we've shown ourselves to be, we should not forget that impressions cut both ways - and truths are often more charming than cultivated lies. We WANT our partners to be mere mortals living and breathing heartbreak, distress, irrationality, madness, quirkiness, and everything else which makes us human. If within those realities, we are not accepted, maybe there is something else in store, someone else to grow with out there, who would enrich our lives in immeasurable ways. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how loves gives comfort -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Epic Intro 2017 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/epic-intro-2017 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Where We Start & Where We End

Sat, 14 Feb 2026 20:00:00 +0500

The charm and beguile of life is that it throws the unexpected with such unerring regularity. We start something with an intent. But the universe has other ideas. We strive for bliss in flight and fall in love with the grizzly earth. So much of what enriches our lives is the unexpected turn we took, the yes we said reluctantly, the adventure which emerges when we step out in the middle of a dull day. We merely want to seduce someone and we unexpectedly fall in love. We want to escape tedium and we find meaning. We enter with curiosity and leave with a cornucopia of riches. We are kind and make lifelong bonds. We wake up early with deep reluctance and find the most glorious sunrise of the year. So much of our life is the misadventure, the wrong turn, the searing confession, the moment of vulnerability. And the whole world opens up. All that is required is chutzpah, intent, the ability to look life in the eyes with brazen honesty and say "this is me, flawed yet beautiful, selfish but kind, always open, always learning, always ready." And the universe just whisks us away, into its limitless mysteries. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how love evolves in beautiful ways -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - When Life is Beautiful by Kalak Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/when-life-is-beautiful Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay - When Did You Say?

Sat, 07 Feb 2026 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it, Sometimes you just know. As someone once said "I knew you were the one, as soon you walked into the room. There was light coming out of your ass!" Frankly, more often then not, love has less drama associated to its arrival, because it is really a feeling which grows and found incrementally, one conversation at a time, one walk at a time, one infraction at a time. You know there's something happening inside you when there's an unexplainable feeling of excitement and queasiness and anticipation which starts to brew inside. Why queasy, I have often wondered. And the only answer I get is that you start feeling that you are losing control. And it makes you nervous, helpless. But it's a feeling you enjoy, giving into it is akin to some other power taking control of how you feel and act. The more irrational the act you see yourself do, the more you see yourself say things which you didn't know you were capable of saying, the more you realize you are in the power of something transcendental. Something which will now never leave you unscathed or unchanged. Love has made an entry. Life as you know it ceases to exist. Sometimes infinitesimally, sometimes significantly, you find yourself change. Even when the high fades, and love becomes a normal part of what you live with, there's a glow which never leaves you. Even as obsession tapers into normalcy, you know your life is forever touched with magic. The most significant change comes as you stop thinking in singular terms. Is it freedom curtailed, or life enchanted for its inclusion? If there's excitement inside thinking of experiences together, then you are on the way to a twosome. Plurality is only acceptable with its promise of shared experience if one does not consider sharing an encroachment or a loss of freedom. Because love is, in so many ways, an acceptance and an accumulation. It's the difference between being breathless and gasping for breath. In that thin line of differentiation, lies the richness of our choices and the changeability of everything we stand for in life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the progression of love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Angels by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Angels Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Sound of a Man Falling

Sat, 31 Jan 2026 20:00:00 +0500

I reach the summit. Not inch by inch—no, I arrive in a flood. Talent spills out of me. Love follows, tidal and unquestioning. Directors orbit me like obedient moons; they cannot imagine a world without my sound. I do not merely compose music—I alter its grammar. I am told I am a miracle. I begin to agree. This is where it breaks. Because admiration, once mistaken for destiny, hardens into entitlement. I begin to believe the applause is owed, not earned. That the place I clawed my way to is permanent, immune to time, taste, or doubt. I convince myself I can offer anything—anything at all—and the world must bow and call it genius. If it doesn’t, the fault lies with the world. They don’t understand music. They don’t understand me. Power arrives quietly. I let it. I summon directors and leave them waiting in the dark, hours stretching thin, just to feel my own gravity. I choose sacred backdrops for first meetings, mistaking symbolism for sanctity. I give indifferent music to a good film and dismiss its failure as “divisive,” because nothing I touch is allowed to be mediocre—only misunderstood. Lines I never meant to draw begin to appear everywhere. Faith, identity, difference—these become instruments too, played without care. When someone enters my home carrying another god, another grammar of devotion, the air tightens. Symbols are stripped, not violently, but casually. As if it is obvious, as if it is necessary. As if genius grants permission. My arrogance is no longer an accident. It is deliberate. Curated. Non-negotiable. I do not spare those who built me. The directors who trusted me when I was still a question mark. The collaborators who believed music was a conversation, not a sermon. One by one, they drift away—not in protest, but in fatigue. Projects thin out. Invitations dry up. And the music—ah, the music. It stumbles. It repeats itself. It loses hunger. But how would I know? I am sealed inside a fog of my own praise, a mausoleum of old triumphs. Self-awareness was buried years ago, quietly, without ceremony. So when the world starts turning elsewhere—towards younger, leaner, less reverential talent—I am stunned. Betrayed. How dare they move on from me? Then comes the mirror I choose because it flatters my wounds. The foreign interviewer. The sympathetic gaze. The easy narrative. I explain my fading relevance with a single, convenient sentence: it isn’t decline, it’s persecution. Not exhaustion, but exclusion. The industry, I say, is communal. I am being punished for who I am. I believe this because it costs me nothing. It asks nothing of my craft, my humility, my failures. And even when someone who has known me—who has admired me—looks at me and says, almost gently, almost in disbelief, “My god, I never even realised you were Muslim,” the truth still does not land. Because by then I am too deep inside my grievance to hear anything else. I mistake isolation for martyrdom. I retreat into the smallest room imaginable: the ghetto of my own frustration. Religion, the last refuge of the unimaginative and the cornered, becomes my alibi. What I do not see—what I may never see—is the scale of the loss. The hearts that once beat in time with my music and now feel nothing. The silence in concert halls where tickets were bought with devotion and abandoned with disappointment. The audience that did not turn hostile—they simply stopped coming. That is the true heartbreak. Not that I fell. But that I never understood why. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on failures & hypocrisies of people -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Relaxing Piano Improvisation by Alexander Nakarada Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/relaxing-piano-improvisation Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Lives of Others

Sat, 24 Jan 2026 20:00:00 +0500

We have to step out of our lives to see what is in the great beyond. Often just outside our gated communities are worlds we know nothing of, lives being lived in ways which we cannot conceive of. Rich, varied, textured, tumultuous. Often beautiful because they are unfiltered and often bleed; frightening because they are so raw. When we encounter these lives, these stories, we are aghast at their truths and trajectories. They are so rich in their lived-in textures that our own lives seem bland and empty. That's why I love talking to strangers. For their tales and their lives. Each person is a universe, a cornucopia of dreams and desires, often of unrelenting courage, often of failure, anguish and hope. We are woven together through our common place on earth. However much we might think ourselves as special, we are purveyors of the same resources, prisoners to the same gravities, trying to make our lives out of what we have been bequeathed, trying to make more out of what we've got. And when we do this interaction, we are twice blessed - one, when we give the grace of understanding the other, and when we lay ourselves open and vulnerable with own stories. We all want to do well. We all want to do better. But when someone shares tales and hope with us, we are part of the same family of humankind. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how a life is made of so many beautiful things -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Winterland by Frank Schroeter Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/winterland Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Space Between Our Words

Sat, 17 Jan 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Why don't we have honest conversations with the ones we love the most? Why don't we listen - really listen - without comments, without reply, without retort - when they attempt to tell us what hurts, where it hurts, and how the hurt devastates them. So much of the pain we cause, and we feel, is avoidable. Not because we don't tell enough - but because we don't listen enough. The smallest of things becomes intractable, our understanding of what things mean have no relationship to what it actually meant. We don't clarify, we conclude, and are damned for it. Bridges which connect love become chasms, and we stand at both ends and wonder - what happened, how did two beautiful people find their worst selves in the relationship which mattered the most. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the dissonance in relationships -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sehnsucht by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/sehnsucht Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Poem as a Gift for a Girl With No Confidence in Herself

Sat, 10 Jan 2026 20:00:00 +0500

Poems have a way of showing truths and making us recognize what we are often blind to - that the best we have is adequate and the worst we think we are can also be beautiful. There is so much we lose out to life because of our fears - of what we think we are, of what others might think we are, of what the world thinks when we fail. The sad truth is - nobody cares. Everybody is immersed in their own stories, and beyond a flurry of gossip, have scarcely any mind space for anybody else. Only the ones who care for us, are the ones who feel for us, in ways which are genuine and true and beautiful. And when they hold us close, in spite (and often because) of what we are, we become the beauty they see in us, we are rendered marvellous, we see the infinite in ourselves because that is the core of us - the boundless possibility, the opening of a flower inside us, the feeling of being with the divine, of being blessed. And all because someone found us worthy of time, of attention. Of a sliver of love. Maybe a poem. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how we blossom into the person we should be -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Feelings 2 by Frank Schroeter Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/feelings-2 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Think I Can Be An Adventure With You

Sat, 03 Jan 2026 20:00:00 +0500

As new year eves crack our worlds open into two - a past and a future - albeit as tenuous in concept as they come, deep inside we know the celebrations - like those we do for birthdays - is just messaging of mortality for all things we hold dear. And embedded within that reality is our realization that the experiences and relationships we live and seek and want to linger in are what sustains and gives meaning to our breath, the limited number that we have. The songs we hear together, the storms we take shelter from, the books we cry together to, the traumas we live together through. Life's fullness manifests itself in our life through our shared experiences. Moments ripen into full fruits when we experience them as summer, letting its warmth flood us into sweet submission. Our lives our only half of their possibility if we consider the indulgences which enrich our lives as ordinary. Or things in passing. The kisses we steal, the hands we hold in the dark, the crook of our arms we give for rest, are more precious to remembrance when we look back than any tinsel star or success in passing. Public adulation is the worst. It engulfs us without redemption, leaving us hungrier for being there, and empty when it passes away. I'm quite sure god lives his life through what we do. And I think the sensory is what he would remember, the unexpected adventure, the advent of serenity because we chose to do nothing one winter morning but sit with our ageing father to look out onto the changing skies. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the beauty of things pass -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Liberty Quest by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/liberty-quest Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Stealing Beauty

Sat, 27 Dec 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We are privileged enough to linger in beauty without thinking of livelihood. We spend time with the skies, linger over petunias, chrysanthemums, dahlias and marigolds as they burst in exuberance, watch a frog jump onto a lotus leaf, spend a day in Givenchy, go rapturous over a Zaha Hadid design, go pensive over a Selma poem, linger over a drying leaf in the walking path, bite slowly into the sumptuous juiciness of an Alfonso, spend a day reading a Ludlum, just sit in the winter sun. I am blessed to have a mother who read poetry to me in childhood, and still points out passages which linger. My legacy to my boy, and to those who spend time with me, has always been to point out, read with, talk about the riches strewn all over our universe, things which make life worth living. Going high on a swing, playing cricket in the burnished neighbourhood field, hang on the balustrade of a verandah as we see the summer sun throw a million colours into the lakes beside our house. When we travel, we do so in beauty. Van Goghs we love, local Banksys, rapturous sunrises we travel miles to see, music concerts we see from the fan pit, ruins whose stories we listen with rapt attention, theatre we see, discuss and then discuss again. And the poetry and the books, which are sewn into the fabric of our breath. And the people, our people we love and refuse to take for granted, the people who we don't know but who are all universes in themselves. All who can be portals, gurus, path seekers or companions. These are the ones who make all the difference in our search for what is most precious to the sublime thing called life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on beauty we find in our worlds -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - You & Me Forever by Musiclfiles Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/you-&-me-forever Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Love Letter from a Frustrated Husband to an Exasperated Wife

Sat, 20 Dec 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Darling, make no mistake. There's so much of you I crave and care for. My morning gratitude wishes are of you, whatever nightmare you might have put me through a sweaty night. I've learnt the hard way that married life is less a game of naughts and crosses, and more of remembrances and erasures. Because the burden of memory in a marriage is Krishna's Butterball rock in Mahabalipura, balancing on a point. But, gosh, how much you can cry. Tears are your inbuilt bazookas. And your hysteria is no match to the desperation in my rising voice. And we find reason jettisoned, and notion & conjecture reigning. We become our speculation of each other. We make each other the worst versions of ourselves. You want primacy - to both have the headlights shine on you - and be the headlamp. And I acknowledge it - the moment you see the softness in my eyes and I slip my hand in yours, it's me feeling gushy inside. You have my heart, my fealty, my side, my air, my breath. And then you start off on what's wrong. The fantasy of what's wrong. The perception, the illusion. And I am gobsmacked. What is the genesis of it all? Here we were, happy, sentimental, beautiful together. And then - bam! - the genefluction. What is the genesis of this reverse alchemy? Golden evenings descend into ironic discussions on you not being acknowledged enough; stellar afternoons drift into brassy discussions of how I fall short on your parameters: you clearly remember everything I've done wrong, not the effort I've put in to be the imperfect but hardworking lover. And then I ask - why are we together? What are we doing with each other if we can't be wild roses in our most intimate moments, when I have to hold back afraid of what you'd think, when our conversation is of need and not comfort. When you don't believe me, and I can't ever know why you don't. When all that we are and all that we need, alas, are different things, where, pray tell me, where is our meeting point? Where do we go, my love, where do we go from here? If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the frustrations of love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Bells of the Burguoise by Tim Kulig Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/bells-of-the-burguoise Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Let There Be Fewer Stories This Winter

Sat, 13 Dec 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Summer makes me light and present. The monsoon pulls me into its flood of feelings. Autumn turns me inward—part stranger, part seeker. But winter is where I truly awaken. In its drifting mists and sudden shafts of light, old emotions unseal themselves; warmth rises gently from the cold. My mind clears, my questions deepen, and I feel myself walking through unseen passages within. I’m reminded that we are rarely as flawed as we imagine, our circumstances rarely as dire as our stories insist. The world is as complex or as ordinary as we choose to make it. Life’s puzzles soften when we stay still enough to let them simply pass through. Perhaps that is why winter feels philosophical: it offers haze and clarity, cold and warmth, the riddle and its meaning. It asks for no quick truths—yet reveals them when I step back into the open. Winter is what you make of it: always misty, always beautiful, always ready to lift its veils for you If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the the way seasons change -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Village Ambience by Alexander Nakarada Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/village-ambience Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Going Home

Sat, 06 Dec 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We are such fools, we are, knowing all about inevitabilities, but never (ever) prepared for them. We will lose loved ones, they will die, some in their prime, some before they would have discovered their worth, some even as they burned themselves on both ends. Such is the life of denial we live. Refusing to acknowledge what we know as truth in the deepest fibre of our beings. And when the end does come, as of course it will, we are emotionally, spiritually, illogically, found wanting, found unprepared, found broken. We refuse to acknowledge the known, and the known's blow lands on us like a bludgeon. And we are broken into smithereens. When, if we had faced unto the reality of situations, we would have moulded our time, our priorities in elegant and deep engagements, which would have brought in a final grace in the ones we love to bits. Because often, only too often, we have to let go - of those we love, of those we hold on too tightly to - because in that release, we are also freeing ourselves from the burden of living on, of being the one alive, of the guilt of destiny, of the luck of having some more breaths left. The action of letting go is often the very action which gives us permission to live on. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the ways death finds us -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Clean Soul by Kevin Macleod Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/clean-soul Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When We Know Love as Found

Sat, 29 Nov 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Love is as you define it. Often a search. Often a precipice. Often an infraction. Often an acceptance. More often then not, a home we finally settle in, a comfort, a place to step out from the edginess of search to build stories of reconciliations. But life has its outtakes and inputs, twists and twirls, bells and whistles, which do not allow love to rest. Because it does not want one basic thing to be forgotten. That love is an effort. Love is a daily ritual. You fall in love again and again with the same person. Beyond the words, lies the question of why it matters. Because even when undefined or unsaid, love comes in our lives in whisper-soft ways - in thought, in touch, in secret care. Because the universe adores us. And spreads its munificence everywhere. No one can say she is unloved. She needs to only look out of the window and see an evening sky or feel a summer breeze. Everything beautiful which loves us doesn't always come with announcements. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how whisper-soft is love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Parting of the Ways Part 2 by Kevin Macleod Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/parting-of-the-ways-part-2 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Valentine Shore

Sat, 22 Nov 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Everyone comes in our lives for a reason. The bad ones, the good ones. It is all revealed in time. Sometimes as a slow-burning mystery, sometimes as a spark in a deep night, sometimes in quiet secret ways even we fail to understand, until we get to look back and retrospect. So many of our relationships tether on the edge, so many drift to seeming nothingness, so many are treacherous like the Annapurna slope, so many solid as resolve. But the true charm of being with someone is the continuous mystery of what emerges, of discoveries and rediscoveries. What sparkles could well burn out, what is secret might not stand the burden of revelation, what seems solid could be merely hollow shell. That's the way bonds go, that's the direction love takes. It revels, it celebrates, it lets time and life determine the direction. Sometimes it leaves us mid-highway, sometimes it helps us navigate through cul de sacs, often it is our companion in long-distance runs, sometimes it goes for a sprint with us, and quickly falls by the wayside. We keep searching for a shore in our relationships, forgetting that we should also be one for those who love us. To be a traveller is beautiful, but to finally rest is also not only a need but a necessity - for ourselves and for those who have covered a distance with us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the gentleness of love's ways -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Elysium by Alexander Nakarada Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/elysium Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Primer on How to Deal With (Being) Hurt

Sat, 15 Nov 2025 20:00:00 +0500

So much of what we are is the amalgam of hurts we carry deep inside. As past life regression reveals, sometimes the hurt runs deep, bringing forward traces of what's left unresolved from the ages before. However accomplished or complete we might think ourselves to be, we roam the world raw, susceptible to the random snide, reacting to the perceived insult, ultra-sensitive to derision. And we react. And commence an unending cycle of soul terrorism - attack, inflame, die. On the agency of words and bruised egos, we are ready to destroy and be destroyed. We grow cynical, we grow tired. We encounter, and soon become, our worst selves. We encounter the largesse of the universe, walk daily into its wonders, find its gorgeousness laid out for us in the most generous of ways - and walk away, impressed but untouched. But come the snide, the insult, derision, and our very soul finds its lees. We scrape the bottom of what we are. We forget words are seasonal mists. They come and pass. It's often only a local pressure point which creates them, and they dissipate as geographies, seasons or clocks change. The old adage of being still and letting the eddies of life flow over and around us, is soon forgotten. We become the current, the tide, the flood. And destroy beauty - around us, and within. All we had to do was to let hurt come, do its deed and go. And for us to remain serene. Because things pass, feelings pass. If we remain centered, committed to our core, we remain what we are. And paradoxically, the world around us, instead of collapsing, finds its best self, grows, and we grow with it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the hurts and pain we feel ever so often -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - You Can't Stay Here by Michael Mojzykiewicz Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/you-can't-stay-here Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

May Your Journey Be Gentle & Safe (as I see a gorgeous eclipse)

Sat, 08 Nov 2025 20:00:00 +0500

It is sobering to realize how insignificant we are in this universe, how much of a speck. And how much the grandeur of nature - a spectacular lunar eclipse, the sun shining on a quiet sea, a moonlit desert - shows us both the incredible world we live in - as also bring us back to the joy of minutiae, if only we have the eyes and time for it. And it brings us back to the gorgeous littleness of our lives. How the highest joys are often reserved for the smallest of things. To have someone in our lives, who knows where the hidden mole in our bodies is. Someone who absorbs the worst of what we are and is ready to let us sink in their arms, irrespective. To sit in serene comfort with each other without a single regret in our hearts. Someone for whose well being we pray with the innermost core of our hearts. Life finds its circle completed in strange mysterious ways. They are no large strokes, there are no Big Bang revelations, it is just the comfort our body and spirit know. A place where we are us and we call it our own. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the journeys we love - or not -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Walking Towards the Light by MusicFiles Majestic Autumn by MusicFiles Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/walking-towards-the-light Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/majestic-autumn Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Moving Tapestry of My Awe

Thu, 06 Nov 2025 22:14:27 +0500

I am so often in awe. Of another being’s endurance or grace — perhaps a lover, a river, the sea, or even time itself. I want to learn how they do it -from borrowing calm, to letting life flow through, to finally resting in stillness and reverence. To see life as a moving tapestry of happenstances, tragedies or ecstasy; living through them, but not allowing any of these to change the essential core of what they are, why they are. They seem to allow both beauty and pain to go through them - such that they are touched and changed, but not rendered cynical or bitter or stormy or intractable. To be that indestructible rock which is soft to touch; to be that bleeding evening which heals; to be that person who is stubbornly calm and unchanging amidst every provocation we might throw at him. I want to be that person who recognizes the essential fragrance of the unseen flower or is hurt but does not drive into a town like a storm. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the grace we encounter in our lives -

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Are All Lovers Pilgrims?

Sat, 25 Oct 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We give up on those we profess to love too soon. There is something primordial, something gossamer, to do with the body, to do with first inchoate impressions, which attracts us to one another in the first place. Because relationships often begin in shallow waters. As things start to become serious, the couple traverses depths. It's not easy. And unexpected. Murky, weed-laden, algae-full. The clear eyes and the pellucid surfaces of early days is suddenly overladen with things about each other we don't even recognize. It is difficult to swim through the muck. For it seeps into our pores, into the day-&-night of our lives, into our senses, and suddenly everything which was golden turns murky, overladen with offal. What attracted now repulses. This is when things start collapsing. We completely forget what brought us to each other in the first place. In the old days, when coupledom, marriages, were unending, and meant for forever, this was a phase which was meant to be borne, till it passed - and one learnt to live with it. Often, things remained as they were, however deep the relationship went. Toxicity was the norm. Individually we were supposed to grow, as a couple we were supposed to fly. Instead there was claustrophobia and a sense of doom. But the tragedy often was elsewhere. The tragedy was when we never gave a chance to time and change. Because as one swam through the muck, something magical often started to emerge. Pellucid waters. Depths which captured light like mussels catch pearls. Where the muck was the rough exterior but grace and beauty were permanent residents - albeit hidden. For the couple, there was a sense of transcendence. And since it was reached with patience, forbearance, commitment, there was a sense of gratefulness and wonder which filled us. So, beyond anything and everything, relationships need the patience of space. Time's hard knocks are a phase to build resilience, to understand the other, and more importantly, for us to uncover layers in ourselves we didn't know existed. Discovery and understanding are both the magnet and the glue which holds a couple together. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the passages of relationships -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Satisfaction by Sascha Ende Reaching the sky by Alexander Nakarada Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Satisfaction Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Reaching-the-sky Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay - Letting Go (a childhood song)

Sat, 18 Oct 2025 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it,

Childhood is a town we have to leave. Home is a destination we have to leave and recreate again and again. Memories are the wealth we carry as reflux. And we create ourselves as our own saviours as we search strange lands.

Even as we flee our abandoned bicycles in empty playgrounds, even as we carry hurt as big as childhood’s sandpit, even as we tell ourselves that leaving is the best thing to do, we feel bereft. What is it about childhood that we carry it inside us wherever we go, however far we might go? We carry it often as benediction, often as an abomination. If we are lucky, it’s the sunshine of those years which light up our later years, if all our growing is done in shadows, what we have inside is a throbbing hurting night.

What do we make of ourselves because of those years when we were open and ready to receive and vulnerable? What is it that we take forward and what is that that we desperately want to leave behind? What is it that we wish was different, what is that we feel should be changed but now can’t? Is there an unwarranted guilt? Is there an anger, a sense of being cheated, a feeling that someone didn’t do their given duty, of giving something as elemental as caresses of breeze and drops of sun?

Because only too often, we live only in the continent of regret, bereft of the balming buffets of past winds, and stigmatise our entire lives to the memory of what can never be changed. Only when we quietly let go of what we have accumulated throughout our lives and find possibilities to remake ourselves in some form of a sunshine, can we come out as full individuals, tempered, touched but not scalded.

We would finally find a new home.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the love, longing and loss of childhood -

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The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Heaven's Gate by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10651-heavens-gate
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finding Home in Places We've Left Behind

Sat, 11 Oct 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Revisiting a place where one has one's roots is tricky business. On the one hand, there is enough familiarity - relatives, school chums as unrecognisable adults, hazy lines of playgrounds, peacocks, changing views from rooftops, familiar cracks now deeper - and on the other, one enters the familiar as a complete stranger. The air is lighter, the light is sharper, the language is alien in spite of familiar intonations, and one sits on judgement. And a sense of superiority emerges - as if the place I've settled in is not only different, but also way 'ahead', whatever the meaning of that word is. But the bigger tragedy is how we look at what was hometown, nay home, is now a place to judge, to compare, to find it falling short. We move on in life - whether it indicates moving forward is a moot point. What does linger is what we leave behind. Sometimes as a place stuck in a time-wrap, sometimes merely reluctant to find new beats, happy in its anachronisms. Sometimes as people, who are happy to remain what they are, tiny dreams ensconced in comfortable immobility. And that is a choice to be happy in one's own quiddities, within one's particularities. And who are we to judge, just because we have found different dreams, racier trajectories, more informed choices. If finally what we as human beings seek is serenity and fulfilment, how do we even know whether that is there in the places and people we have left behind? In our desire to know ourselves better, it is often a good idea to haul ourselves back to our roots, and then just sit back and see ourselves implode, explode, sink or float. If nothing else, we will get to know ourselves better. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the ways we find and lose homes -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rising Sun by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Rising-Sun Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When it Rains, Love Slips

Sat, 04 Oct 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Love is fragile but can withstand blows; it is easily dismantled but can be unrelenting in its persistence. It can disintegrate in a word, but can stand unbreakable after the worst of happenstances. Love is both ordinary and a maverick. It can breathe as if it is taking its last inhalation or linger as if infinity is a friend. There is lassitude, there is energy, there is determination, there is presumption. Of course we know when we are in love and when we are pretending: when we carry wounds like a fireball hidden inside. So much of love is the warmth of a glance as also the heartbreak of a look avoided. The shadow of love is often fraught with short-term memory. We remember the last outtake, the last remark, the last deed. The fractured nature of our feelings, invariably, leads us astray into judging love as a finality, defined as that last piece of interaction, forgetting the warmth, the light and the wonder of what it meant for so long. Of course, we drift, of course we are flooded, of course we are castaways in our own opinions, of course we are prisoners of minutiae, even as the big picture looms large beckoning us into its now-fading glory. Our obsession with the now and the just-elapsed, makes us error-prone, subsuming us in its shallow currents. We lose the perennial for the ephemeral. And even as we sit at the shore, we drown in innocuous backdrafts. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the way we romance rains and storms -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Artemis by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Artemis Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lovers Who Synchronise (& those who don't)

Sat, 27 Sep 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Pondering as I do on relationships, the beauty and brokenness of them, I continuously marvel, nay wonder, at both their tenacity and tenuousness. And how, at the bottom of them all, they all exist on the basis of a single decision: to be together. However old, however strong, whatever the optics, the couple is together only because they want to be. Years might slip by, a thousand experiences might be shared treasure, but a single call, a sentence, a simple "I want to leave you", and a bond collapses. And it doesn't require a calamity, another love, incompatibility or differences, for that decision to be made, enunciated and executed. We, as humans, are victims to so many things - possessiveness, insecurities, jealousies, emptiness. And then history doesn't matter. And a separation just happens. The question always is - what right do we have in or to each others lives? What is the value of a paper signed as ritual, or a promise made to love each other forever. And that's why I'm in awe of people who not only stick together for years, but do it with equanimity and a quiet happiness. I see couples who gel with each other with such felicity that when they are together, when they speak, when they share silences, they do it as one. It's almost as if there's no distance in their souls. That, without meaning, somehow, some place, they simply got split, though they were one body, one spirit, one soul. Their presence is a generosity, and an answer to my own cynicism about the future of long-term coupledom. If only we go beyond the surface gnarls, flaws, habits and blemishes, so much is possible. Such serenity is garnered, if only we realize the minimising effect of expectation, and see each other as flawed creatures of infinite possibilities. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the ebbs & flows of love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Day After Tomorrow by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/the-day-after-tomorrow Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Just Be Air

Sat, 20 Sep 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We don't always realize, how much of our lives belongs to others, is determined by others. Their concerns, their insistences, their jealousies, their phobias, their happinesses, their frustrations. Their blank stares, their under-the-breath comments, their lack-of-joy. Their obsessions, their obsessive need to control. Their potential reactions, their prejudices, their silences. In time, what we do, indeed, what we become, is a factor of what someone else might want us to be. Covering the entirety of our realities is the miasma of overwrought anticipation. What would she say? What would she think? How would she react? Would she agree? Decisions then genuflect to a person and not to the situation. And this subsummation is complete when, in time, we forget what we want. In the extreme case, we look to the person for everything we want to say, want to do, and even asking "is this what I want?" This genuflection is ultra-common with Personality Type A people who naturally assume that the world revolves around them - else it would collapse under its own incompetencies. The cost is severe. Allegiance generated is tenuous. And even if such a person is ultra-intelligent, she will find herself to be her greatest enemy. Thus unhappiness is not always generated, it is excavated, gathered. As if we go into a meadow to obsessively pluck thorns instead of flowers for a bouquet. Relationships invariably require a light touch. The bonds, paradoxically, become stronger when they are tied in gossamer. The responsibility to a relationship comes not from insistencies of history or law or sacrifice. It is far subtler. The strongest ties come from discovery, curiosity, space, respect. Relationships are never simple. And we do not always help in making them simpler for ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the gossamer nature of relationships -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Evacuation by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Evacuation Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Waiting

Sat, 13 Sep 2025 20:00:00 +0500

People drift. Love leaves home. Life becomes a refugee. We become migrants in our own cities. What brought two people together often becomes the reason which tears them apart. Poetry is often a glue, often it it only a record-keeper. Often it is a bystander, checking out its own pulse. And the two who loved how poetry defined them, find the suburbs of love - where they finally have to settle - to be boring brick-laden homestays. So much of love - as of life - are the boring intermezzos. When definitions of everything get recreated inside endless vistas of nothingness. What survives is cacti, or becomes prickly like it. Our best selves dry out. And we become our worst versions. We are very rarely sensitive enough to know how we have regressed, how we have devolved. We see our sunburnt smiling faces in the mirror, and then go cursing into the arena of life, desperate for distraction, despairing to know where we'd gone wrong. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on relationships which are adrift -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sayan 21112020 by Sayan Mukherji

So Tonight That I Might See You

Sat, 06 Sep 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Relationships often run their course. But we don't. And I'm both heartbroken and frustrated at the phenomenon. As I try to decipher the possibility of a rich life, now existing as an afterlife. It's not a question of toxicity setting in, but of a river in full spate disappearing into an arid empty bed. And I ask - why do we hold onto relationships which subtract us as human beings? Because what doesn't lift us, diminishes us; what doesn't inspire us, enslaves us; what doesn't make us see the best of what we are, curdles us. But. We hold onto these because we are prisoners of affection, of a history which often consists of laying bare our soul, of being conjoined at the hip in adventures which defined us, of seeing the world through each other's eyes. And then we see this world of two collapse. There could be too many reasons for any one even deserving a stating. Human nature - both in its proactive compulsions and reactive idiocy - is the same in its self-destructive propulsion. We lose our direction because someone is unfaithful; we lose our head because someone has decided to determine our future; we disengage because someone doesn't think our advice deserves attention. Now, facing the world with dread because of an acidic relationship, makes us smaller versions of ourselves, making us give little of what we are capable of. Because we are affected by what is infinitesimal in infinity's scheme of things. And we go into a state of statis. In purgatory, araf, bhuvar-lok. Forever in limbo. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems of when love is forever grey -

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The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Children of MH17 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/the-children-of-mh17 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Morning After

Sat, 30 Aug 2025 20:00:00 +0500

What did my palms come to know what did my skin feel what did my eyes own as I transversed universes as I clasped light conscious we are captive of time and age held together in ways undefinable on the wings of unsaid hope, possibilities held as a moment's gift who are we if not fools holding love as a talisman a bushel of kisses as proof that when all fails there's a touch which knew as we other our other worlds as we hold love-bites as we withhold wounds as we travel our bodies knowing there is life knocking incessantly on the door and there is time time only for one last kiss one last look If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on ways of lovemaking -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - True Summer Love by musiclfiles Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/true-summer-love Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finding Myself Beyond You

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Someone said something very telling the other day. In a court of law, the criminal knows he's the one, the accuser knows the criminal is the one. So in the scheme of things, it's actually only the judge who is being judged. I was reminded of this when I realized that our relationships are intrinsically not of the other, but about us - the person in front of us is a mirror in which we can see ourselves. A friend, spouse, lover, stranger, colleague - they will always be who they are. We can come to them as wrecking balls or have the sensitivity to see them as messengers who help us know ourselves, just by being who they are. It's then very simple to realize that our impatience for people to change is merely our message to ourselves to reexamine who we are. The paradox is that once we change, people around us do too. They need to have the confidence of our intent, that what they see as the realized us is an inside-out phenomenon, and not cosmetic change. Of course, there are the outlier cases, of the obstinate or the evil, of the irreparably hurt or the irredeemably wounded. Often these are the relationships we need to step away (run away?) from. When you can't change the world, change worlds. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on forked ways of loving -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Andromeda by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Andromeda Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Heard The Other Day

Sat, 16 Aug 2025 20:00:00 +0500

So much of our time is spent in yearning. A slow despair of knowing life is slipping by, and of somehow not being able to wrap our arms around its fullness. Of, time and again, sinking our fingers into something we see as compressible but finding mere nothingness. Of having touched love, but having lost it before experiencing its infinite lushness or its prickly pleasures. Because through love, we know how we are given this limited-edition life but often just lose the opportunity of making something worthwhile of it. It's worse when we see the copiousness we have lost being embraced instinctively by those who we've jettisoned in our myriad journies. Even as we live our sad life in a minuscule corner of the universe, with our bag of barrenness. What is this depth of relationship, which is often close in definition to depth of life? It could take on so many forms. But each has to do with immersion. What probably lasts in us at the cellular level is being fully with the person we love, when we are with them. In conversations, in silences, in disagreements, whilst grieving, when in joy. As close as possible physically, as much in soul when not. The importance is the intermeshing. Of being so close that we are able to experience each other's breath. Because relationships show us the way to life. The way to immersion. Because in that lies the way to our sense of immortality. Which might not be what we want - but which gives us the satisfaction that we've lived life to its very lees. And in love, as in life, this often means turning back to what we've left, or letting go of what merely shines, or of just sinking deeper into the present because that is all that we have. This could lead to infinite joy, or depthless grief. But, ultimately, it would be giving our infinite to the only thing we possess - the moment in which we breathe. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on yearning in love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Childhood by Sascha Ende Lonely Bird Instrumental by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Childhood Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/lonely-bird-instrumental Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Have Watched You Make the Ordinary Holy

Sat, 09 Aug 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We are what we make of the minutiae of our daily lives. Because love resides in them. We have a simple choice - we can curse at the commonplace or be masters of the mundane. The ability to observe and feel and let go, all at the same time, is what determines both the trajectory of our days as also the journeys of our heart. Because the other choice is of getting overwhelmed with the negativity each relationship perforce brings. Because two people always mean two views, and often with no common plane to resolve them in. It is at such times that our ability to look at the big picture by changing our focus to small things comes into play, and gives levity and counterbalance to everything which vexes us about the person we desperately want to love. Love is scarcely ever a statement. It's a feeling which atomizes things into soul-pieces. A patch of sunlight on skin, her fingers gently touching flowers wilting in the evening, an un-sonorous note from her throat as she strums an unstrung guitar, her proud serving of an unflattering dish made of quinoa, the irresistible urge to kiss her haphazardly reddened lips, the reassurance of holding soft hands with unpainted nails: the wondering if your name features in the lines in her palms. And you wonder how someone can be an unhealed wound and a salve at the same time. Love then is simply care, the care to look beyond quiddities, to where sunlight comes from inside the person you love. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the gentle art of loving -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Die unendliche geschichte by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Die unendliche geschichte Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Let Me Sit Beside You, Quietly

Sat, 02 Aug 2025 20:00:00 +0500

A colleague committed suicide today. 7 am. He woke up early, took a bath, did his pujo, and then hung himself from a fan. His wife discovered him when she didn't see him in the pujo ghar. I'd met him the day before getting into office, and asked him how he was doing. He was cheerful. I asked him to drop by for a cup of coffee. Another colleague did two meetings with him. Another one said good bye to him at 7 in the evening. Just another ordinary day. Last year his wife had come to me with their son and talked of how there was something which had snapped inside him. He wanted to resign. There was immense pressure, and he had an unsympathetic and cruel boss, who went unrelentingly after him. It was often ugly. And the pressure was getting to him. And he was doing frightened office-talk even in his sleep. I and my HR colleague got him aligned with a good psychiatrist. And in a few months, he was as near normal as possible. Till today. Do we all have breaking points? However strong we might think we are. That point where our heart breaks and our mind splits. And a strange duality emerges, of moving ordinarily in an ordinary life, but carrying a soul in turmoil. Didn't he have anybody he could talk to - with full vulnerability, unfettered by judgement? What was that last thought, before he took that decisive step? Didn't he think of the wreckage he would leave behind? Is suicide then, intrinsically, a sad amalgam of despair and selfishness? But more than anything, I'm angry at bosses who let go without constraint on hapless subordinates, without the sensitivity of the overwhelming effect their position has on those whose livelihood depends on them. I only wish I had stopped for that coffee when I'd met him. Maybe he would have opened up. Maybe things would have been different. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on ways of dying -

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Lemonade at the End of a Buzzing Day

Sat, 26 Jul 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I was reading poet Joy Sullivan's book of burnished sepia-tinged poems "Instructions for travelling west", and followed the footsteps of her poems into my childhood. Trying to catch the magic without sinking into syrupy nostalgia. And was amazed at how much I remembered - the games, the bruises, the sweat, the moths, ice-cold drinks - and just that feeling of unencumbered joy. But much more than that was the closeness of friends - we were thick as thieves - and the refusal to break friendships because one of us was nasty to the other. We knew facts, and just swallowed them and moved on. I think we learnt accumulation much later. The layers of anger and resentment and helplessness which, as time went by, made us smaller versions of what we possibly could be. It was an irony of sorts - how we were much bigger when we were smaller. I think normal childhoods glow because we have memories of goldfish for hurts. Where did we lose it all? When did we learn to layer our existences with slights and notions of unforgettable pain? When did we think memories are given to us to remember the worst of what life brings to us? We are supposedly the most intelligent creatures on this earth, and we let ourselves be buried under debris rather than stardust. We are the privileged summer of fireflies, the vaunted recipients of a sheltering sky, we can crush flowers in our palms and know of its perfume, we can slip shoes and walk outside to save ourselves from scars. Maybe it's time to reclaim the glow, which our lives have lost to the neon we thought showed the way to us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the luminosity of childhood -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Imagefilm015 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/imagefilm015 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Do Wait For My Ashes

Sat, 19 Jul 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I am at that age when I see more deaths than births. And, for some esoteric reason, such news arrives either as an early morning call - these are shriller, as if recognizing the weight of the tragedy - or as a message deep in the night - when the night lights up with the neon glow of a phone which refuses to predict the darkness it predates. And I skip a heartbeat. And the news seeps in. And then it takes a while to reconcile with a world with one loved one less. Mansi's grandmother lost her husband six years back, and broke her back in a fall thereafter. Then an intractable disease made her lose her vocal chords. Then she lost her son a couple of years back to cancer. That really broke her. She became completely reliant on others. Deep inside she could not decide what was worse - losing her life partner, her son or face a future completely at the behest of others. She pondered killing herself. But she couldn't reach a fan and was just too weak to slide a razor across her arteries. I met her about once a month. She was small in her bed, but her eyes shone ferociously, even as she gently caressed my cheek. And when she died a few days back, she left behind a primer on things the bereaved needed to do, and not do, after her death. She'd written - "No one will give me a bath or change my clothes after I die. No one will touch the feet of my dead body. That's not me. I have gone. The mourning will not last beyond the time I'm consumed by the flames. Life has to go on and become normal immediately. Everything I own will be donated to the Marwari Widows Society, including my zari sarees and my mangalsutra (please note). Don't make my room a shrine. Remove all traces of me. I would hate to have my photograph put up with a sad garland. Give my room to Sandesh. He needs a bigger one, what with him getting married and all. Remove that rickety cupboard. And that infernal painting by Asha that I've suffered for so many years. Don't put my dead body in an electric crematorium. Burn it on a wooden pyre. Do wait for my ashes. And my last request. In time, take the ashes to the mangroves of Sunderbans. Not the sea, but the rivulets. And scatter them amongst the magnificent roots. I like the idea of vexing the roots a bit before floating into the infinity of the sea. If possible, can you do this in the monsoon? Then you will remember me as rain, someone who nourished you, teased you, but cherished life, and knew when to fade gracefully, leaving no traces behind, apart from freshly-hewn leaves." And I know as I know myself, that we might lose the final shred of our faculties, but we will hold onto the last vestiges of our dignity. Beyond the fug of appearances and compulsions, lies the burning presence of identity - often merely the idea of it - which we hold on to as a hungry dog holds onto a sliver of meat against hungry predators. And we are all better people when we learn to embrace this reality of everyone we love, and those who love us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on death and other passing ons -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Lonely bird instrumental by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Lonely bird instrumental Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Luck by Chance

Sat, 12 Jul 2025 20:00:00 +0500

So much arrogance! I see people preen into their power, as if they owned every bit of what they are. Old wealth and position are often the worst. Privilege turns into a right; dissent sparks righteousness; power becomes a press drill; wealth is mistaken for intellect. People forget they are humans - a bundle of gorgeous contradictions, always at the brink of errors, growing out of contradictions, alive inside abstractions, beyond simplistic judgements. How can any man or woman walk this earth, be born into its beguiling aesthetics and lesson-worthy stumbles, its company of the wise, its examples of grace, and still arrogate themselves the illusion of knowing-it-all? Decades into my life, I still sit open-mouthed at stories of unbridled resilience, and unrestrained joy; I still stand corrected - and I still let myself be a sieve through which the world flows and leaves traces of its infinite grace. All possibilities of life are on the table if only we let them be. The richness comes not from the dullness of veracities, but the magical world of infinite mistakes. When we swing our focus away from ourselves, we find a world full of possibilities - and we give ourselves the chance of becoming the flawed beautiful person we are capable of being. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how life is nothing by destiny -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Lockdown by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Lockdown Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

On Falling & Failing

Sat, 05 Jul 2025 20:00:00 +0500

So much of our lives, nay, our heart-space, our mind-space, is about flying or falling, of binaries like coming ahead, being there first, being smarter than the other. We live and die in comparisons. And as always, when we wallow in shallow waters, we never ever get drenched fully. Without realising that this is the way of the world, that we can be the maximum of ourselves, but never more, and that comparisons are a zero sum game, anathema to coexistence. And actually, if we apply our mind enough, they are the interim stage to combine strengths, compensate weaknesses and come out sturdier, more resilient, a team. But much more than that, falling is merely the stage before getting up. And to realize that in life everything adds up. How that happens is a matter of staying the course, and later, much later, looking back and seeing how it all added up to get us where we did. The universe collects the debris of our heartbreaks, the whisper of our tears, the pollen dust of our regrets, and keeps them in a cachet of remembrance, pushing them back into our lives as accretions, as milestones, for us to know them as growth in time. In the immensity of our lives, we should fall gloriously, fail with panache, and never forget to be kind to others - and to ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on failings and kindnesses -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Your Name by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Your Name Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When We Meet Again

Sat, 28 Jun 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Friends, lovers, relatives. People we know intimately. Who do we become when apart? Our bodies replace 330 billion cells every day. Every 15 years or so each one of the cells get fully replaced. We do not remain the same person physically, then what about the metaphysicality, the psychology, the soul, the belief systems of us? How much of us is built by the new people we meet? What is chipped away from the experiences we stumble into? Did an unshared sunset injure us? Did a random hurt hurled in the streets prove to be a last straw even we were not aware of? Did a birthday alone hurt us irredeemably? Did we pass through a crisis with no one to hold our hand? What do we become when unobserved and unheld by the one we dearly love? Like flowing water glides unhampered into every decline it finds, our beings slip every slope when there is no hand holding us through. And then when we meet, everything familiar about us draws us in, the memory of what we have been, for and with each other, is the bridge and the magnet. We settle in quickly. But slowly the stranger emerges; different reactions, differing views, till the person in front of us is not the one which we knew. And our skin prickles, we sink into a growing dismay, and we realize we are holding a stranger in our arms. Our decision to build a relationship anew with, essentially, a stranger is a matter for our heart and circumstances to decide. But nothing is simple. Because, like in all relationships, we are prisoners, freedom fighters, compatriots and counsellors, all at the same time. Who prevails finally is anybody's guess. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on arrivals and departures -

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En route (how I encountered war)

Sat, 21 Jun 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I was in Emirates business class, on the way to Dubai, en route to a holiday. I was happy with myself, my life. A full meal, two rom-coms, one to go, and the relief of my kids tethered, as they slept after all kinds of indulgences. There was a peaceful sea which awaited me, massages, and sunset walks. This is life, I deserve it. I sighed into my smile. Then there was static, peculiar to a plane, the one which precedes an announcement. Unusual, as it was dark in the cabin, and it was sleep-time. "Ladies & gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. I know I am disturbing you, as a lot of you might be sleeping. And I debated with myself before coming on. But I thought it would be fair to tell you this. You know about the war between Iran and Israel. If you would care to slide up your window cover and look down, you would see several streaks of light. They are beautiful. Those are missiles. From the direction you would know which country fired them and where they are headed. Don't worry. We are safe. We are several thousand feet above them. Don't worry. All I would like to say is - whoever you support, at the end of these missiles is death and destruction. Not awe. Not celebration. Hold a prayer for those who these missiles find. Because we are all humans. And we all die, when someone else does. Sorry for this intervention. But I thought a collective prayer might help. Good night." I looked out and down into the clear space. And saw how calmly those beautiful streaks travelled with us. If they were humans, we would have waved at each other. I looked on for long minutes, till the missiles veered and found a new direction. And we stayed onto our course. I am glad the children slept on. Else they would have wondered why their mother held on to the seat handles till her knuckles went white, they would have wondered why she had her eyes closed through the rest of the journey, they would have wondered why she was crying so inconsolably. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on wars of all kinds -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Cinema Blockbuster Trailer 10 by Sascha Ende Begegnung Romeos Erbe by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Cinema Blockbuster Trailer 10 Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Begegnung Romeos Erbe Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Survivors

Sat, 14 Jun 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I have always wondered about people who go through tragedy, and then fall into profound grief. Such that their lives change, trajectories bend, and a state of being moribund sets in. In much of our existences, we are all living half-lives in our own way, pur-blind, half-dissatisfied, fully-disgruntled. The world refuses to work according to our diktats or wishes. And we are being continually rebuffed or embarrassed. Till we take it as normal. And then what do most of us do? Chin up. Take the blow. Move on. Things invariably add up somewhere. And find some sort of an equilibrium. Because the future is a consummate stitcher of 'rafoo', a darner of torn existences. But then there are those whose lives don't find their equilibrium, those who stay mired, however impractically we might think, in the turbid morbidity of past tragedies. For so many people, lives stop when their love dies, or heartbreak breaks a bond with life which they assumed was irrefutable, or a financial muscle breaks and their whole existence collapses. They lose the will to find light, the flex to transition into an alternate reality, the humility to seek redemption, the ability to let go of happenstances and embrace realities, to learn, absorb, embrace and then become the light. They never understand the value of taking life seriously but never so much that it becomes both a vice and a vise. Because that's when they find themselves as castaways in their own stories, forgoing their ability to find a log, and the wind, to set sail again, this time with a fearlessness bordering on ferocity. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the dramas of life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Blockbuster Atmosphere 9 Sadness by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/blockbuster-atmosphere-9-sadness Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Tell Me, Tell Me, How a Tear Was Born

Sat, 07 Jun 2025 20:00:00 +0500

There are so many microscopic things which happen which tend to change our lives - not in cataclysmic ways, but in infinitesimal ways making us the persons we become. A word said in passing, a kindness shown when not expected, a smile out of the blue, a touch when unexpected. And when a person opens up to you with all her vulnerabilities, bare to her soul, regardless of consequences, regardless of the delicate position which she places herself in, is the time when something inside us shifts. We learn of the preciousness of trust, how simple keepsakes can be life-changing, how devastating and life-affirming can a peek into someone else's truths can be. Paradoxically, our complex journey through our lives is made richer when our choices become simpler. To pause to see, to stop to listen, to go silent to let the noise subside, to acknowledge presence, to reach out, to reach in. Each person we meet is actually a cornucopia of dreams, actualities, hopes and compulsions. To breath with them is to travel with clear eyes and a pellucid heart. To know that to know a truth of another is just another way to find our own truths. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on life and its infinite mysteries -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Gracias by Sascha Ende Kathrin by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Gracias Link: https://filmmusic.io.en/song/Kathrin Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Here We Are In The Years

Sat, 31 May 2025 20:00:00 +0500

"My love, of a thousand reaffirmations, we know we will never find ourselves in adequacies. Beyond the blemishes you absorbed, the ones I ignored, it was enough for us to have found the places where we fitted." Who are we if not a pack of confusions and misdirections? Because we are so inadequate in our understanding of what we are, and what is truly important in our lives, we ever so often miss the very opportunity passing by us with a shy smile. Until, through a strange alchemy of circumstances, we don't. And we find something, we find someone. And everything changes. There are a million reasons why something shouldn't work, a relationship should collapse, why an idea should die an immediate death, but something holds us up, gives us the courage of our convictions, a boldness which says "whatever be the consequence". And things happen, in their own messy ways, such that through the chaos emerges a new kind of light. Soft at times, harsh mostly, often accompanied with music, often blinding - but light it is. And through the clutter we see ourselves and our lives with clarity, and we finally recognize what is important to us. And beyond the love we have for another, things, seasons, art, beyond all the lives we find - our love for ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on fractured relationships finding peace:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Blockbuster Atmosphere 10 Relaxation by Sascha Ende Blockbuster Atmosphere 9 Sadness by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Blockbuster Atmosphere 10 Relaxation Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Blockbuster Atmosphere 9 Sadness Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When Did You Say?

Sat, 24 May 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Sometimes you just know. As someone once said "I knew you were the one, as soon you walked into the room. There was light coming out of your ass!" Frankly, more often then not, love has less drama associated to its arrival, because it is really a feeling which grows and found incrementally, one conversation at a time, one walk at a time, one infraction at a time. You know there's something happening inside you when there's an unexplainable feeling of excitement and queasiness and anticipation which starts to brew inside. Why queasy, I have often wondered. And the only answer I get is that you start feeling that you are losing control. And it makes you nervous, helpless. But it's a feeling you enjoy, giving into it is akin to some other power taking control of how you feel and act. The more irrational the act you see yourself do, the more you see yourself say things which you didn't know you were capable of saying, the more you realize you are in the power of something transcendental. Something which will now never leave you unscathed or unchanged. Love has made an entry. Life as you know it ceases to exist. Sometimes infinitesimally, sometimes significantly, you find yourself change. Even when the high fades, and love becomes a normal part of what you live with, there's a glow which never leaves you. Even as obsession tapers into normalcy, you know your life is forever touched with magic. The most significant change comes as you stop thinking in singular terms. Is it freedom curtailed, or life enchanted for its inclusion? If there's excitement inside thinking of experiences together, then you are on the way to a twosome. Plurality is only acceptable with its promise of shared experience if one does not consider sharing an encroachment or a loss of freedom. Because love is, in so many ways, an acceptance and an accumulation. It's the difference between being breathless and gasping for breath. In that thin line of differentiation, lies the richness of our choices and the changeability of everything we stand for in life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the progression of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Will We Ever Trust The Skies Again?

Sat, 17 May 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Someone once said "The path of peace goes through power." It's not only the truth, but a reality. Sadly. In a world largely ruled by men, rules are set as statements of power and domination. Even if someone seeks a hassle-free existence, unencumbered by positions, they are forced to seek bullies as allies, and are blackmailed in the name of security guarantee. In the sick paradigm of domination, innocents are both targets and collateral. And we, who are unaffected till we are not, react in disgust, fear and with the full force of our prejudices. Somewhere in the chasm between left and right, right and wrong, righteousness and hope, prejudice and fact, we the innocents also become warmongers in the name of being opinion-makers. Even on the sidelines we bring in the full force of our prejudices and opinions, seeking to change who cannot be changed. Facts take flight, and we become mood makers, reflected in wayward news articles, op-eds masquerading as headlines, passion disguised as television reportage. We the populace, the common people, thus also become warriors. And find that the battlefields and nationalism which conjoins us, does not stop us from fighting our own battles of our versions of right or wrong on social media, newspapers and tv channels. We stand divided. And we, the hoi polloi, become our own worst enemies. And we find, later, much later, that we are the ones who are the ones who hollow a nation out. Much much after political parties have come and gone, our debilitating legacy stays on. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on country, war, and other confusions -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Sleepers Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Sometimes Life Leaves You Alone

Sat, 10 May 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Vincent Van Gogh, possibly the loneliest man in history, once said - “A great fire burns within me, but no one stops to warm themselves at it, and passers-by only see a wisp of smoke.” We are so much, and so little at the same time. As we transverse our fulfilments and relationships, seeing one flourish, and the other flounder. And we struggle to understand why. We find that we are that person who is loved outside as also the person agonizing over the one he loves the most. So much of us lies unidentified. Why - we struggle to know ourselves! As we see ourselves in other people's eyes and are astonished that they see someone else altogether than the one we thought we knew. Until the realization comes that we are illusions trying to find our own realities. And we transverse the world through the dream version of our lives. And we encounter strife and pain. Things start unravelling. And with dread within our hearts we know we are less than ideal. And we find ourselves alone. With space to not find someone else but to find ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loneliness and aloneness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rising Sun by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Rising_Sun Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Living Inside a Wound

Sat, 03 May 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Too often, only too often, couples live lives of quiet despair. Without knowing that's not ordinary, that's not what coupledon is all about, that we can't have lifetimes compromised to the extent that an entirety passes by and there's nothing to show for it. Life is valuable and nobody, no relationship, has a right to take away from the preciousness of each moment. Because we have too few in the entirety of a lifetime to be in a position to even lose a single one of them. We need quick reparation, priority conversations, time to sort things out, to sit down with the intent of resolution, to come halfway - if not whole - to mend. But that's easier said than done. For the simple reason that hurts are deep-seated, more cavernous than ego. And fault lines once created are like deep crevasses. The solution is not bandaid, neither surgery because the scars which remain still hurt. It's only massive change and a change of attitude that will act as the silt to fill those fissures - a flood of gratefulness which would leave its residue behind, a continuous level of self-awareness of how our inadequacies are compensated by the other's presence. Couples are a team, and much more than the centripetal forces of differences, it's the pre-assumption of intent which destroys. Close relationships have to start with gratefulness, take each other as gifts and stay in the moment, to find real joy. Zen is not a strategy for love, it is the first principle. Nothing is impossible if intent and awareness are the emotions which lead. Ordinary lives are then haloed in quiet beautiful ways. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the struggles which mark coupledom -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Evacuation by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Evacuation Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

As Summer Finds a Beginning

Sat, 26 Apr 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Summer is late in the city I stay in. There are discussions about it but no conclusions. Some say - enjoy the extended spring. Nobody minds, as there are high winds coming in from the south-west, and windows rattle. There is more time to get the air conditioners serviced. But the intimations of summer have not ceased. Much before the papers announced the hot days ahead, the mornings had started to get more humid. Joggers knew. Windows in cars started being closed and the air conditioning cranked up. Summer bushes along walking paths started flowering. Pink Bougainvillea, red frangipanis, yellow elders. Flower beds had amaranths, salvias and hollyhocks nodding away delightedly. And as I went to office, Red Road and the Victoria Memorial complex was strewn with gorgeous gulmohur and amaltas, the golden yellow shower tree, the purple jacaranda and the flaming royal poinciana. My drives every morning were ablaze with colour. And I knew though it was a welcome, things would unravel in different ways. The tar on the roads would start to melt, as would the barely hidden anger on the edges of side streets. People would tend to get tired faster and more irritated. Fuses would ignite and punches landed. Relationships would begin to unravel and truths told in harsh tones. People would fall into lust more than they fell in love. And there would be too many misdemeanours conducted by common people in commonplace ways. But legendarily people understand. Even as they fight and argue, they understand that the heat is a character in every situation. People make plans to go to the hills but some refuse. Summers are when they reveal themselves to their own. They write their most honest poetry. And understand the enormity of their misdemeanours- and do not hesitate to ask for forgiveness. Springs just make you glad, happy to be alive, perky without reason. Autumns are for deep depression, to think of the worst life has every given as just desserts: it's the time for seeking redemption. Winters are to freeze inside, to not reveal oneself. Everyone is too embroiled in one's own battles of seeking succour and warmth, to be able to think of being benevolent. But summer is when we allow everything to fall apart. Our clothes, our defences, our truths, our untruths. Even as the most iridescent flowers burst uncontrollably in colours which sometimes hurt the eyes, something soft inside wants to tell truths. It seems easier to give in then rebel, or wallow in stories with long lives. It's good to be ordinary and open. Summers are the time for both passions and truths to find their own paths of destruction or redemption. Whilst other seasons are one dimensional, summers are when the roads get forked, ready to form - or destroy you. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the the seasons of our world and lives -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sehnsucht by Sascha Ende Summer Dream Instrumental by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Sehssucht Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Summer_dream_instrumental Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Return to You

Sat, 19 Apr 2025 20:00:00 +0500

The riches of our lives, even when we are not searching for it, is like the journey of Santiago, the young Andalusian shepherd boy in Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist. The treasure is always nearby, always close. We just don't have the eyes for it. The treasure is often our search for meaning, sometimes it is the clarity we seek of what the fulcrum of our life is, so often it is our despair to put together the disparate parts of our lives into one knowing compass. Most often it is our search for a person who gives meaning to our lives. And we have to wander through our days and our dullness, the inequities and confusions, the seemingly directionless pull of our lives, the cornucopia of choices, or the dearth of choice. And we return home, tired, our ties crunched, our spirits defeated. No balm, no gentle commiseration, no time with the closest to us, seems to make a difference. And we keep searching, keep looking outwards, keep wondering what will give solace, give intent, bring significance. Who would be the compass and the companion, the commiserater and the catcher in the rye? And in our search for an adult cradle, even as we lie curled on the lap of someone we care for, laying bare our existential issues, we forget that possibly, this is the person who is both the destination and the means, the person who could hold us and lead us, the one who both understands and scolds, the one who is the wind beneath our wings and the first step of beauty in our lives. And in that realization, lies the gorgeous reconciliation of our search, as we realize that who we thought of as an accessory, a necessity, a cultural perk, a socio-economic order, a social necessity, often a burden, an enforced liability in the form of a gift, is actually purpose and direction, succour and signal, a parachute and a mattress. And in that realization we are like the prodigal son. Our return becomes then just a realization. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on elusive love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Der Kristall Ending by Sascha Ende Der Kristall the Glade by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/der-kristall-ending Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/der-kristall-the-glade Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Elegante Solitude

Sat, 12 Apr 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Aloneness is forced, solitude is a choice. Loneliness forces me unwillingly to be with myself. But solitude, as the great Montaigne said, gives me a chance to know how to belong to myself. A mental stand - and an entire outlook changes. But, of course, it is not so simple! Ironically in our worlds, we have to forcefully claim our aloneness, often to fight for it. It is antithetical, nay, antisocial, to voluntarily eschew company, and be alone. In its own way, it's a rejection of social norms, company, to say that 'hey I prefer myself to you.' We are all meant to be social animals, and nothing should deviate from that. If you seek droplets of solitude - that is acceptable. We need 'me-time'. That's hip. It's new age, recommended. But to deliberately and pointedly eschew company - to travel alone, to go to a film on one's own, to decline an invitation to a party for no reason whatsoever - is anathema, non-understandable, hence, well, 'unacceptable'! Because nobody can understand solitude. How can I explain its texture, its ability to embrace like a warm comforting room, to give the feeling of teetering on the edge and of being held at the same time, of getting the feeling of being with a stranger you know well, of discovering the undefinable in the person who's definition you thought you had down pat, of having the full force of freedom with oneself and of pulling oneself back all the time, of being excited because you've just said yes to something which all company would have abhorred. And one discovers what the great Soraya once said - "Sometimes being surrounded by everyone is the loneliest, because you’ll realize you have no one to turn to.” If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the loneliness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Time Is Now by Sascha Ende Colossus by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Time-Is-Now Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Colossus Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Come With Mud

Sat, 05 Apr 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Coming back, when you've slammed the door behind you, is not easy. Literally or metaphorically. There is too much history to deal with, to have it hit us again like hale. Fresh starts are rarely as heroic as in fiction, and there is too much pus oozing out of the pores of common history for it to be a conjoinment without terror or distress. We do not always desire recall, because rewinds bring with them memories of unbearable pain. But often there's a knock on the door which we cannot ignore. And we are forced to reach in to rediscover not the agony but the good times, we reluctantly revisit the residue of love, to seek the part of our heart and memory which our best selves house. And once the trickle begins, the flood is not far behind. There's nothing right or wrong, there's nothing good or bad. It's our life, and it's our best or flawed self finding its apogee or its nadir. In our search for happiness, we are ready to let hope triumph experience, to be reductive in our pessimism and let our beings be flooded with possibilities. Because intrinsically we are good people. What works and what doesn't is a matter of chance and opportunity, of desire and purpose, of intent and attitude. But to know we've given ourselves and the universe a chance for redemption is a simple acknowledgment that we are flawed, our lives are flawed, and we recognize that, and are ready to forgive and rise above the wallow of bitter memory. We are gorgeous because - unlike a lotus - we can float with the pelf inside us, not below. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on second chances in life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sehnsucht by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/sehnsucht Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Said I Love You First

Sat, 29 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0500

You have to say it first. You have to do it first. You have to use the words. You have to acknowledge what is burning inside you. You don't have to find a reason. You don't have to wait for an apposite season. Lack of Reciprocation, fear of rejection, the vulnerability of putting one's heart (one's ego?) on line. Life is a hurdle race and love is strewn with obstacles. In the magnificent tapestry we create of our own scars and wounds, a bulk of them - unmentioned, hushed - are self- inflicted. But they are also an atlas of our journey through the landscapes of angularities and anguish. They are markers of our journeys from which we can learn, recalibrate, reignite. Because - where's the time? We have to love in a hurry. Before anything else claims our time, mind, heart. Because nothing would be worth the wait. Just as, in the selfsame vein, we need to forgive first. We can't wait for the 'who's-right-or-who's-wrong' of it all. The moment regret visits our heart, we need to walk across, or pick up the phone, and say that most difficult of words - sorry. Because asking for forgiveness is a major component of love, going unrecognized because it is construed as compromise, a shame, a capitulation, when actually it is a show of strength, vulnerability masquerading as compromise, understanding standing with a hangdog expression asking for a rewind. Every moment is a vacuum. Waiting for us to fill it with what we feel is important. If we choose not to do anything, the universe rushes in - with its offerings, its insistences, its random temptations. The reason why we need love to be a driver for our life is because we can then choose it every minute, every time. Even if it feels premature or inchoate, and there's no stardust falling on us, we would have walked through the evolution of our own truths. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the confusions and insistences of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Dreamsphere2 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Dreamsphere2 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Assisted Suicide

Sat, 22 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I read about the famous economist Daniel Kahneman, author of 'Thinking fast and slow', opting to end ha life through assisted suicide, euthanasia. He went to Switzerland, and died. A friend and I were talking about it. And I remembered what Tanu and I have often discussed - Not to live if we become a permanent burden on someone. I told my friend, I was quite clear - I get to decide when I will end my life. But he asked a simple question - is your life only yours? And it made me pause. And as is my wont, I started writing to clear my head. First I wrote from the perspective of the one who has decided to end his life, and followed it with the feelings of the one who is left behind. And it wasn't an easy decision any longer. It's easy to say that our breath, our life, is a gift to us - and after that it's our decision as to what we want to do with it. But that also started sounding glib. Because the fact is that our breath, our life, is also a collective. We are made of the efforts, the hope springs, the heart carvings, the soul bindings, the body cravings, the thought mouldings of all who love and care for us. We start being someone and then are slowly changed and created out of what others see us as. What might start as an opinion, an illusion, starts getting recreated. We then are what we make of ourselves, but are also deeply vented and grooved by what our world thinks of us. No, we no longer remain our own. If our presence makes a difference to the lives of someone else, we are not only our own. If our mere breath gives solace to someone else, we are not our own. If mere presence, without words, without effort, makes someone's life feel complete, then our life is not merely ours. And that, if nothing else, needs to give us pause, before we decide to go to the next realm. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on deaths and similar journeys -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Movie extract by Sascha Ende A Sad Toy Story by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/movie-extract Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/a-sad-toy-story Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Call Myself a Poet

Sat, 15 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I often feel that as a poet I am destined to live through the infliction, the gain and the loss, the incandescence and the darkness, of a continuing bruise. I have to confront too many truths, and make sense of them, I have to face the world with too much honesty, and to crack open too many of my lies and illusions. I feel alone, trying to tell the story so I camouflage the truth, to iron up to rebuffs and to the reality of losing space. To know that I am both a mirror and a weapon, though I profess I'm just an agent of stories whose words sometimes seem like a lunging sabre. When all I do is to sit on a desk alone, with a single bulb throwing shadows on my notebook, a pen which makes a scraping noise as I write, shovelling out the detritus of memory, scraping my heart and soul for revelations, which would help me unravel my own mystery. Why do I do what I do, why does the universe pull me towards disaster and then helps me flee, why do I rebuff destiny, why do I run away from sanctuary? And then I stop in my heels, and realize that I know. I'm merely being the poet that I am. No more, no less. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the absolute glory of being a poet -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/sleepers Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Last Legs of the Day

Sat, 08 Mar 2025 10:00:00 +0500

So much of life is of journeys, just the way death is the final one. Of course, I'm not only talking of trapezing around the world, country to country, city to city, in innumerable trips. I am also referring to metaphorical and metaphysical journeys. The ones which reveal the greatest of mysteries - of what we truly are. The journey inside. Because that's where the truth of our sighs and lights resides, of what haunts us in the night and of what drives us in the morn. Of what irritates us, what irrigates us, what parches us, what floods us. We learn to recognize people who freeze us, and the ones who free us. How at times we become blithe spirits when alone, and how we are completely imprisoned even as we move around in company. Who are we if not responses to our own stimuli? Who are we if not found persons, dug out of our own excavations and discoveries? Because in life and in death, however many our encounters, accidents or conjoinments, we finally keep meeting ourselves. And, without comparison, it is the greatest unravelling. Because journeys help us shed skin, help us become raw and open, vulnerable to our own revelations, to see our deeper fears, and what we are but also what we can be. In the world of circumstances, we are both the greatest possibility and the meanest retraction. Inside us, our wings are tightly-folded. And there's no need to fly in the crowds, as there is enough space to hide, from people and from ourselves. But, journeys give us a chance to unfold those unused wings, renew our promise to the universe, and to slowly, timidly, then surely, learn how to fly again. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on different kinds of journeys -

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Tenderly

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0500

What are we if not the ones who crave for second chances. And what is this world if not a place which is spatially abundant but trajectorily linear. An opportunity lost, a call not made, an apology kept back, a feedback reined, a love abandoned. Life is a compulsive giver. It's we who are blindsided with the cornucopia of choice - mistakenly thinking that life will keep giving. That we will keep rebuffing its generosity, with impatience, with disdain, with ego, and we will keep getting what we want. But even the universe gets tired. When it sees its largesse being rejected, being thrown asunder with impunity, of being taken for granted, it just takes its plentitude elsewhere. That's why trying to get back what we've lost, trying to bring back whom we've lost, are often exercises in futility. Apart from the context being changed, the dominoes having shifted, the reference points getting lost, the heat and light which accompanies first crushes and initial rushes simply do not find any resonance when time shifts reference points. When time and tide bring other people and more contexts which are eager to adopt the universe's gifts, the munificence shifts. Our rejection of the other then leaves us bereft and alone. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the touchy-feelness of departures -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Pullman City Hard by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/pullman-city-hard Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Love Actually (more & mess)

Sat, 22 Feb 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Love they say Is the mess you invite, The mess you make And the mess you leave behind.) It's a flash, it's a paint, It's basil in the soup. It's a kite which finds the sky Because its cut loose. It's a shore being tugged by the sea, It's the moon staying on in the morn, It's the sunshade in a roadside cafe, It's the chef's apron he can't take off. It's the brownie you crave, It's a drink you like strong, It's a glass too many in a pub, It's a staid party and you want to pole-dance. It's the chilly flake on your pizza, It's a fondue too hot, It's the tandoor crispening your roti, It's the buttered part of the toast. It's the street which you love, It's the bend in the lane, It's the view which you search When the highway is long. It's the blood you give in a camp Though you don't know its journey's end. It's the ticket which you get When you park too long. It's the sock which you wear, It's the inner to keep you warm, It's the tattered shirt on the hanger, The torn jeans you don't mind. It's as warm as worn-out slippers, A curtain which can't be still, It's a dream which won't let go, It's when you're awake though long-gone. It's your song sung in a foreign tongue, It's a glimpse you get in a throng, It's the thong you see on a mannequin, It's when you are hungry in a rich repast. It's the sigh of a dream unfinished, It's breathlessness after you run a mile, It's a vein blocked in your body, It's your heart going still, at first light. When was love ever tea sipped alone? When was it ever just dawn's first shine? It's the hale which cracks the wind-shield, It's when its clear and you're snow-bound. It's your semen in a condom, It's a baby you might not want. But when you hold it uncertainly It's, finally, the world you find in your arms. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the gorgeous mystery of love -

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Sometimes We Remember So Hard

Sat, 15 Feb 2025 20:00:00 +0500

So much of life is about forked roads and where we choose to lead ourselves. If we are vigorous about living, we would give little time to ourselves to reconsider or think back to our choices. We ensure that our lives overflow, each minute tumbling into another almost breathlessly, with little time left for reflection or regret. But oftentimes, on a tired evening, when a passing strain of hopelessness seeps into us, and nothing seems to be right - the ones who are closest seem far away, and circumstances weigh us down in the name of destiny - we try to fathom the mystery of choices, and think back to the forked road. And think about lost chances, of what might have been, of what we could be, of who we could have been with. Memories come rushing in - words ignored, questions answered wrongly, those we professed to love taken for granted. It could all have happened aeons ago, but it suddenly seems like yesterday. And we try to think of where the lost ones might be, what could they be doing, who they might be with - and whether, in some balmy sighing night, they think of us. And what would it be like to be called again, or what would they say if we call them? Whether their number would be the same, whether they would recognise our voices, whether their voices would suddenly flood with emotion. Or just remain neutral, unfeeling, silent. Whether at all they ever think of us, the way we are thinking of them? And we wonder that though we might not go back to having the luxury of changing our choice, but whether there is ever a future for a remembered past? If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loss and regret -

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I Would Hate To Be That Man

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I fear disuse. I fear lack of purpose. Not necessarily in terms of conclusions but more in terms of direction. Whatever I do, I feel good to think it adds something somewhere. No, I'm not thinking of increasing the national GDP or my fame or fulfill a spouse's desire. I think of it more in terms of experience. Where nothing goes waste. It could be anything - a film which knocks the daylight out of me, music which haunts me through the day, a shadow I see lengthening as I lay in the winter sun, the unceasing drip of an incurable tap as I sit reading, of sitting silently with my dad as he nods off to sleep, of letting my mum tell a story from her childhood a millionth time because old experiences are her mainstay now. But I grow older, and have started to forget. What gives me sustenance are traces of the life I have lived and am living. Because that is what experience does - it makes you alive in the moment - and the moment consequently never ends. I am keenly aware, with each passing day, of how life seems long but days turn out to be so short. And before I know months have gone by, and then years. And I have nothing to show for them. Not in memories, not in the senses. And I ask myself - 'what have I got this life for?' And I battle for a full day, and consequently a full life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on embracing life -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Flucht Romeo's Erne by Sascha Ende Childhood by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Flucht Romeo's Erne Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Childhood Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Waiting for My Flight to Chennai at the Kolkata Airport

Sat, 01 Feb 2025 20:00:00 +0500

We are all strangers singularly and a brotherhood en masse. With a seamless earth and a sky being shared between us, in spite of boundaries - of homes, cities, countries, continents, hearts, colour - we cannot but be similar, looking out for each other and being there lending a hand when we see the other struggle. The tragedy of borders is their illusion of easy divisibility. But a line drawn is a slash on a heart which in spite of divisions seeks conjoinment. In thought, religion, spirit or opinion. How can we be anything less than a whole? If a million stars can be a galaxy, and adorn the skies with their synergetic beauty, how can millions of us be merely individuals, concentrating on differences, trying to find our fulfilments alone, and not strive for connections? I love the idea of all of us solitary as a reality, but being part of a collective as a necessity. It could be the way our parents are the nurturers and the caregivers, to the way we marry and start our own broods, seeking and getting succor and shoulders. It's not a case of quid pro quo but a primordial need. We are not meant to be alone - however much we might do a Thoreau. And if we can be at one with a partner why can't it be with a collective, a mass, a country, across countries? In the hullabaloo of our own egos and existences, we forget we are lesser alone, as soon enough we start to struggle with the minutiae of our solitary existences, wondering where time went, wondering why we are not what we can really be. In the schemata of life's design, we are made independent by body, but are never enough in brain or brawn to pull the entirety of our existence alone. It is my firm belief that it is the universe's strategy, its design, that we are made adequate, but lesser - so we can reach out, join hands and find both the strength and the comfort of being in each other's company and support. We are more because we are more, lesser when we are less. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the need for being solitary and together -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Walking Into The Winter Sun

Sat, 25 Jan 2025 20:00:00 +0500

I sometimes wonder if there is anything comparable to the generosity of a morning? Once you force yourself up, the cornucopia of the universe is laid out for our delectation. The sun is at its most benevolent, the birds are full-throated, the flowers are sleepy and demure, the air is soft even as it bites, the leaves are brittle, letting themselves to be crunched to a satisfying exuberance. The trees above are in a state of measured chaos. Bushes which have grown thick have deep caverns and shadows, inviting exploration. The smaller bushes are like poodles itching to run away. My walking path has a large amoeba-shaped pond, which suddenly appears as you take a turn, and it bares its shimmering heart to the red of dawn. And the canopy of trees is a filter for light, throwing dimples and moving tapestries as I walk. And I enter this treasure room, as an auberge of hope, a safe place to replenish, an energy drink to jumpstart one's nerves. A morning is a kriya, a dawn is a kripa, as we walk purposefully for a life, which is nothing but an opportunity to find meaning in everything we find beauty in. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the whispers of mornings -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Medieval Tabletop Session by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/lonely-fish Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Immersion by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/childhood Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Perpetrators & Victims of Love

Sat, 18 Jan 2025 20:00:00 +0500

Our lives are a collage of a thousand scraps of random, and often irreconcilable, happenstances and mistakes and decisions thrown onto a canvas of existence. Love is often the most decisive happening of our lives, often trooping in unannounced and more often than not, grossly disrupting our lives - and mostly overstaying beyond our comprehension. We are both perpetrators and victims of love, even as we are the helpless receptacles, seeing ourselves change - beyond our own comprehension. All because we are in love. Love makes us reactive, even as we grow generous, imaginative, fiery, beautiful and gentle. It is the only thing in the world which shows us the good and the bad we are perfectly capable of. We become both warriors and gentle creatures. Meek to suggestion, fiery to defend. Beyond ambition, beyond our need for fulfilment, love gives us justification. The question then is never of right or wrong, of the ethics of choice or decision, it's of direction. The question is of being consumed, of being in the shadows and the sunlight. Unbehest to our senses, when love enters our lives, our stars immediately realign - we are then not ourselves but of our destiny. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the quiet advent of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Medieval Tabletop Session by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/medieval-tabletop-session Licence: https://filmmusic.io/song/medieval-tabletop-session Immersion by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/immersion Licence: https://filmmusic.io/song/immersion

Different Ways in Which You Can Fail to Say Thank You

Sat, 11 Jan 2025 20:00:00 +0500

It's basic good manners they say, possibly one of the first things taught to a child, the most primal form of grace. The importance of, nay, the necessity of saying 'thank you'. But ever so often, we are taught the semantics but not the emotion which needs to go along with it. And there lies the crunch. Because we start noticing the gap, the inadequacy of a formal thank you, particularly in the closest of close relationships. One theory says (in the form of twisting an immortal line) that "Love means never having to say thank you". The other end of the spectrum says that you can't take love for granted - and every little thing done is to be observed, embraced and acknowledged. And I struggle with my thank yous. So I substitute the verbal with the act. A deed for a deed. Maybe immediately - likely not - maybe later. But I keep the memory like a blessing laid on my door - to be embraced, taken home, nurtured, never forgotten. It's not a question of equalising a favour and then moving on as if a debt has been repaid. It's more like a flame, to ensure it keeps on burning in some form or the other - as a 'pay-it-forward', as a habit, as a friend-in-need, as as a karmic credit, as a sign of being the person that I really am. Folded deep in the warm embrace of a thank you, in word or deed, is the gift of accepting that we are complete only with each other, that alone, we are exactly that - alone. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the absolute glory of kindness and ordinariness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Dreamsphere 7 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/458-dreamsphere-7 Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Stranger In Me

Sat, 04 Jan 2025 21:28:19 +0500

I sometimes look at myself and wonder who I am. I surprise myself often with the way I react into situations or the way I say things, and I look back and wonder if it was me there. Sometimes it is something outright unpleasant, and I'm completely ashamed of myself. But I also love the times I surprise myself with my own generosity or wisdom, of what I am capable of saying or doing. And then I sit back and wonder about how, after so many decades of knowing myself, of living in my own skin, of having gone through millions of situations, expected and unexpected, I can still surprise myself. And then the vital realization comes - if I am a stranger to myself, then how can I ever expect anybody to understand me? And that really is a sobering thought, because one of the things which we always struggle with is the question of not being understood by the other. It is a tragedy of a kind that we are strangers to ourselves, but want complete familiarity from the one we love the most. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the pain of loneliness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Spring Bloom by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/9216-spring-bloom Licence: Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/12335-battlefield-heroes

I Have Often Thought About God

Sat, 28 Dec 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Our relationship with the almighty is a complex one. I have grown up with an atheist father (he calls himself agnostic, but the search never ends), and a mother who grew up as an Arya Samaji, so 'believe in yourself, believe in no idols'. Dad was a man of science, well-read, an engineer, hence well versed in his arguments against the presence of god, per se. As a family on holiday, we only visited temples if they were scenic - which of course meant that I have climbed more hills and trekked more miles than any faithful might have done, just to reach a gorgeous temple set on the top of a mountain or of an architecture which could make you swoon. But as time went by, at some level, the serenity of a church or the calmness of a Jain temple or the incredible noisy and emotional faith of the throngs in front of a Hindu temple, got to me. I stopped trying to determine the logic of religion, its genesis of fear or need, and gave into the feeling it evoked. I could somewhat understand what some people could do for god, where their faith came for, and how seductive was the thought that there was somebody who, finally, guided their destiny, irrespective of what they did - and that there was meaning to it all. Even as a basic philosophy it made sense - do the action, let the fruits evolve. I'm aware of the symbolism embedded in the stories of miracles and victories of gods. But I love stories of piety and sacrifice more. Of gods, of human beings who could be gods. And I love it when I sit inside a temple, a shrine or a church, and find my thoughts change their tone and tenor. I grow calmer, thoughts of reconciliation start forming. I am a better person just for being there. I feel we are our full-formed thoughts. Our essence sleeps inside us in an amorphous, sometimes inchoate, form. Whatever alchemizes them into being, a fully-alive gentle, generous, forgiving, kind self, is gold. Or maybe god. For me, there's no better reason, or definition. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how we struggle with god -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Der Kristall the Glade by Sascha Ende Der Kristall Ending by Sascha Ende

The Happiest Couple You Will Ever See

Sat, 21 Dec 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I think if we did a dipstick survey of happy couples, we'd find an overwhelming number who aren't. No surprises. Nobody ever knows what happens behind closed doors. Hurts run deep like rivers which cut through ancient rocks, till you can only see the sunrises above them and not the deep gorges they've created. Our primitive instincts call out to us to conjoin, cohabit. But nature also gives us the complex tapestry of emotions, often irreconcilable, with the uncanny ability to bruise. And the scars we get reduce us as human beings, because what is revealed is our worst selves, more often than not as enforced derivatives, and not reflections of what we truly are. I'm convinced that some of the terrible things we do, do not always arise out of vestigial truths, but are generated afresh as weaponry against unprovoked attacks. Simply said - there are some people who have the unerring ability to take the worst out of us - a side we don't even know exists. But we are magnificent, because we are humans. We forbear, we camouflage, we often forgive. There's something called the big picture, and in its altar, we also find our best selves. We survive the worst of coupledom, the anarchy often wrought on us, because something inside stands up for us, as an instinct to be more than a merely reactive beast. In a world of iniquitous battles, we are our own flag-bearers, our national song, our moral compass, our survival guide. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the difficulties in relationships -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Medieval Tabletop Session by Sascha Ende

I Heard That You Just Set Off on a Journey

Sat, 14 Dec 2024 20:00:00 +0500

What do you do when a friend dies? The one friend who spoke softly and was beside you in the best and worst of times. What can you say except that's it's just too soon. That, if an end was inevitable, why would someone so sweet and kind ever have to go through the pain he had to go? That why would an affliction like cancer affect someone who had not harmed a fly in his life. I look at his photograph and I think of the times we'd shared. From college, through our respective marriages, to having our kids, to this, now this. Someone in deep sorrow had once said that god is in desperate need of good people up there, that's why the nicest of them all are being called up. I can well believe that. Too many people I've loved have died. All much before their time. But then - when is it too soon? As an individual, in relationships? Is age the criteria or unfinished work? Or the fact that infinite potential suddenly grows cold? Often when I see someone put on ventilators and other desperate means to keep breath going, though it's clear that the person is well nigh gone, I wonder if we should not dignify death and just let it come and take a person away. What is the use of letting pain eat away a good man's soul? We reconcile to every death, because it is the fact we live with, but the hauntings rarely go away. The missed opportunities of shared times, the softness of a smile remembered, the unexpected visit, the phone call when most needed. There is no substitute to the care a good friend can give. There then becomes a life before and a life after. However much the routines of daily life engulf us, loved ones we lose are air pockets of emptiness, which we hit and plunge endlessly. We survive but our existence gets tied into knots, which we spend a lifetime unravelling. Losing someone dear and close is to lose the possibilities of myriad conversations and things we could be. Because we change for and because of the people we love. And when we lose them, there is always a part of us which lies orphaned. As a body grows cold, there's a part of us which also stratifies and freezes into eternal sorrow. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on passing on -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Positano by Otis Galloway

In Memory & Mist

Sat, 07 Dec 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Every morning I walk into a small shrine, housed by Ganesh and Laxmi, and ask for a blessing for someone in my life. It could be anyone who I feel requires the touch of divine that day. It could be for someone passing through a tiring time, someone who is worried about outcomes, a couple which has just hitched, a colleague who has a presentation, a friend grieving, or for someone I know as a happy person and I seek a blessing for her not to lose her joy. I have survived, been saved, been held together, been forgiven, been born. And I've been held in arms whilst in incipient flight, till I could learn how to soar. And I in turn keep wishing fervently, that I'm the person who can make a difference in the lives of all who are with me, around me, for me, against me, but who need a touch, some wings, some air to find their flight. Otherwise, what are we in this beautiful world for? We are changed and blessed because of a multitude who we don't even realize are working for us, as a collective or individually. Silent partners, as it were, the nameless, the unspeaking. In the midst of turmoil, strife, petty battles, small injuries, unrelenting scars, often it is the smallest of thoughts or deeds which become the benediction and the very direction of our lives. We are blessed because of the blessings of people who don't give up on us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on love steeped in nostalgia -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - About Moments by Sascha Ende

Why I Disagree With The Moon

Sat, 30 Nov 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We need to walk straight, with our spine erect. There's no other way. We need to know ourselves - what keeps us abreast of ourselves, beyond the bullshit requirements of the world. There's the sinister expectation of people who plant redemption of their failures on us, and coat it in aphorisms both sweet and compelling. We are sold because we love people and hope to keep them happy. We feel it's incumbent that those who reach out to us are a challenge, a benediction, an opportunity, a duty to be addressed. There couldn't be bigger lies. We need to cease being reflected glory. We need to own ourselves. We need to find our own catastrophes and disasters. The springs and the geysers, the continental drift and the tectonic plates, the fissures and the gush. Because in the entirety of our acceptance lies the way to find new skies. We need to become a bold moon not afraid to challenge the sun in a morning sky. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on moons an d suns -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Walking Towards the Light by Musiclfiles Majestic Autumn by Musiclfiles

Replay - Those Days of a Lost Summer

Sat, 23 Nov 2024 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it! Youth is so wasted on the ones who carry it as a burden. The changes which wreck havoc to the body and heart are later looked back at as the sweetest damnation possible, irreplaceable but never ever lived through fully. We all know and understand the alchemy of a moment richly lived, but still let it pass us by ruthlessly, unthinkingly. Why do we consider time as a rich man’s wealth, when it can’t be hoarded or spent endlessly? In its strange and beautiful equalities, we realise it is the only thing bequeathed equitably to all. But we are fooled by time’s serene passage, lulled to forget its irrevocability. And in that lassitude we end with half-lives. In our puzzling pursuit of things which finally matter little - lucre instead of light, breath in lieu of breathlessness - we take away the most precious gift we could give ourselves. And when we realize our folly, often it is with nothing left in our banks - not health, not inclination, not circumstances - and what is lost is a glow, and the possibility of finding light - and being it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the summers of our lives -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Positive Way Of Hope Piano Solo by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7522-the-positive-way-of-hope-piano-solo
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Dawn in Hampi

Sat, 16 Nov 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I am so engrossed in the theatrics of my mind that I often forgot that there is a world outside which has been gifted to me to revel in, to find pleasure and meaning in. Getting too intertwined in myself is often the bane of my existence, as I lose purpose in my desperation to resolve the quotidian quibble or the boredom riddle. Time and again, seeing myself immerse in the labyrinthine issues of daily grind, whilst failing to notice that life is desperately trying to grab my attention, is to also lose a potential way to unravel the knots of my very being. The times serenity descends on me as I see the water boil for my morning tea, or I stand at the window and watch a flawless sunset find its night, or listen to the cadence of a loved one's voice as they talk of normal things or when the doorbell rings and my heart leaps as I know who it is. Suddenly, priorities get sorted out, issues get resolved. Later, much later, do I realize that the true path to the universe inside me comes through the vagaries outside, as I cut though the noise, and find that the world is much more then a mere domicile for me for my desires and ambitions, and offers a journey of senses and fulfilments. Everything I could ever want is merely a question of merging what's outside to what is inside. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on mornings and cities -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - A Bright Star in the Sky by Musiclfiles Mystic Mediation by Frank Schroeter

That Dull Boring Place Called Life

Sat, 09 Nov 2024 20:00:00 +0500

As we age, we hark back to the ordinary. After we've seen it all, our sense of wonder might not have dimmed, but it does become selective. And we know that though there is no end to discoveries, we find even a still moment is rich in repast. And without wallowing in nostalgia, we remember simpler times. And we remember the glow of presence. No details are required, because the feeling remains. And we realize in all the iterations of love, the one which abides is of letting the ordinary surround us. And we start the transition from being a participant to becoming an engender, from walking into sunlight to being the sunlight And we ease into the slow gold of easy conversation, the easygoing minute. Home is an excitement and an evening out is a cafe which allows leisurely lingering. And in that transition, we embrace the beauty of boredom. Of recognizing that life's bounty is often nothing but the steady elongation of the pause between the storms we invariably step into every morning. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on life and times -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Follow That Dream by Luca Fraula

An Ordinary Poem On Love

Sat, 02 Nov 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I write so much on so many things. Relationships is a recurrent topic, as I traverse myriad emotions. Because of them my heart and my mind are my poetry labs, and I'm never bereft of things to write about. And I'm amazed at the discoveries. Day in day out I find new ways in which I can hurt - and get hurt. There are old fault lines which never get repaired, and fresh wounds which find their way into scars. Its facetious to say this is the cost of being in love, the price one pays to be vulnerable and open to both bliss and hurt. Because much more than being, love is a realisation. Because beyond its craggy transversion, it's a discovery of all the good residing in us, things we didn't know about ourselves, the essential purity which actually defines us. Beyond the drudgery, jaggedness,and angularity - which often becomes our character's annotation - lies the still clear water of shadows and sunlight, the beauty of which even we don't realize until the clear sight of love discovers it. Because at the bottom of it, love is action. It is giving beyond our urgencies, our insipidity, our masquerade : love is the only emotion allowed entry into our fears, our secrets, our failures, the essence of us. The dawning of this, with the advent of love, is to find the treasure each one of us really is. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loss and desolation -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Positano by Otis Galloway

That Ordinary Lie

Sat, 26 Oct 2024 20:00:00 +0500

What is the ethical and practical length we would go to save a relationship or a situation or ourselves? Is our segue into safety always self-protection and a rapid walk through a portal of lies? Or do we girdle up, step up, chin up - and say the truth (and nothing but the truth), consequences be damned. Or do we tell ourselves - let's be practical. Let every situation determine our choice of what we say. We become chameleons of ethics, as it were. Maybe a person can't handle a particular truth and things would become bad (if not worse than bad). Or maybe you will finally tell the truth - but by and by. But there is also the question of the little lies, the white ones, the ones which slip into togetherness like a whisper in the softness of a mutual feeling. The ones which seem harmless - but which, when they start getting recognised, chip away soundlessly at the very foundation of what the relation stands for. But then there is also the nature of the congenital liar, as also the one for whom self-preservation - name, blame, fame - is primary. Where stories become second nature, and lies are a permanent armour. This then is not second nature - it is nature. But most problematic, if not tragic, is when we don't want to lie, but decide to. Where the only immutable thing we've ever known is the conscience. But we still decide to lie, against the very fibre of our being. The very act then puts us into the dungeons of despair, when we know we've broken the first rule of relationships - trust. And even more than that, we've fallen in our eyes. A self-reductionist act, a diminishing, a shrinking. There's a world of guilt one transverses into. A lifelong affliction. An unfolding of the soul, as we look at ourselves with both disdain and despair, the questioning never ceasing, the wheel of cause-&-effect stopping at the choice, a self-damnation. A lie is then not a compromise, but a self-condemnation, a hanging without death. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on lies and truths -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Crescendo by Alexander Nakarada

Before Bruises Become Wounds

Sat, 19 Oct 2024 20:00:00 +0500

George Meyer, a co-writer on The Simpsons, referred to marriage as “a stagnant cauldron of fermented resentments, scared and judgmental conformity, exaggerated concern for the children . . . and the secret dredging-up of erotic images from past lovers in a desperate and heartbreaking attempt to make spousal sex even possible.” There's bitterness and cynicism there. That's a relationship at its very nadir, where there seems to be little hope for redemption. But, of course, that's not how things always work. Most relationships work in the twilight zone. Part incandescent, part dark. Not so much hate or love, as simmer and freeze. And as is true with most extremities, there's a sense of humanity lost, of balance skewed, confronting more of what's lost then loss itself. But we are humans: the more we hurt someone, the more we require healing; when falling out is often synonymous with falling down; and more we push people away, more we need them beside us. The tragedy of people who injure others is not that they use their ability to draw blood, it is how much they would like to be the one who would rather bleed. Their natural disdain is for themselves - their lowest opinion is reserved for their own weaknesses. They are fragile waiting to be broken, to be destroyed, to find meaning in their extinction and maybe their exhumation. Those who create tragedy are themselves tragediennes. So much of the grace of good gurus is nothing but to teach not to judge and merely embrace what seems to be imploding in front of one's eyes. Souls are redeemed by the mere act of acknowledgement. The words "I understand" have saved innumerable lives. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the desolation in relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rising Sun by Sascha Ende

Whilst Looking at a Newlywed Couple and Thinking of All Our Years

Sat, 12 Oct 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Relationships are such journeys! Once you get into one, one prepares for the long haul. Railroad crashes, car rides, boring flights. The odd distraction, the unwilling participation, and the rare view of the Kanchenjunga through impenetrable clouds. One wishes for transcendence and encounters reality checks. In our closest relationships we discover our worst selves. But then a few things start to change. A few things seem to find their niche with a satisfying click. You start seeing things together and find consonance in your reactions. Slivers of light seem to come out of the brokenness. Our sharp edges transcend to become rough surfaces. And we start to redefine the definition of 'smooth': the chiding, the irritations, the battles, all become quiddities - to be paid attention to, but not with emotional equity. And suddenly the uncertain universe starts taking the shape of two. Habits behove relationships. Habits knit into relationships. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which reminisce on the passage of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Satisfaction by Sascha Ende

I Have Been Thinking of Life Again

Sat, 05 Oct 2024 20:00:00 +0500

So much of our lives is a choice between the hard rock and a soft landing. Time and again we struggle, forgetting this is one life, and just a few million breaths. Beyond that, it's retribution. Endings are rarely spectacular. Because, we are all slaves to our insecurities, our fears holding us tightly. And it is in very rare occasions of singular clarity and fearless realisations that we let ourselves go. We blindly let the universe take us into places we would never dream of. And we find our nightmares to be illusions. And the coyotes we get to run with are the only honest beasts we know, who will hunt with us, and will find their one peaceful corner when the time comes, just as they leave us to ours. Our lives are richer for the wildness we keep seeking outside - and inside. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the mysteries of life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Andromeda by Sascha Ende

Home Tonight

Sat, 28 Sep 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I'd written this poem years back. I can't even remember the context or the time. But it brings an overwhelming feeling of loneliness, of evanescence - of people and loves who move on, always too soon it seems. Parting seems like demise, and its irrevocable passage doesn't make it any easier. Bitter lovers have often talked of such periods as those of wasted opportunity, as if anything which doesn't have a classic consequence or a desired denouement is a phase in futility. The fallacy of endings being more important than the rush of the journey. But those who know about transience, who know that life is only a zen exercise, an observance of moments, know how life is both accumulation and movement, of experiencing and moving on. All my poet friends keep telling me "Don't wallow in nostalgia! It is treacly. Too much sentimentality is dangerous to health." Maybe. What I do love doing is to think back and smile. Of having reconciled with what travels, what hurts, what sustains, what follows, what stays. And of looking back at it all, as the hurt and gain of irrevocable passage. f you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on departures -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Golden Journey Under The Sky of Autumn by Musiclfiles

Quietly Yours

Sat, 21 Sep 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Ara (who goes by the name 'petrichara' on Instagram) writes "someone who allows you to rest is the relationship dynamic of all time". And I think - it's not only people but places too. Places we're familiar with, places which allow us to ease into ourselves. Like a home. Where we know everything, where everyone knows us, and all we have to be is what we are in our own skin. And often when we move in our home with awareness, we find the new in the old, messages we hadn't got earlier, congruities we hadn't encountered before. We know our home's oddities to be our own, we find its nooks suffused with hidden histories, and it is our witness and sanctuary. A home is a friend, silently seeing us unwind or unravel with equal sang-froidness. Familiar people, familiar places are a boon to our hearts, solace to our souls, as we step into the unfamiliarities of an unforgiving world. We start our days, unaware what it would bring, our guards up, a thin tensile strain keeping our spine straight. Are we funny, are we competent, have we met the world on its terms without losing ourselves, have we stamped it with our individualities? The modern-day stress we keep hearing about is merely a result of these unmeasurable presences of a normal day. When we step into our homes, leaving our shoes and artifices behind, it's the medicine, the panacea, the equaliser, which brings us back to our sanities. We would be deranged without our homes. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the healing and beauty of homes -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - True summer love by Musiclfiles Tranquil Fields Peaceful by Alexander Nakarada

Recalibrating Dawns

Sat, 14 Sep 2024 20:00:00 +0500

The relentless agency of living, its insistencies to persist - until it no longer could - its proclivity for drama, its calmness to tired souls: that's one way to see life, when you are about to give up on things, when there seems to be no redemption to distress, when life seems to be an unending travail - something which doesn't give up even when you are ready to. And you search for a reason to carry on. Viktor Frankl said "Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'." But, alas, you simply can't find a reason - and you can't let go. So you strain to come out every morning. And you see that the ones who are always present are - the sun, the morning, the birds. They find joy without anticipation. They find a sense of being in the very act of repetition. Without expectation, without thinking of the past or future, just letting the nature of what is uncontrollable to do what it does best, and going along with the repetition and the ride. And you step back, and look at this with a new eye. Not as a wound which doesn't heal, not as pain which keeps nagging incessantly. You start to look at it as benediction, a faith that things will unravel the way they have to, that agony is not preordained reality - rather, to be in the incident of life is to be in the full glow of its grace. And everything changes. You look at life with new eyes. Not as anticipation or affliction, not as scar or suture, not as the space between sighs and celebration, but as presence, as stillness, as sanity. The time to create, and find the beyond. Because that is where we always find ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of healing tired souls -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rising Sun by Sascha Ende https://filmmusic.io/en/song/86-rising-sun

I Can Sense Her Loneliness

Sat, 07 Sep 2024 20:00:00 +0500

How much we are afraid to say what often simply needs to be said. It's an unavoidable fact - the conversations we avoid are the conversations we require the most. Often we are afraid to face the black-&-white of the spoken truth, often we fear the unpredictability of confrontations. Maybe, in the past, we've had to face the consequences of a scathing talk, and have now sworn to avoid anything which has the potential to break or hurt, welt or injure. But subtly, irrevocably, what lies unspoken also changes us as persons, as it does our relationships. On the surface, a calm descends. The need to avoid conflict overwhelms the need for stark truths. And the elephant sits fat and solid in the room, munching away time, growing fat on what's unspoken. And by including avoidance in the definition of love, we chip away at truths. We become politer but less honest, we want to confront monsters by pretending they don't exist. In the song of life, we try hard to avoid the discordant note, and thus lose the soul required to give love not only its longevity but its singular breath. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loneliness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Loneliness by Sayan Mukherjee

Old Friends

Sat, 31 Aug 2024 20:00:00 +0500

What is important to us? This question needs to be asked every morning, because weeks, which have been days, soon become years, and when we look back, we find that things have changed and people have drifted. It's not that we lose ourselves in the trivial. It's how we let things subtract our lives rather than add to it. And we regret the time where we let go of opportunities to be with people who mean everything to us, or do things which we feared at that time and now regret not doing. Time and again we are told to live in the moment, to embrace the passage of time, to know that living in the moment is the only way to find meaning. Time and again we regret not embracing it, and to let go of the opportunity which life gives us.

Akin to this are the small stones of resentment which grow inside us, sometimes slowly, sometimes rapidly, for people we care for, which become boulders stopping us from reaching out.

When we look back we can see the reasons of withdrawal were so slight that in the schemata of lives, sorrows and admonitions, they really counted for nothing. But then we would have wasted time, we would have wasted years.

We would have lost out on someone holding our hands in grief. We would have lost out in hearing voices with laughter in them speaking to us. We would have lost out in seeing familiar faces in front of us, growing more loved by the minute, because we love their mind and their heart and what they stand for and what they mean to us.

More than anything else, it is people we should always reach out to and be close to and pick up the phone and talk to, because our true meaning comes from only two things: the things which we do, the people we reach out to.

Our lives are always lesser when not filled with who or what we love. And in turn we are lesser as people.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of friendship -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Spring fervour full version by Musiclfiles Mystical autumn by Musiclfiles

The Party is Outraged!!!

Sat, 24 Aug 2024 20:00:00 +0500

It's been a tumultuous few days.

According to WHO, one person is murdered every 60 seconds in this world. One person commits suicide about every 40 seconds. One person dies in armed conflict every 100 seconds.

And busy with our quotidian struggles, we let the numbers swirl around our consciousness before slipping away. Until one day, our blasé conscience finds something which goes beyond even our overburdened shock meter.

And in strange infinitesimal ways, our world shifts.

Something inside us breaks - and something else breaks open. The overwhelming feeling that a public tragedy is a personal visitation, beyond a dining table conversation, starts to haunt us. The tragedy becomes our own.

We want to go beyond the pale of our usual cynicism - "what will change? what can change?" - and want to demand change.

Of course, the patient procrastination of officialdom, the slow overtures of bureaucracy, the survival instincts of political whataboutery kicks in - as do attempts to wear us down.

And we understand the strategies, we know how we will grow angrier and progressively frustrated - and our lives will begin to call, our duties will come to the fore. Our livelihoods will begin to be at stake - and we do give up. But we don't give in.

For we know the long game too.

Along the years we have also learnt the power of giving the long rope. We know that beyond the immediate sufferance, there are a few knockout blows which we hide beneath our sleeves. The streets, the polls, protests, poems, a non-cooperation movement, emptying halls where they speak, refusing their doles, walking out in the middle of speeches, a continual call to conscience.

Beyond the pale of greed and corruption, which we all see and bear on a daily basis, we unite ourselves from cynicism, of not giving up because struggles often take years, maybe generations. We ensure that the blow is significant, and political parties, for years to come, will remember that those who bring them to power can never ever be taken for granted.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of what politics does to all of us -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Refugees by Sascha Ende https://filmmusic.io/en/song/539-refugees

Memories of Sex Addiction

Sat, 17 Aug 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Who are we if not slaves to our addictions? In the annals of definitions, we are often what we are at our worst. Which is the world's way of prioritising simply - and slotting conveniently. But much worse than our ruthless judgement is what we do with our own judgements about ourselves. Within the tumult of being a sex addict or an alcoholic or being bulimic, there are those despairing battles where we fight our worst indulgences, and heartbreakingly, lose, and lose again, till we stop even putting up a fight. And to live in the shadow of this continuous defeat is to realize how much of a lie we live in, and how everything dwarfs, even in our mind and soul, in front of this assault of unrelenting indulgence. And after a while there's no place to hide - from the world or ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on sex as life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/3232-sleepers
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Old Poems for Old Loves

Sat, 10 Aug 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Our feelings are a yo-yo. Forever seeking more, something different, something ultra energising. As if different is better. We are not able to figure out the difference between excess and endurance. Everything around us moves so rapidly - technology, circumstances, opinions - that even relationships fall victim to the syncopated rhythm of indulgence & desertion. And in this cornucopia of life, we lose sight of what is actually enduring, what is flippant, what we need to hold onto, what we need to release. We indulge in a hurry, and regret at leisure. And in the hullabaloo of choices do not even realize what we've lost. Till, someone recognizes our gold, and realises the unmindful flippancy of our directions - and refuses to let us take them. And in the blessings inherent in our lives, the accumulation of the good we've done in this world, we are able to embrace what finally endures. Our life is changed, we go past the nightmare of options, and find both the compass and the perch, the arc and the direction, the zen of the passing and the depth of what endures. We are then blessed, because we have been found. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems full of nostalgia for love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Children Of MH17 by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/268-the-children-of-mh17
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

What is Loss, She Asked Me

Sat, 03 Aug 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Loss is embedded into our lives. Its advent has both unpredictability and inevitability written into it. It never comes as a stranger - but never ceases to break us. As humans, we are too embroiled in the now, too sure that the inertia of happiness will never cease its trajectory, to even mentally (leave aside emotionally) prepare for it. The definition of loss, for each one of us, lies in whether what we lose is in our care, is our concern. Whether it lights us up. In concrete (often amorphous) ways, whether it gives meaning to the breath we take. Every which way, loss has a wake of tragedy. It could be a pinprick in the routine or a chasm in our soul. However robust our defence systems, however practical our relationship with reality, loss which means something to us, leaves us desolate. It's this fear which leaves us unprepared. Conversations on death - the ultimate loss - are avoided, because we think it's bad omen. There's no one to blame - we are humans, we have our quiddities, weaknesses, blind spots. But the loss which leaves as deep a cut is when someone we love decides to move on. The sadness fractures us because the occurrence is not inevitable, and is often unexpected. To lose someone who brings gold to our lives, and amber to our hearts, is to lose treasure. We are then no longer the lees of loss, but its extension. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loss and desolation -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Blockbuster Atmosphere 9 (Sadness) by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/304-blockbuster-atmosphere-9-sadness
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Living Tragedy Forward

Sat, 27 Jul 2024 20:00:00 +0500

There’s nothing like tragedy to make us feel dreadfully alone. The particularities of what afflicts us is so personal that very few can find ways to hold us together as we fall apart. We seek the shoulder of those whose contours and smells are familiar and make our desolation feel less lonely. But often their presence is merely a body to hold onto, even as we tear up inside. So, paradoxically, if there’s anything which exacerbates the implosion, it is the non-presence of the one we expect to be beside us as we disintegrate. Because what could be more devastating than not having a loved one, whose mere presence lights us up, to be not there to hold us up. One can travel across the globe in multiple hours, there’s no office, no binding, no power - except probably deep illness - which could or should hold a loved one back. And in that absence lies the deepest cut. Because human beings are tactile, and sorrow requires presence. And hurt CAN build upon tragedy. We shrink inside when love gives intimations of deserting us, particularly when it still hasn’t deserted our hearts. However much we find ourselves self sufficient and centered, we are special when people find us so - we are the validations we receive, we are the unexpected call, we are the sidelong glance, we are the deer caught in someone’s glance, we are the unplanned trip, we are the early-morning love-making. Our life is often full because of the smallest gifts. When we are denied those, our lives shrink into decimal places. And our tragedy multiplies. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of lovers who move on -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - A Sad Toy Story by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/563-a-sad-toy-story
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Bella's Meadow

Sat, 20 Jul 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Bella's Meadow* * inspired by Rumi’s Field by Bella Mahaya Carter. A little help from Leon. We have all been asked one question from time immemorial - “What do you want to become when you grow up?” Or the more sophisticated variant - “What do you want from life?” When I think back, I’m bemused with the varying answers, I would have given as I grew, and do give now. When I was a child, it was to be a railway engine driver. Then it became a desire to be a writer. Later as life's reality checks started sinking in, I just wanted to make tons of money. The subtleties of life started showing their face. And I realized all I wanted was happiness, which turned to fulfilment. And today all I want is to be present in the moment As the most important things in our lives keep shifting, this subtle transition is one of the benedictions of aging, mirroring, as it were, what is important to me at that phase of my life. But this last wish, this desire of presence, of being true to the moment, will now stay with me. Because this one moment is all we really have, to create a lifetime of riches. Of making a difference to myself or my world. Because allied to presence is the biting realisation that we cannot forever be carriers of regrets or recriminations. In a world choc-o-bloc with choices, why in the name of heaven, should we choose to carry stones in our hearts? Amnesia to things which bite the heart late in the night is possibly the most powerful path to serenity. And a good night’s sleep. The world opens up its riches to those who see it with clear eyes. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the generosity of time -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Lonesome by Sascha Ende

Her Breasts as Shelter

Sat, 13 Jul 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We are terrible at recognising symbols. That’s why much of popular art believes in high jinx, and the subtler softer art of hidden stories and allegories find their home in empty art galleries. For me, one of the greatest joys of living in a world full of wonders is to find symbols and messages - where probably there are none. But stop me! It all started in my childhood, when I and my mum lazed in our garden, each chewing a strand of sweet summer grass, watching clouds, discerning shapes out of them and she saying “The next cloud will be what you will be when you grow up” and laugh uncontrollably when it turned out to be the shape of rotund elephant. And now everything sets me up. From a random political poster saying “Savdhan” as I step to start a day; to the way my skin crawls when I enter a home I don’t like; from the uncharacteristically generous splash of jam on my morning toast put by my wife; to the way flowers fall on me at the exact moment I pass a tree. If I’m crossing a road and a dark cloud passes the sun my instincts go alive, if I step out and a child coos at me I start looking forward to a lovely beatific day. I have never tracked the efficacy or the evolving truth of the messages, because for me it is enough that they are there. More than their truth it’s their presence which thrills me. It’s like the universe is having a secret conversation with me. As if it is being both naughty and generous - sharing secrets and giving messages - be aware, beware, be alive. In the same vein, the body of a loved one is chocobloc with messages. The arc of an eyebrow, the way a hand is withdrawn, the seconds in which a hug is broken. The way her thighs touch yours when you sit in a crowded hall, the way she smiles in an elongated silence, the way music wafts out of a filigreed window as you walk to a lover’s house, the way she lets her breast caress your chest in the gentlest way as she kisses you on your cheek. Beyond practicalities, our entire body is a gorgeous possibility of messaging. The subtle art of Vipassanna - which I so prefer to the secret-mantra artifice of TM or the forced kindness of Metta Meditation - asks us to explore our body for messages, to observe and move on. For in that observance, lies the recognition that it is important to know, but equally vital is the immediate passage away from this realisation. I see the morning sun filter through the leaves, and there’s a delicate dance happening on the walking path. A snail waits for me, probably to let me lift it to the garden on the upper ground. It’s actually lifting me up. It’s gonna be a good day. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the mysteries of the body -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Way To Kataka by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/11-the-way-to-kataka
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Sunset at Glengorm by Kevin Macleod

Musings as I Step Into the Morning (Leaving a Lover Sleeping)

Sat, 06 Jul 2024 20:00:00 +0500

One thing which I celebrate with a fullness of heart, is the normalcy of a strong relationship, which allows for consent, dissent, conversation, dissatisfaction, honesty, fun. The pleasure of knowing one can be one’s own imperfect self, and still make a relationship stronger for it. Life, as it were, throws enough seductions to test us to our weaknesses - of faith, of belief, of purpose (and I’m not even getting started on religion and politics!) - not to further have the ones who love us the most to sit in judgement on our munificence or transgressions. And this is, of course, easier said than done. Because much before we demand non-judgement, we have to ensure we give it. I for one am very quick in ‘disliking-rejecting’, ‘liking-embracing’. It is my own private fiefdom of choice and I carry my opinion fiercely inside me, until I deem fit to change it. And progressively as I age, I show my true feelings more transparently than before. I have fewer friends as a consequence, but the ones I have, are the rocks and rock stars of my life. Because we know this of each other - we are both more because of our quiddities and irritations. And we enjoy the frayed package of what we bring to each other. Life is complicated enough not to allow love to be nitpicking. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on leaving a lover -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Your name by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/13-your-name
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Sunset Fields by Alexander Nakarada

A Meaning Without Questions

Sat, 29 Jun 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Time and again I have wanted to die. Oh there were reasons enough. A bruising fight at home, an extreme embarrassment outside, an absolute absence of intimacy when I was bereft of everything I cared for. Of course there was an absolute lack of balance, a misreading of circumstances, an extreme reaction. But far more critical was what the universe laid out for me in those times. I found an iridescent evening full of orange and purple thrown my way. When I stepped out into a budding dawn after a sleepless night, the trees bent down to caress me, the snails stopped their steady progress in the walking path to wave at me with their tiny antlers. I met a stranger who paid for my change in a coffee shop. Poori kainaat. The whole universe was conspiring to tell me - abide, hold on, you are not alone. And I was glad that I noticed. Time and again, I wake up to the blessings of a world which never stops giving. Of course, it’s always there for the seeing. It’s we who ignore the signs and the colours and the aromas of a world which is crying out loud to be experienced. It’s we, who internalize our senses such that we are awake to our minutest emotional tremor but miss out the broad strokes visible everywhere. But much more than that, the message to us continuously is that meaning is not a derivative or an equation. It is a presence, to be embraced, without suspecting payback or a happenstance seeking a price. Once we realise this, the entire grace of the world is out for the taking. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on why life is so beautiful -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Artemis by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6934-artemis
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Punctuation for Lovers

Sat, 22 Jun 2024 20:00:00 +0500

"He made love to me,

smooth as a colon,

and when he went down on me my body waved like a tilde."

Secrecy is an aphrodisiac. As powerful as pursuit, it is often mistaken for ardour. It is by and of itself an indulgence. Its translation into a stronger emotion, into love, is a different genre of effort. Chekhov once memorably said “There’s a proper order for a woman to become a man’s friend. First she’s an acquaintance, then she’s a lover, and finally she becomes a good friend.” Love then is a long distance run, and friendship a journey of a lifetime. Far beyond the satisfaction of an ego to ‘get’ someone, is recognition and acceptance. Of giving the time to know someone so thoroughly that the things we fall in love with mesh seamlessly with what we don’t. Irritations become quirks become things we adore. Time spent together is finding meaning in life. And hiatuses are then filled with remembrance which then act as bridges. Till the next time. My best friends never complain about not being in touch. If they do, they are still lovers and have not transcended to friendship, which in the holy trinity of relationships, is the highest form of coexistence. (☺️) As I walk through the hundreds of relationships I have formed - online, physical, tangential, official, family - I have continually learnt how it is often our closest relations who suck the marrow out of the marginal happiness we exist within. And sometimes it is mere strangers who elevate us with their attention or life stories. I survive by being in a zen state. As a Buddhist sutra succinctly advises - “Sab anitya hai”. Everything passes. Indeed.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of how lovers tie themselves into knots -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - True Summer Love by Musiclfiles Contemplative Cinematic Trailer by Musiclfiles

Replay - The Improbability of Wishes

Sat, 15 Jun 2024 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, republished with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. "There's always a road waiting for one of the lovers to depart." The saga of love is a play of light and shadow. There is incident, coincidence, an assemblage of adrenalin, a bellowing of blood, a singling out of songs, a resurgence of senses. Love arranges it's own arrivals, often as a storm, frequently as a story, most often as winter sun. It rearranges parts of our life, it splinters our days in ways that distance hurts - the desire to be, see, touch, smell, immerse, borders on desperation. For deep inside, every lover knows that embedded in the ecstasy of a love story is it's extinction. Sometimes as slow burn, sometimes as a turn on the road, generally as gentle drift, often as an exercise of getting lost. And then the helplessness ensues. Compasses point towards the setting sun, the flowers coalesce into routine, the days stop beckoning, sunrises only show autumns. But it is as if it's preordained - just as love is as much a part of life as breathing, separation is it's conjoined twin. Why does love wither? Where does it go when it's gone? Are there secret burial grounds for love, epitaph-less, unmarked? Is there a floating cemetery of feelings in heaven for lost love - a consideration for the hurt, commiseration for the haunted, a soul for the homeless? Because the inevitability of drift is in love's DNA, it's loss is in its definition, it's celebration is forever aforetime. But we accept its inevitable tragedy, because our life is governed by its presence, and gets its mojo from its promise. The journey, in life, or love, then, is everything. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of poignant separations -

Heartbreak
Lovers of Broken Mountains
Fallen Flowers

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. Uncut Poetry has started a new Podcast called Red River Sessions (on Spotify, iTunes, Pocket Casts, etc), where we will talk to published poets, about their poetry, their craft and what haunts them. It is brought to you by Red River, which is the premier independent publisher of poetry books, and Uncut Poetry. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Reaching The Sky [Long Version] by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6222-reaching-the-sky--long-version
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Grief Strikes Where Love Struck First

Sat, 08 Jun 2024 20:00:00 +0500

When someone we love dies, everything changes. The normalcies of routine possibly give an outward sense of balance, but the turmoil inside resembles wreckage. We sink, wish to remain sunk, everything around us seems trivial - almost as if we can see through the artifice of the world, unable to tell everyone how they were missing out on the most important things in life, as they fought over the the insignificant, the trivial. And as is our wont as good people - we remember the good and the rest is subsumed in a closed vault inside our soul. And I wonder - what is ever normal? And I wonder about this connect of love, the dependence, the care, the thought, the absolute faith. Are we emotional limpets to love? Do we grow stunted in love? Is care just an euphemism for dependence? Is the gift of attention a form of smothering? Is what we call love just an emotional crutch? When someone we love passes on, we can see our worlds contract, we see ourselves stand diminished, and we can suddenly see with incredible clarity how much we are an accumulation of all that we’ve now lost. In a strange way, we know we’ve become representatives of who and what’s lost, the protector of the flame. And then we realize how love is always a completion. We come as sketches and it’s who we love who fill us with the colours which make our lives iridescent, and us a 3D rendition of life itself. We are lucky if our beings have overflowed with a loved one's presence, cantankerous and problematic as they might have been, because deep inside every such relationship is the kernel of care, the warmth of which fills our life - it burns when it breathes, it glows like a flame when it’s gone. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of passing on -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Long Travel to Terra Two by Kalak

Dreaming of You

Sat, 01 Jun 2024 20:00:00 +0500

A lot of what we are, the comfort of living, the beauty of how we view the world, is when we know we are cared for, and the ones closest to us are people we have implicit faith in. To know that love is a thought away, that nothing will take away the presence of the person we care for the most, is to know that the primary foundations on which our esteem, worth and respect lie on, is immutable and unmoving. And in a broad sense, it gives us permission to fly - or not - with the full knowledge that we will be saved and savoured irrespective of whether we succeed or we don’t. Faith is potent force. Its presence, though amorphous, is what really makes life’s meaning tangible, as our relationships get cast in something which is akin to a permanent state of being. We are better because we know we are not alone. However much the physical distance from the ones we love. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on distances between lovers -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Summer Morning (full version) by Musiclfiles

Life for Rent

Sat, 25 May 2024 20:00:00 +0500

So much of our life is a reaction. As if it is determined by someone else’s priorities and emotions and needs, and we become byproducts of their ambitions and needs. It could be anybody - a father for whom we become the fulfillment of failed dreams, a lover whose hauntings of failed relationships find shelter in our quiet nooks, a brother who leans on us when he needs validation or unquestioning support. The list goes on. And we act as obedient support systems - loyal, available, eager to help. Even when we know we are asking for trouble, even when we know it is not in our best interest, even when we know life has something else in store for us. But we still become someone else’s agenda. And we suffer for it. Because we get sucked into universes we did not want to be part of, but of which we become reluctant denizens. And our lives change. And instead of making our own lives, with our own mistakes and compulsions and realisations and hurts and sinews and wounds, we become carriers of other people’s needs, bridges to other needs, derivatives of others dreams. Till we build the courage to look inside ourselves and force ourselves to learn to say - no, no longer, no more. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the strange dilemmas of life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende Strange New Worlds by Sascha Ende

The Art of the Lonely Good Deed

Sat, 18 May 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We are often given chances in life to go beyond ourselves. These could be random happenstances, things which only we notice, and which we may choose to ignore - or not. If we pay attention and choose to clutch at those moments and do something tiny, unwittingly we invite, if not the appreciation at least a nod, from the universe. Maybe nothing changes, maybe nobody notices, but here’s the thing - we change, in tiny degrees but enough to shift something inside us. The quietness in this is important, the element of shy boldness is a prerequisite, the lack of noise is a given. We should do, we should move on. So, what does this unheralded, unspoken of, often unnoticed, act do to us? I think, apart from the loud gifts of DNA bestowed onto us, we are also a growth of things we do, an amalgam of all the traces left behind in us of the deeds we do stolidly or impulsively. But something shifts inside us. Something tell us - we are better for it. To be a good human being does not need headlines or acknowledgment, as it is sufficient in itself. And this goodness radiates out, and people who know nothing of it, also wonder and gravitate towards this basic element which shines through. Because this is a secret which nobody can see but everyone can sense. And makes people dip into their better selves. The fire grows, as it were, with just a sense of the flame. And the world is a better place for it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on good deeds which fall on us like soft rain -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Politics on the Dining Table

Sat, 11 May 2024 20:00:00 +0500

There is nothing worse than politics dividing family. I have seen people develop distaste for their dearest and closest because of being on opposite sides of the political divide. Something which is (mere) belief, takes on an expanded definition to include a commentary on character, and acts as an unsubstantiated and unsavoury revelation. And with astonishment we exclaim “What! You support —-?” As if it was the ultimate excretion and misdemeanour. In the city I stay in, everybody is a political guru. Some emotionally, and some after study and observation. And it often becomes a battle of belief vs intellect. And conversations and emotions go haywire. And become deeply divisive. And being a highly political nation, where as a people we consume (and practice) politics with gusto, finding someone close being not even close to our political beliefs is dismaying - and often unacceptable. How, then, can a conversation not be a battle? How can we not conclude that the other is at best insensitive or at worst a cretin (kreet n)? The hypocrisies are inherent in the premise. All dining table discussion on politics are nothing more than air. We criticise with the depth of our beings, lean left whilst having expensive wine, talk of one god whilst deeply suspicious of another’s religion. How much do our politics - and religion - diminish us, how it makes our worst define us, how much something which is nothing more than a reaction to headlines makes us be judgemental of the ones closest to us. In a life which is so short, and so completely beautiful, we deliberately lean into what we think defines us, when at best it is an amorphous state - changing as we understand more, read more, feel more, see more.We bring tragedy merely because we give importance to the transient. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of how politics adn religion determine our lives -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Liberty Quest by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/293-liberty-quest
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Heavens Gate by Frank Schroeter

Adventures in Two Worlds

Sat, 04 May 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We live multiple lives. Each one of us have variations, but everyday our paths fork out. And we move from the secure to the stormy; from standing naked to being armoured; from garnering the blessings of the universe to ploughing through the detritus of the denizery. Often we are able to navigate this transition in the simplest way possible - we remain the same in every world, raw and uncluttered, ready to take the blows for being us. But more often then not, we tweak our selves to the scenarios in front and archetypes expected, to fit in, to flit through, without too much damage to the world or ourselves. But it’s not always easy, definitely not for the sensitive soul, which wants to remain true and get by peacefully. And I say to such people - go gently, be true. For there is a reward at the end of every struggle to fit in or not - to be recognised for being authentic. And the universe invariably converges its rewards towards such people, albeit slowly, dreadfully so. I learned to stay in two worlds as two people for a long time. And it was extremely strenuous apart from being incontrovertibly inauthentic. Until I could no longer be what I was not. I have no memory of the inflection point, the moment when something inside me said “I will implode.” But I dropped pretences. And I lost friends. And I got peace. I seeked lesser commitments, I could speak my mind with ease, I could say no with complete peace of mind, and I walked guiltless. The drainpipe of my worlds became a bridge, and both my worlds converged into one. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the struggles we face in our daily lifes -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Misty lights by Rafael Krux Melodic Interlude Two by Alexander Nakarada

Adrift (on parents and lovers we survive)

Sat, 27 Apr 2024 20:00:00 +0500

They say, in actuality, there are only two kinds of people in the world - fighters and survivors. I have often thought about this grim prognosis of life, and without attributing anything dire to it, I really think it is close to truth. In seeking acceptances, we often have to struggle with the true us and the version the world wants to see. Because we are first a subset of a larger expectation before we start to even begin to be our own person. The corollary to this is often the complete abdication of lives. Most often to parents, soon enough to partners - husbands, lovers. We are first loved for what we are, and then are given a larger acceptance only if we confirm to their idea of us. If we waver from there, try to become something which is truly us, if we protest, we have to face consequences. It could start from emotional appeal, transcend to consequences, end in incarcerations of all kinds. We often seek refuge, escapes; clutch at straws, good hearts; and find ourselves giving into patterns. One prison for another, as it were. Unconsciously we build shackles inside of us. Without realising we have become our own prisoners. Which becomes difficult to break out of. There IS redemption. Alas, it comes with a high price - shame, isolation, death. Often even unconditional love is not enough, as it it riddled with complex past archetypes, windmills of the confounded mind, as it were. We are finally of ourselves, suicidally jettisoning this one wondrous life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems talking about our relationship with parents -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Yesteryears (DECISION) by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/244-yesteryears-decision
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

In Search of a God

Sat, 20 Apr 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I went to Varanasi a few weeks back, and spent time wandering the lanes, in temples, on the ghats, sitting beside the river. I was a non-sequitur: a non-believer in a holy city, amidst people who had the name of god continuously on their lips. And I saw holiness and ordinariness mesh in seamless ways. Almost like a message that a spiritual search did not entail you to be anything other than what you are - messy, complex, confused. Because that is where every journey begins. Varanasi is special because unlike other holy cities - Vrindavan, Assisi, Ujjain, Vatican - it is not a mere destination - it is the beginning of a journey. That’s why it’s co-existence as a city of chaos and one of silences, gives it a sense of transcendence. Because that is what, if you really think about it, true religion is all about. It starts with belief, not cynicism; it has intimations of doubt, bouts of questions, dollops of scientific inquiries. And the only reason a person persists is because she knows there are too many questions which the normal human experience cannot answer. And in the space of the unexplainable, we find what seems like the miraculous. We can accept it as grace, and move in our lives with a sense of utmost gratefulness. Or we can give it a name. God. The Unexplained. Mystery. Maybe - mother. In whatever way we find the Unknown, Varanasi is an immersion. With or without the holy dip. It will never leave you unaffected, unmoved or unscathed. Varanasi will hurt you - even as it holds you, heals you, makes you its own. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the holy -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Lockdown by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/7658-lockdown
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Strange New Worlds by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10369-strange-new-worlds
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lovers as Witnesses

Sat, 13 Apr 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Whenever I see couples getting hitched, I say a silent prayer of thankfulness. Because every day the couple has a ringside view of each other, of things which they say and do. They crack a small joke, they fulfil small wishes, they stop someone from stumbling, they secretly make someone’s favourite dish,they listen with their bodies, they stand beside the window and see the morning sun drop on the floor. We all need someone in our lives who can see us for what we are, way beyond what the world sees us, as someone made of greatness and grime, someone who is beautiful and ugly at the same time. Someone who sees us as selfish and doesn’t turn away, someone who recognises the smallest gesture as generosity and embraces us for that. To be ready to be a couple is to be with each other, through the massive and the minute, to know we can be huge in tumult and small in celebration, and still not turn away, because we have promised to take each other as we are. To know that we have the capability to accept way beyond what we can dream of. Because we are privileged to be the witnesses of the lives our lovers lead. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of love as a thing to be witnessed -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sensitive Cinematic Romantic by Musiclfiles

Things We Gather

Sat, 06 Apr 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We are such carriers of burdens. We have nothing to lose, but we carry the weight of such unnecessities. In the end, irrespective of what the Pharaohs believed, we have to leave everything behind. Which then probably is the only time we truly travel light. But here we are - seducing, desiring, acquiring - and if not for things, we are busy burdening ourselves with myriad feelings, emotions which we should have experienced and moved on from, felt and unfelt, tasted, remembered and then forgotten. But such is our blind-sightedness for immortality, our instinct to persevere and our desire of acquiescence, that we give the halo of permanence to the things which are most ephemeral. And therein lies the deepest cut. Because much more dangerous than the quicksand of useless acquisitions is the accumulation of feelings. And how little do we know how to handle those. It is never our passage through emotions that is deleterious, it is our staying in those emotions which creates havoc. Because that’s when we ponder and speculate and conjure - and invariably think of the worst. Much more than the action which precipitates our feelings, it is our continual analysis which brings about fractures in relationships. We have to learn to live through passing storms of ties, be swirled, tossed around, battered, but then to survive and move back into the warmth of our mutual sanctuaries. If we realise that it is in the nature of things that they don’t last, we would be less hard on ourselves or others. If we stop being conscious of the world and learn to revel in the quixotic quirkiness of our beings, and learn to laugh at and laugh about it, we would have found the core of life’s mysteries. Laugh and move on. There would be no need to go to another realm to find ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on things we gather and those that we leave -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

A Legacy of Kindness

Sat, 30 Mar 2024 20:00:00 +0500

So much of the good we have, things we are proud of, our looks, our most innate traits, are in truth merely gifts. They are an inheritance in our blood, nature’s largesse for us to build on. But what we become is a factor of what we do with what we are given. We can hold these gifts as talisman, to seek the good beyond them, to figure out our dharma, the very core of why we are in this world. Or we can just let them define us in shallow ways, as we work behind the facade, building our dynasty of desire. I am just glad to be part of a family which is both my biggest cheerleader and the sternest rapper of knuckles possible. Our strictest teachers are the ones who love us the most. The ones who hammer into us where we’ve gone astray are the ones who cry and pray for us in the silence of the night. I am blessed to be born to the parents I have. Not that he has much choice, but I hope my son looks back to me some day and feels the same thing. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how kindness changes lives -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Francescas Story by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/2981-francescas-story
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Coming to Your Side of The Bed

Sat, 23 Mar 2024 20:00:00 +0500

So much of what we are is because of abandonment. Often as reality, often as feeling. We talk but we don’t get through. Our silences are many, none find a resolution. Our words come out with warm intent, but when conjoined sound harsh. We love to death the very person we find the most fault with. But in this morass of disintegrating hope, we are firm on continuums. We are not ready to give up. Because we know things change, people change. And no season is permanent. And such do relationships survive. And often, very often, they find their equilibrium. Not so much as a reconciliation, which is often there, but as an understanding. Beyond the spontaneity of an outburst, or the harshness of a habitual word, one recognises the heart, well hidden though it might be. And then everything is forgiven. But there are times when such understandings do not emerge. And that’s when two good people are found to be excavating the worst of themselves: in relationships people discover the depths of depravity or dismay or disillusionment that they can reach. Alas, that is what then defines us as people - everything else is forgotten. Even if we move to the other side of the bed, we find it empty. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the complex rhythms of relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Good men do bad things by Phat Sounds Shadows of Autumn full version by Musiclfiles

Replay - In the Drift We Will Find Our Certainties

Sat, 16 Mar 2024 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed with the hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. "We walk under boughs heavy with fragrance, petals touching our cheeks with infinitesimal tenderness, and think back to how meaningless was what we’d said. In a universe of a million possibilities, we could be a certainty, but we suffered our uncertain inequities. We should have found tenderness like kittens venturing into the world - with fright and wonder and the ability to believe. Alas, we stopped at our conceptions of each other." They say “The only real battle in life is between hanging on and letting go.” In that one coruscating truth lies the crux of relationships. The question then is not of doubts or misgivings or dwindling love, but it is - have you given yourselves enough time? In that one question lies an irrevocable truth - things take no time to unravel but take time to settle. You have to keep examining, you have to keep asking. Why don't you care? Why did you hurt me? Why did this happen? Why do you believe this about me? Why did you do this? The answers would be unsatisfactory, they will be evasive, but though they might not bring clarity to you, they will make the other think. And they will understand why you hurt, where you hurt. The shrapnel will be blunted. At the same time, you are embracing your own strengths, the preciousness that you bring, the value of what you are, and it nullifies when others attempt to make you think less of yourself . You will not like everything, but you will understand a few things. You will be able to cut through the fluff of your own misconceptions, and theirs, to understand the truth of what makes relationships work. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on complexities of relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Heart Love by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/9259-heart-love
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Asperger by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/9264-asperger
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Tracing Shadows On Your Back

Sat, 09 Mar 2024 20:00:00 +0500

It’s one of the ironies of life that relationships which have persisted for years, often have hesitation built into their fibre. You know everything of each other, but are still not sure of your place in their lives. The important thing which keeps haunting you is - what do both of you mean to each other. You say the things which you have been saying for years, she reacts the way she has been reacting for years, and both of you dislike the way you have conducted the conversation. But you have not been able to reconcile with the hurt which you somehow convey in that interaction. You are completely off sync. You feel you are being normal, she feels she is being normal, but you are totally off kilter. And you’re not able to reconcile what is wrong in the way you are with each other. I have often wondered how misconceptions persist over the years. It’s not for want of trying. You attempt trying to make each other understand your love languages, and to show where things hurt, and how what’s normal for him is hurt for her, or how a simple word or gesture can be so irritating, devastating or problematic. But what you get in return is another layer of misunderstanding. You of course love each other. There’s too much you’ve been through - joys, pain, babies, walks, coffee breaks, loved meals, cookouts, relatives you don’t like, friends you love, movies you’ve seen holding hands, music you’ve both loved with tears in your eyes, the dresses you’ve admired each other in, the dusks you’ve spent doing nothing but holding each other. All the little things which have made you persist. But even then the questions persist. And such do simple lives find their own ways to fragile devastation. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the simple complexities of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Natural Paradise by Musiclfiles

And The Crowds Roared, As The Music Rose

Sat, 02 Mar 2024 20:00:00 +0500

As I gear up for the Ed Sheeran show, I’ve been trying to fathom the excitement in me! I’ve seen some terrific shows - Kylie Minogue, Kate Perry, Michael Jackson (omg - goosebumps!), Norah Jones, Michael Learns to Rock, and the innumerable gigs of favourite Indian singers and jazz bands - and somehow when I see tour rosters of my favourite artistes, I keep wondering if i can match my travelling plans to catch them perform. And there are so many. The ones I would love to catch - Billie Elish, Sia, Mansa Jimmy, Elisapie, Hania Rani, Birdy, Jon Batiste, Ali Sethi - just to name a few! And the ones I will regrettably never be able to hear - Leonard Cohen, The Doors, Ghulam Ali, The Beatles, Simon & Garfunkle. Somehow when I draw a circle, to denote the completeness of my life, these invariably feature as a factor. It’s easy to say that we are merely listeners, as we sit in a hall, a stadium, under darkened ceilings or lie flat with starlight above. But when a listener gets drenched in the music she loves, there is both a transcendence and an immersion, which is as much a part of music being for the listener’s soul, as it is the musician’s in creating sublimity. I have stood with 50000 fans and sang along songs which each one of us knew by heart, and felt transported. Felt communion, felt lifted, knew the meaning of soaring. Apart from the concerts, with their presence of community and crowd, for me music is an intimate accompaniment to life rhythms. I have music playing almost through my waking hours. Soft, often indescribable, often random. But for me, it is a way to be more productive, to bold-italic-underline the moment. It makes life more important, richer. Whilst it is often considered mere distraction, it never is. It is forever giving. It enriches, even as it is played in the background. I have often puzzled how the most puerile of lyrics (“love, love me do, I love you too” - for Christ’s sake!) become ear-worm and stay with us throughout our lives. Such is the power of music notes, the words and their inimitable interlinking. But in that remembrance they often transport us to some place of essential innocence, a place of swaying trees, a breezy arbour of sundrops and shade. If music is first sound, then our first intimation of love - our Mum’s gentle cooing - has to be the first music note which gives us the confidence to believe the rest of the world. And possibly therein lies the kernel of music’s mysterious warmth and comfort, the reason why we often forget the notes but remember the feeling. We are home with the music we love. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the advent of esctasy -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Die Unendliche Geschichte by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/512-die-unendliche-geschichte
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Mr Hoskote, have you visited Kashmir recently?

Sat, 24 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Ranjit Hoskote, the famous art critic, poet ,writer wrote an amazing piece on Gaza and the humanitarian tragedy unfolding there. It was a piece which broke my heart, truly, as it brought out in sharp relief the incredible carnage taking place with impunity and for days on end. But then he interlinked Gaza with Kashmir. And that was something which he did casually, as if he was duty-bound to do so, as a fact. And I was grieved that someone so sensitive and aware, could also be so frivolous, so tone-deaf. And suddenly I realised how much his words were artifice, played to a gallery, which would anyway cheer him along. It disturbs me that poets, writers, thinkers find it expedient to bring in Kashmir in all narratives of torture, pain, without delving deeper into the principal issues, without historical perspective, without even trying to find what the present reality is, the truth of the ongoing narrative. This casual interlinking, using Kashmir as common coinage is something which truly disturbs me. Hence this poem. Read the incredibly sensitive essay here - https://scroll.in/article/1063846/ranjit-hoskote-in-our-interconnected-world-gaza-is-everywhere If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the meaning and price of freedom -

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Medieval Love by Frank Schroeter

Maybe, a Little Kindness

Sat, 17 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I have often been cruel. Knowingly, unconsciously. With people closest to me, and invariably because I take them for granted. So it is a mini tragedy, when I sit down and have a conversation - and I’m short, I’m angry, I’m sarcastic. Take my mum - she is frail now, though her voice still has passion, but is veering towards gentle tones now. And I can ‘win’ any battle by the sheer dint of volume. Pyrrhic victory, if there ever was one, as she goes silent, and I keep reading the newspaper as if nothing has happened. We are both in a space of a confined relationship, whose contours could never be changed. I would be her son forever - and we were tied to each other inextricably, as fact, as benediction or affliction. Our relationship is one of perfect imperfection. We come with legacy in our blood and history in our senses, as we fill each other’s space on a daily - often hourly - basis. And within that proximity lies the very seed of slowly getting blinded to the good we do to each other. We start taking each other for granted. And I mull on Oscar Wilde’s symbolical lines - “Yet each man kills the thing he loves, By each let this be heard…” The realisation is a sickening thud. Because to hurt a loved one is to do the irreconcilable. Circumstances might determine a future of forced togetherness , but the heart remembers what it remembers. And scars take longer than forgiveness to lose their mark. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the preciousness of gentleness and kindness -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Motivational Soft Piano Meets Cello by Horst Hoffman

Replay - A Home as an Open Dream

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed with the hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. "We would talk of the day to make the outside world our own, and lay joint claim to our individual memories." A home is of so many definitions. The place we grow in, the place we get our first intimations of the living world, the place we are desperate to get to at the end of a day - but also the place we are desperate to leave as we grow. Often a shelter, often a prison, often just a roof, often the very symbol of unquestioning acceptance. We learn the meaning of bruises from those in the next room, and the ill-imitable depth of love from those further down the hall. We learn there is often no difference between the command of an elder and the confines of an ego. We learn of chains of command and of the subtle exertion of real power. We learn how some of the hardest decisions come from the softest heart, and male prerogative is often just a cover for cluelessness. We leave home for pilgrimages, when actually we are in search of a home. Home is deep nights and late escapes. Home is often of going away without looking back. And to die in peace often only means to have found that address which we can finally call home - and to have that address find us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which take you back home (and its strange dynamics!) -

It Takes a Long Time to Arrive From Not Very Far Away
Extraordinary Life
A Morning Ramble on How Love is Rediscovered at the Bottom of Rubble

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Romantic Piano by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5471-romantic-piano-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Like The Ordinary Life

Sat, 03 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0500

This awareness, this stopping to see something insignificant, the overwhelming desire not to look at my mobile for long moments - I sometimes think it’s aging which is doing this to me. The fact that I have seen a bit of life, of tragedy and joy, of the big events of life and some, and no longer wish for the large and the loud. Now what stops me are things which seem to happen in passing. A snatch of music, the stitching of a happy conversation, a stray comment followed with a comfortable silence, the sound of laughter drifting out from a street-level window. Suddenly these seem important. Often, when my dad and I stand in his room’s verandah, and watch a decaying sunset, the rays reflecting in the three lakes in front of us, his arm around my shoulder, my chest swells such that it seems it will burst open. I just know these are the things I will think of on my deathbed, and these are the things which will help me drift away serenely. So I am going about collecting these moments hungrily, as if there is no tomorrow. Somewhere in our desire to see life only as movement from one high to another or as a remembrance only of the photographable, we lose sight of the infinitesimal, the mote in the sun-ray, the buzz of a wasp going busily about its business. I’m just glad I’ve fallen in love with my common uninteresting unadventurous life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the preciousness of the passing moment -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Nothing but memories by Reegsb

A Sense of Her Tenderness

Sat, 27 Jan 2024 20:00:00 +0500

I doubt if there’s anybody who tends to words with such infinite tenderness. For her, they are rounded pebbles on a seashore, sea waves washing over naked feet, the gentle curve of the sea at the horizon. She holds words the way I hold her. But strangely when I think of her, it is always with a silent smile, like a truth which leaves us speechless, the way the sun slips out as a guest does when tired of a party. I sometimes feel there’s too little of her in this world, someone who feels the world as a good place and sees it with forgiveness. I ask her what her greatest fear is and she says “Losing you.” I tease her and ask “Not losing yourself?” She looks at me and says “You’re there to find me. That’s why I can’t lose you.” Then she adds “But I know something. In this life of unfinished hope, I also wish us dirt, passion, devotion. I want to burrow so deep into the entrails of life that I almost drown in its depths - and just because it can’t stand me anymore it spits me right out.” I listen to her silently. And know the reason I love her is because she helps me see the wonder in everything which I fear. And in her boldness and her gentle desire lie her insistences. As if Hania Rani had given breath to her song ‘Esja’, and her notes wanted to break out and dance on the thinnest ice possible or at a precipice which could crumble and break. And as we sit in the winter sun, our fingers intertwined, I realise how much she wanted to dance, with her words, with her life, with her being, with me. If life could be a music track, she would start with a hymn, let rap take over and then go out in a blaze of the most improvised jazz adventure possible! And as I hold onto to her gentleness, I know her to be steel. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the serenity which comes with love -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Traveling OVer The Clouds by Musiclfiles

The Woman You See

Sat, 20 Jan 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We as persons are so much of the people who inhabit our lives. Not only by way of how they are connected to us and change the trajectory of our lives, but what they mean to us by way of how our souls evolve. But beyond it all is their influence on our minds and hearts to define to us what we are. Sometimes we are unsure of our own abilities to achieve, to fulfil, to create. And though we might be brimming with every talent, we might be an uncertain wreck inside, unable to comprehend the intensity of our own possibilities. And then someone in our life comes by and refuses to accept our limitations. They keep seeing beyond, they keep seeking more, they keep insisting that we are much more, that we are needlessly imprisoning ourselves in a low opinion of ourselves, and we can be beyond everything we can comprehend. I remember a Japanese story where a girl considered plain by the whole world and jeered at whenever she came out of her house, is wooed by the most eligible man in the village, and he proposes with a record number of buffaloes, which nobody in the village could even comprehend. And soon enough the girl grows into becoming the beauty which her beau saw inside her. Of course the story is allegorical, but it’s truth is not. We grow into our best selves when someone refuses to believe that we are anything less. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on love & trust -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Crescendiocity by Alexander Nakarada

How a Poem Finds Itself

Sat, 13 Jan 2024 20:00:00 +0500

We are never as strong as we feel we are. What’s ostensible, what’s shown, matters little. As we walk, with our eyes wide open, sometimes in wonder, often in fear, we need someone beside us to interpret the world. A conversation is the blood flow of a love story. To be generous enough to listen without interpretation, to hear without interruption, is a gift we give our loved ones. Because we already trust them. And everything we share with them is only an expansion of the shared world. There’s nothing good or bad, we are not judges, we are partners, and when we choose to let the other know everything, we let them into the fragility of our beings. There’s first fear, a testing out, as it were, for nobody wants to be broken by unkind hands. Then there’s unabashed laughter. Tears come in the end. Because that’s when dams burst, and you don’t mind, because you know there is someone ready to catch every teardrop, so that the sorrow doesn’t go unacknowledged or wasted. I think tenderness as a vital ingredient of love is often underestimated. Knowing how the trajectory of our lives changes due to the entry of some people in our lives, we need a safe zone for our fears and vulnerabilities. Often we find it immediately, often we need to search on, often never. Much more then the highs and the rush of dopamine which love gives, what finally sustains it is the generosity we accord each other as a place of protection. Where we know we can say anything without being judged, where we can be goofy without a cantankerous response. Or be afforded a strong attempt to understand even on disapproval of what we’ve revealed of ourselves. Else then love is a snail out in a tentative dawn, which senses danger and withdraws within its shell, and finds it difficult to emerge again. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on poems themselves -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: When Life Is Beautiful by KALAK
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/11355-when-life-is-beautiful
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Your Body is a Truth

Sat, 06 Jan 2024 20:00:00 +0500

Deep inside, we all seek grounding. In the complex hullabaloo of desires, facades and one-upmanship, within sudden dollops of searing clarity, we search for the timbre of our being and realise the glitzy syncretic synthetic fabric it is made of. And the disquiet emerges. If the rot in our beings is not all-pervasive, the disquiet is a beginning to our conscience wanting redemption. We want to return to a point where we’d not lost our innocence though the ways of the world might have brought both wisdom and cynicism in its wake. And this shows up in all our relationships. In the way we confess to love, in the way we make love. There are truths waiting to be revealed, there are truths wanting to be told. At our most elemental state, we seek the danger of vulnerability, to come clean with our soul. We are ready to lose much for a glimpse of that one clouded truth. As we drift back into the other world of our lives, we then carry the revelation inside. We already know it’s power, we know it’s ability to cleanse, but we also know it’s revelatory power. And we decide, through its possibilities of disruption, to let’s it’s coruscating effulgence to emerge, and in one stroke bring us back to that state where we might stand damaged but we are cleansed. We are one with ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the loneliness of a craving body -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: Romantic Interlude [Full version] by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10421-romantic-interlude-full-version
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Music: Time Of Mourning by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9646-time-of-mourning
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

What Stretches in Front

Sat, 30 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0500

As 2023 turns its back with a sigh, we walk into a brand new year. Hope - with all its bewitching deceptions - will make us wish for our best selves, to slough off the undesirable and ugly, and emerge fresh and wet, with unfazed optimism to conquer the world. But soon enough, we will know that, as always, all we need to do is to conquer ourselves. And I sit down and make a list of what I want to leave behind in the old year and another list of what I want of the new year. And then I realise. - the new year wants nothing of me. It’s a sobering thought. And forces me to think of everyone in my life who loves me unquestionably, and expects nothing but an ear to listen as we sip our tea together, and a hand to hold as we go out into the world. Hence my only wish for myself - and for everyone in this world - is that we honour time and we create space. For we have to both hurry in this life and not forget to savour the moment. Because we need to both honour our ambition and be beside those who need us beside them. May we all be unafraid to do what we love, and find peace in the torn and tattered bounty of what we are. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the ephemeral nature of time -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: Moments by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/11940-moments
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Letting Go (because I’m alive)

Sat, 23 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0500

One of the incredible things which are little talked about, but one which I notice ever so often around me, is how the loss of love often frees a person in magical ways. I tell myself - it can’t be love if it’s absence gives the feeling of liberation. But I also know how life’s bounty comes in contrarian ways. There is life within love, but there could well be revelry beyond. I know of at least two ladies, who have had solid and steady and happy married lives, but after the demise of their respective husbands, have rediscovered life in a million ways - the freedom to travel as they wished, of going out when they wanted, of dressing up as they wished. It was almost as if we were seeing a different persona emerging from a cocoon we did not even know existed. The end of the world is never nigh. However deep the depths of our sorrow. It’s the simple truth of living. Nothing destroys us if we don’t allow it to - in fact within the seeds of the worst resides the incandescence of the best. Because that is what life demands of us, to discover or (as in this case) rediscover the basic premise of living - to be both wild and wise. Wisdom allows us to bear, forbear, adjust to, compromise with, until something breaks loose. And that could be with or without the person you love. If we are open to possibilities, there is nothing which will stop us from the rediscovery of the gorgeous in the mundane, of the magnificent beyond the obvious. I hold on to love with my dear life, but I keep knocking out the walls of what’s routine, the dreary, the drab, to ensure that in this one life of mine, I do not lose out on seeing the sunrise when it needs to be seen just because someone wants me to sleep late - not just one day, but day after day. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the transience of of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: Garten Eden by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/477-garten-eden
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Music: Mystical Autumn by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9755-mystical-autumn
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay - The Complexity of Simple Lives

Sat, 16 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed with the hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. An ordinary life is so complex. In its unending inevitabilities and Gordian knots it is both an unravelling puzzle and an enduring mystery. To mesh our life’s experiences with those who we love, is itself a quotidian Everest to be conquered. And we slip, and we fail, and we try valiantly and fail miserably. And then we pick ourselves up and start all over again, and then we fail again. And then we find a rhythm and we lose it. Recriminations and regrets galore come into the equation, and we again seek balance and again find ourselves in the deep end. What is it about ordinary lives? Why does nothing find an equilibrium? And why, when it seems tranquil, it sinks in a morass of habit. What is a complete life, and how does a couple find it? Does it exist in sacrifice and adjustment or does it reside in the brave singularity of lives which happen to find togetherness. As love stops being a wandering minstrel and works towards finding tranquility in the domestic, the lines of everything gets blurred and within its confined confusion lies the truth of two fully alive people living half lives. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of ordinary lives -

A Home as an Open Dream
Extraordinary Life
The Ageing of Love

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Your name by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/13-your-name
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Changing Your Address (on marrying & moving homes)

Sat, 09 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0500

My son got married a few days back to his sweetheart. Both of them make an adorable couple. As always I’m in awe of people in love who decide to marry each other. I know the atavistic urges and the reasons why we seek to gravitate towards a permanence in our deepest relationships, but I also know how the shelters of each other’s arms is ever so often open to storms and thunder. Roofs leak, houses get blown away. The reason why we marry could also be the reason we suffer. But from time immemorial, marriage has been found to be a risk worth taking. Embedded in its imperfections, it’s scars, it’s lesions, are it’s flights. But then, love always starts as an adventure, but finally seeks rest. And that takes time. And patience. Like everything good, there is much which needs to be transversed, to be taken cognisance of - and forgotten. I sometimes feel sagas of love would do better with poor memories. Do relationships get better with time? Do they eventually find plateaus of calm? What is the mystery of the alchemy which makes two different people find their peace together? For me it’s - space and an ear. Whatever is a couple’s decision on the most minute of things, it has to transverse a conversation, which has more listening then talking. We should never have a problem with a differing view - we grow as persons because of people who do not agree with us, but who have listened deeply and are also ready to change because of us. Life is a cornucopia of choices. To restrict it to only our own world view is to asphyxiate (as fix see eyt) our very soul. To love a person is to love their differences, to let them enlarge our worlds, to help let us find meaning in every part of our separateness. That’s why, whenever I wish for love I wish for disparities (for the adventure) and kindness (for the good sleep). I doubt if love would demand any other generosity than this. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the transitions of love:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: True Summer Love by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9369-true-summer-love
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Music: End Of Summer by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6633-end-of-summer
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Birthday Musings of an Ageing Man

Sat, 02 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0500

So much of old age - like life itself - is of acceptance. I saw a young girl, without fear or preconception, pet a dog which had just snapped at me. She simply found the love inside her and in some mysterious manner it transmitted to the dog. And I wondered if this wasn’t exactly what life was - like that instinctive dog, which subconsciously knew the deepest instinct of love or indifference. And so much of how we age - happily forgetful or bitterly reminiscing - is how we’ve lived. We often forget that every breath given is a gift bequeathed to us. As also what we will be as we age. We could be dissolute but generous, we could be self focused but harmless, we could think first of ourselves but always with a good thought for others. And when we reach a genial age, we will have the legacy of smiles in our bag of memories and a rucksack of goodwill to help us get over the rocky terrain which old age invariably brings. Grace is my favourite word. And when I see it in people, in their demeanour, thought or behaviour, I give into that generosity. Because that is what it is - the ability to maintain dignity and care and understanding in both good and bad times and in front of good and bad people. Because grace leaves levity in its wake. For to be old - and then to pass on - and having left behind a space of serenity, is to have succeeded in life and to have shown death how exits should be made. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the tired grace of growing old

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - New Sky by Rafael Krux Cold and Frightened by Steven O'Brien

Replay - The Things We Become When We Leave

Sat, 25 Nov 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed with the hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it. "I have gone, love, now let me go." We are all changeable creatures. 50 billion of our cells die every day, physically we are not the same today as we were yesterday. And that irrefutable truth seeps into the very core of our beings. Every day, we change as persons too - imperceptibly, almost surreptitiously: the people we meet, the experiences we stumble into, what our senses see, what scares our heart. If our beings revel in the scars and bleed in the unexpected, we are already what we were not. And we start looking at everything and everyone with new eyes. And often the direction of our life changes, the people we thought were inseparable to the importance of our lives, now look like milestones - without the love dimming, without the care diminishing, we know we have different directions to take. And we drift. We do not break off relationships only out of bitterness or regret. Sometimes we also recognise that we have moved on, and moved in different directions. And we know it’s time to part, and we know the hurt we will leave behind. We know explanations might sound lame, and to say “I love you” whilst leaving, is contrarian and often unexplainable. But our heart knows the truth - it often says that there are bigger issues than love, when our very existence is at stake, when the space we need to find for ourselves needs to be unencumbered, when what we stand for or seek, needs solitude because we’ve already crowded it with personalities and our own personas which require either recognition or elimination. We do not leave anybody - we are only in search of a new self. And to find a new nook which says -“Stay”. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on departures -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Evacuation by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8118-evacuation
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Of Love (& other bouts of sadness)

Sat, 18 Nov 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I’ve been thinking these past few days of sanctuaries - of how we take some for granted, how we crave for some. Sometimes both at the same time. I also think of how homes are most often our sanctuaries - but so are memories, so are our desires, as also our regrets. We regret chances we got and didn’t hold onto - we console ourselves that the chances at least stopped by at our doorstep. Of course, the shelter of first choice, and last resort, is often a person. Someone who listens, doesn’t spoil things with advice, has a broad shoulder to put our hard head on, and arms wide enough to embrace our biggest sadnesses. More than the person we love, often it’s the person who is the least judgemental that we turn to. Often mere presence helps, sometimes it’s just a coffee and a slow moving conversation discussing trifles and insignificances. But often, there is just no substitute for the physical presence of a person. I have felt real hurt inside in the region of my arms and chest, hurt with the desire to have someone sink there, to hold onto someone, to feel familiar texture of skin on my skin. To deeply inhale a familiar scent, a body odour which resides in every layer of my memory. One feels bereft without this simple physicality and the sadness is insurmountable. We realize, at such times, how much we are finally beings invariably left by the creator in the care of other beings. However much we might reject their company or shun them because of their irritations, their presence is often the difference between maintaining our sanity and losing it. In however infinitesimal degree it might be. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the space loves seeks to grow:

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The Tragedy of the Other

Sat, 11 Nov 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Like almost every human being in this world, I am perforce political. The fact that I rarely let that side of me seep into my art, hasn’t stopped me from seeing, reading, feeling, reacting. And the singular skew of the narrative and the increasing sharpness of tone of response, and the frightening cohesion of ideologues is disturbing. It’s a tragedy of our times that time and again we face a world where human beings are razed into dust - and we are asked to be selectively outraged. One foetus torn out of a mother’s womb is less talked about then the bombed-out hospital full of children which is cynically being used to shelter terrorists. I read, I observe, academically, artistically, with growing dismay. I can see how everything is distorted, where bastions of free media are compromised, and ideology masquerades as unbiased thinking, mendacity struts as editorial slant. The manipulation of images and stories, the surging protests, the singular pointedness of agony without referencing reasons, are not so much changing my world as making it progressively clear how we are puppets in the industry of the proselyte. I see good friends, well-meaning chums, whose centrist belief of live-and-let-live, has conjoined with mine, and we have been similarly outraged at extremities of all kinds. Until we started noticing the growing mendacity of feed, the slow poisoning of the story-telling, as it were. And the horrors of both the right and left paled in front of the terror of the liberal. The facade of civilisation and the plum accents of those who stood cemented in medieval thought was flooding both news and the timelines. The thinker Naval Ravikant wrote in his almanack “Any belief you took in a package … is suspect and should be re-evaluated from base principles. I try not to have too much I’ve pre-decided. I think creating identities and labels locks you in and keeps you from seeing the truth.” For good measure he added “ To be honest, speak without identity.” And as the world was beset with one calamitous flagration after another, it was clear how truth was always the first victim in the tragedy. Newspapers had vitriolic opinion pieces masquerading as front page news items, prominent news channels had clear religious agendas behind their reputation of credibility, poets tore their hearts out only when deaths occurred on one side of the border. All this was open secret for those who studied, observed, knew. What’s new is how ruthlessly the present tragedy has revealed the hypocrisies of peddlers. The fangs have been revealed for the whole world to see. But are we learning? Go back to what Naval had said. We are all so intricately tied with our ideologies and beliefs that to now abandon them is to lose the core of what we stood for. We would be ‘othered’ in the very society which has given us our identity. So we keep quiet. And the overwhelming lie of the aggressor grows and fills the empty space. I write this as my attempt to reclaim that lost space inside me. I want to take a stand for myself. To delve deeper into the history and culture and devilish agenda to understand the cynicism of the narrative disguised as a torn body or a dulcet poem. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the futility of wars and ideologies:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Clockwork Lullaby by Otis Galloway
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Mornings (as entry points to life)

Sat, 04 Nov 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Mornings are such fabulous entry points. This time of dark departures and silent welcomes. Something which is sheltered tenderly through the night is brought out, a chance to wipe every falling tear, the time to see if blossoms can blossom to wipe the night’s sorrow, when the pleasure of the view far surpasses the depth of a nightmare. I often wake up feeling stale, helplessly hoping for streaks of light, and step out into the uncertain dawn, which wonders about its status, but still moves ahead with its uncertainties. And that gives confidence, that emerging of an old world as new. And I step out naked to all feelings, open to change, open to jettison the old, to make way for acts of strange bravery. There’s this tingling, as the skies find ways to give into colour, just as a singer says “this is the naked truth, this is the light”. And you wonder if this is a start or a break, for truths have to be given their due in ways you will never realize. Pulchritude has a price, you think, but you postpone the thought, as there is too much to absorb - thinking can be done later. And you realize there is only one place to go - forward. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the grace of mornings:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Tranquil Fields Peaceful by Alexander Nakarada
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Love as a Snack

Sat, 28 Oct 2023 20:00:00 +0500

As the years have gone by, I must confess life has confused more than clarified. Possibly life is a tease, urging me to study the deeper truths of our being, meditate on possibilities, and find what sustains, what doesn’t. And till that happens, I stay in the splendid anagrams of my confusions. And first up on that is - love. Having a life full of seeing it, reading of it, passing through it, being abandoned by it, seeing it implode around me, knowing it to be the ash it is, love is a puzzle, to say the least. I have lost the definition of what it is. I have seen what people who are in it do, I have seen it’s destructive power, I have seen it as obsession, I have read, seen, experienced the art created for it by people who are in it or without. I have seen it being called out as permanent, life-affirming, what makes the world go around. But when I examine it, I see it more as courtesy, as priority; and as time goes by, as duty, as habit. Love grows into strange synonyms. And I muse, sometimes dismayed, more often merely cynical, wondering if love wasn't just an invention for propagation, to give emotion to procreation, a feel-good, an entertainment, a melodramatic journey to pain through joy. Beyond the hyperbole of spiritual bliss (which is too beatific to be true), and the purple prose of the besotted (which is too pink for good health), I only see forbearance of the patient, life as a means to navigate relationships, find balance in confusion, and awareness in illusion. Lovers are all purveyors and creators, ready for fiction - and forever eager to believe their own tales. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on love's myriad sides:

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What I Miss is The Tender Moment

Sat, 21 Oct 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I keep returning to the themes of missing out on the small things which make us feel human, nay, which reward us because we are human. And how their absence is often the biggest tragedy of our lives. Often the absence is because of unawareness; but when we yearn for them, search for them, the tangibility of tragedy is like physical pain. Our home then becomes just an address, often the one we love becomes just a habit. And roiled in the battles of the day, we lose out on the tender moment. The unasked for hug, tracing shadows on her dimpled back, searching for each other’s hands when your favourite song plays, to be aware of each other’s presence wherever you might be in a crowded room, the poems you read together, the time the tears flow and you know you’ve crossed the line, knowing your silences to be pauses to heal, the non-judgemental indulgence, the forgiveness for being our worst selves at the end of a gruelling day. Our individual recognitions coming out of us or to us as small prayers, and the entirety of our lives suddenly surrounded with an illimitable grace, brighter than light, softer than dawn, the minutiae becoming bigger than the biggest triumph we can conceive of in our lives. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the grace and beauty of small things:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Relaxing Guitar by Liron
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Loneliness (oh these rains)

Sat, 14 Oct 2023 20:00:00 +0500

The more I live the more I understand - and appreciate - the import of interconnectedness and transience of all things. The rains come, and so does a gnawing feeling seeking something undefinable; love comes with its fullness, and we wait for the infinitesimal more; the lane we stay is alive with sandwich cafés and chairs on pavements and we sit alone, worse, feeling alone; the temple bells and the sound of om carries to us and we think of our place in the world. The universe carries us in its arms into its enveloping warmth, and we don’t recognise the gift. And in the flood of disappointments, we conjure love as mere presence, failing to recognise that it is first a feeling, and then touch. We become prisoners of our own unending emptiness, without first immersing ourselves in what we have already been gifted. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how rains and storms come into our lives:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Lonely Fish by Sascha Ende
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Darkness

Sat, 07 Oct 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Of course, relationships have rules. The fact that we are animals plus, a more evolved species, only recognizes the fact that humans are feeling, trusting, hurting beings. And in the depth of that reality lies the fact of what makes us much more than merely sentient. Alas, there are also transient feelings which gatecrash this party of lifelong-commitments. Because beneath the veneer of manicured gardens are also wild roses desperate to break free. Because relationships are intrinsically a riddle of staying tied and breaking free, of committing and struggling to keep commitments, of staying steady to a promise and getting drunk to a vision. Is it the challenge of a temptation or the end of a search? Is it a conflict you are searching for, or an existential crisis our heart is seeking to resolve? We are lucky if our promise to ourselves, to a loved one, also brings in a concomitant connect which evolves, is elastic to change, sensitive to conflict, kind to intransigence. There’s always the reality of returning home. Or the wreckage we leave in the wake of our uncertain hearts. In a world where nothing is fixed, we seem like perpetrators, but often are no more than victims. In a world of shifting loyalties and drifting moral codes, of seeking ways to fill the holes in our souls, of deciding to live in half-lights of incomplete satisfaction, in places of permanent twilight under the summer noon, we find the best ways to find love and life. We are lucky if we get it on first strike, or we remain seekers - whether we finally drift or not. In a relationship crumbing to touch, irrespective of what we do with our body, we have already drifted - our hearts have found nooks to rest, our thoughts have found spaces to withdraw, for a promise made we have already compromised with the only life we have been bestowed. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on transience and drift:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Rookie by Phat Sounds
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Balancing Beginnings

Sat, 30 Sep 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Unrevealed to us, the universe is working for us. Like master chefs will have you bite into something bitter before bringing in a sweet savoury, life will spin out the worst - only to balance it out in mysterious ways. It’s my firm belief that if we are open with all our senses to our inner beings and the world outside, we will capture the subtle genuflection of the universe’s grace. It could be the sudden advent of an astringent odour from childhood, it could be the perfect amalgam of rain and a heart-aching tune coming out from a window, it could be the touch of a hand as you feel an evening’s loneliness grow in you, it could be a flower crumbling and falling in front of your eyes almost crying “Witness me”. And we see this, and we absorb it all, and immediately put it into a context as minutiae which gives us intimations of the universe. And we are not alone, with our grief, our struggle, our desires, our disappointments. We are no longer alone. Our hidden sorrow is counterbalanced by a secret smile, our emptiness is filled by the fullness of someone’s joy bursting to fill the world. Even in the worst of the times, we need to have the explorer mind, because riches abound in the world, and are often found at the precipice of arduousness and the inflection point of ardor. The universe balances everything out. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how life often means stopping to experience it:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Shadows Of Autumn [Full version] by MusicLFiles
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Why We Should be Happy With Berry Jam on Table Edges

Sat, 23 Sep 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I see young people together, in love, in lust, lost, planning an event, a day or a life, and I see impatience, I see the desire for appropriation. I see conclusions rather than drifting coffee aroma, I see hard closed city alleys rather than coastlines lazily disappearing into beautiful haze. I see uncomfortable hiatuses, wounded silences, I see complaints where there should be enquiries. I see good times as planned methods instead of uncapped madnesses. My heart breaks to see ordinariness being discounted so deeply. Nobody likes a small life, but nobody can ignite the heart without seeing light glisten in a raindrop. And why is it so difficult to let life unfold in its uncomplicated munificence instead of trying to continually force its hand? There’s only so much that the heart or a life can manufacture, as the machinery will be wrenched and what will come out will maim. Let each other be free, I say, let the other fail. In the frailty will lie the kernel of the strength of what both of you will mean to each other. Beyond pretense, beyond the need for proof, beyond the desire to make a point. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how small things can be so big in our lives:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Summer Morning [Full version] by MusicLFiles
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Across The Universe

Sat, 16 Sep 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I remember the story of a bunch of strangers taking shelter under a tree on a stormy night. They could see bolts of lightning falling all around and charring trees. They looked around and saw that they were all high caste Brahmins except for one poor simpering low caste Sudra, who could suddenly see all eyes on him. One particularly arrogant Brahmin pointed his finger at him and said “He is the one who will bring us bad fortune!” And in a flash he was thrown out into the storm, above all entreaties. The poor man ran into the forest, soaked to the skin, looking for some other shelter. And right then, a bolt of lightning fell on that tree and all the high caste Brahmins were charred to death. It was actually the Sudra’s presence which was protecting them all. I remember this story every time my loved one and I have a tiff. The commonness of daily life chips away at the magic of bonds inexorably. Plus life extends far beyond our most primary relationships: the hours of a day are appurtenant to the time we spend with them. There is so much more which goes on in our lives over and above one relationship. And we need to keep floating through those also, so we come out of them richer, unscathed, protected. And in the ups and downs of my trajectory in the world, I know I’m protected because of her. How do I know? I know it in my bones. I know it because of the purity she brings into us - her unrelenting unapologetic unstinting stand beside me, the unblemished crystal of presence, the absoluteness of her continuing forgiveness. She is nature’s inexorability - just as the sun finds its way every morning, just the way a bud bursts in spite of not being noticed - in spite of everything, she never leaves my side when it matters. She is inexhaustible - when I’m about to give up she somehow transfers her energy, her very being to me, and is luminescent in spite of being empty. So much of our lives needs to be spent in utter gratefulness - the inexhaustible supply of grace which we encounter, is enough to put us forever into the universe’s debt. But nature has simplified it for us - we just need to look out for that one magical person - and know where our universe resides. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems about those who are just that much more special:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Adventure by Alexander Nakarada
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Living in a World Deficient in Hugs

Sat, 09 Sep 2023 20:00:00 +0500

There was an incredible experiment done years back where children were put into two batches - one where they were out in the care of nurses who cuddled and hugged and caressed them regularly. And in the other batch none of the nurses cuddled the infants. They were efficient but cold, caretakers not care givers. And they tracked the children as they grew. The results were startling to say the least - the former children grew up to be be emotionally stable and balanced kids, and the other batch had children who didn’t fit, and often turned out to be disruptive and rowdy. The truth of the experiment has not diminished, and it’s truth has been revealed time and again to not be restricted to infants only. If nothing else, it’s importance has increased manifold in today’s manic world, where nobody has time for anybody. And in our rush for deadlines and accomplishments, we forget that our souls require nourishment which is often found in such humdrum things as companionship and embrace, attention and listening. Small physicalities like a hug, a caress, a kiss, often do more to well-being than any medicine can. Seers of all ages have mulled over questions of life and purpose, and time and again have come to the conclusion that all that we achieve is often of no meaning if our lives is bereft of human connection. Because rewards lose their glamour, we as people lie diminished, if we are not able to externalize the ecstasy inside us. Just as grief lies reduced when spoken about, joy multiples on sharing. And in that small homily lies the kernel of the final fulfilment a person can seek - or get. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the power of touch:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Liberty Quest by Sascha Ende
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Damaged Bulbs in a Parlour

Sat, 02 Sep 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Finally life is only about choices. The quality of our life depends on it. And that applies first to what our reactions are, and then to what our actions are. Because much of what we do is in anticipation of or in response to what we think people will think. The subset to this is the overriding power of our ego - what it makes us feel, what it makes us look like in this world. The need to feel acknowledged, the distress when we are not. The tragedy inherent in the situation is that we live an inauthentic life, lit for someone else’s gratification, engendered for someone who actually couldn’t care. And slowly we sink in a morass where we lose sight of what we truly are. We start believing our own lies. In fact our lies become our crutches to walk through the world - shiny and empty, praised outwardly but scorned on the sidelines, touchy to feedback, inured to truth. The tragedy of what it entails is that we seek low lights to surround us, so our dim brightness shines like a floodlight, and we consider ourselves as resplendent. And we live in this well of penumbra, thinking we’ve conquered the world. Celebrating life, singularly unaware that we are dancing on a cemetery of our own dreams. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on choices and how we make them:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode -\ Music: Abschied (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende
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A Cynical Old Man Acknowledges His Birthday Very Grudgingly

Sat, 26 Aug 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I try hard not to be cynical. But I think that’s my terrible gift to myself. Life had a hand to play (of course!), bringing me people and platitudes in equal measure, to leave me nicely acidic for a lifetime. Not that I don’t fight against my worst instincts, read tomes to learn how to return to a crystal-clear state of trust and welcome, a kind of knowing innocence, measured but complete in itself. But it’s easier said than done. As the entirety of my being screams “Alert!” whenever I see a good deed being done. ‘What’s in it for him?’ is the instinctive response. It’s almost as if I’m done with believing there is anything which is simply selfless, guileless, truly giving. And then I stop myself and think - how can I be chained to a thinking where nothing is lost and nothing is gained, but oh I pay such a cost! Go to hell with Sophocles who said “Trust dies but mistrust blossoms “. I want, again and again, to be the fool who gets fooled daily, hurt hourly, and the injured soul who has to be picked up drunk from the narrow alley every night. But be the one who doesn’t lose hope in humanity even as friends lie, colleagues use, relatives conspire and outsiders ingratiate. It’s better to die innocent with one’s heart full of the sky then bitterly, much before the universe closes in. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the travails of growing old:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Melodic Interlude Two by Alexander Nakarada
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Minor Earth Major Sky

Sat, 19 Aug 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a thought which has haunted me time and again. I have done, thought, engendered, perpetrated things which I know are not me, at least what I’ve thought of as the actual me, the essence of me. Things have happened unthinkingly, impulsively, reflexively, without the intervention of what I call my better senses. Then I reason - all my instinctive reactions and actions have come out of me hence they are as much me as the better ones. If my better senses have a home inside me then so do the worst of my instincts - and what’s the use of denying the fact. And I lie bemused and ashamed. I console myself - overall I’m not a bad person. So here’s what I do. Even inside the furtiveness of my secrets I try to seek a balance. Kindness over revelation, pause before thought, acceptance over recrimination. And I realise the impossibility of changing things which don’t wish to be changed. And I slowly accept that reality. And in that acceptance is the seed of peace. We only have ourselves to understand and change. And because of that the universe will come and show us another path, if there is something inside us which wants it. There is then no need to change anything else. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on introspecting on life and times:

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: AnotherDramaticScene by Lilo Sound
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I WIll Leave The Last Line For You To Fill

Sat, 12 Aug 2023 20:00:00 +0500

One of the tragedies of growing older is how we see more and more people pass on, even as we wait for our own mortality to kick in. Surviving loved ones is not a blessing, as we find lesser number of breaths intertwined with ours, and our hours spent in longer days. There are several people I remember with great tenderness. Along the years the particularities have started to fade. The slant of a smile, the squelching of eyes, the way some words got spoken, the firmness of a hand on a shoulder, the moments a hug lasted. Lines of a face start fading, we forget when we last laughed, what we last said - what we regretfully didn’t. The only thing which remains with clarity is the glow their memory evokes, the smile which comes when I think of them, and the lump which forms in my throat, when tears start to flow unabashedly. As the years add up, and death seems more a reality than a concept, I hope even if my life doesn’t engender any remembrance, at least, to whoever who thinks of me, they find themselves filled with a glow, even if it is as small as a flame. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the grief and tribulation of passing on -

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The Grace That We Give

Sat, 05 Aug 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Karma is destiny’s calling. The smiles and bruises we give, troop back to us in (as the famous Gladiator once said) this birth or the next. (Likely to be this, as I’ve seen God getting to be progressively more impatient). The things we twist, the generosities we quietly lay out like sunlight, the hypocrisies we ooze in our sanctimonious smiles - we might not get our just desserts in this birth but we are definitely found out and scorned for what we really are. The belief has, I must confess, given me satisfaction whenever I have encountered the worst of humanity and not been able to do much about it. But much more than the illusory future retribution, I have seen life come by with its lessons and lesions in ways too subtle, too meaningful to brush away. A rampaging mean lying boss who gets a son who steadily gets to become the same. The deep conjugal misery of an acquaintance who only has a warped opinion of everyone. A serial adulterer who has health problems galore. I see cause and effect everywhere. Friends say I’m giving logic the widest canvas possible, and life anyway has these instances of good fortune/bad fortune, heartache and woe in the normal course of life. Of course it does. But grant me my satisfaction. But the greater imperative is the multiplier effect of all that we do. The universe we inhabit is far more sensitive and absorbing of what we say and do. We don’t always realise it, but our nature is also prone to go viral - things we say, things we do, and not only when there is extreme good or extreme vileness. And simply by being ourselves, we affect people around us, who in turn touch the senses of those whose lives they touch, and so on and so forth. Without realising things change, because of us. And thus the good we do finds a way back to us. Nothing beautiful we have achieved has ever happened in splendid isolation. We are plugged into the sensory ether of the universe, and there are waves which carry us up - and it’s the infinite grace of our doing which takes us to places which we wouldn’t even conceive of reaching. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the mystery of karma and life:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode - Music: Village Ambiance by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6586-village-ambiance
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Music: Army Of The Dead by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10276-army-of-the-dead
Licensed under CC BY 4.0: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

On Growing Up (that haze of sunshine & dust)

Sat, 29 Jul 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Growing up, and the art of doing nothing. How I wish I was again sure of the former and a master of the latter. Because I’ve lived years, often without experiencing anything new, and fill my time - and myself - so much that there is no place left to give wings to my choices or desires. I still remember the days when I naturally knew what was important - reading, and thinking about what I read; talking, and then letting long silences puncture my words; of waking up, and watching a random tree outside my window sway; of sitting at the dining table, of mum waxing eloquent about a new technique of soil petrification, and dad taking a spoonful and saying “This is good”, and a silence descending, punctured only by the sounds of blissful chewing. The choices were simpler, and unbeknownst to us, we were creating nooks for return, for solace. In our tumbling, involved worlds now, we are heroes of the rote, progenitors of the already parsed, masters of the cliched, slaves to the routine. We don’t change rhythms, we don’t stop on the way to the office, we have an iron grip on whom we meet, we are shy for the new, we are afraid of the unobvious. In the immensity of possibilities, we pick a few strands and tie our world with them - and think it’s gift-wrapped. A friend wrote in, when a poem from 9 years back popped up on her Facebook feed - “I miss those times of poetry, conversations, simplicity.” A flood of pleasure ran through me just thinking of those days. It’s easy to say that we’d moved on (the truth), it’s useless to say “let’s return” because we can’t. Every time is a different time, and we are in many ways different people - what connected us then was that magical alchemy of time which presented us with the plain brass of time which we turned into pure gold. Nothing can bring back that transition - yes, because it was that - as the rabbit hole of life is always destined to take us somewhere else. Nostalgia is a bitch, but it serves a purpose. It reminds us that what is valuable to our memory is because that time was particularly lived in. It brings into our sensibilities the need to immerse ourselves into the ride and stop chasing shadows. To experience the leakages of time as the stream to slip on, to try not to multiply moments into meaning. And minutiae becomes life - to give your sister’s hair time enough to grow, to let things pass such that the first wrinkle does appear on your mother’s face, to let our father’s laughter resound like echo inside us long after it’s last note has drifted, to let flowers float and be grounded. In our realisation of the drift of time, lies the possibility of it becoming permanent parts of our being. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the joy and tribulations of growing up:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Following is the music used in this episode -

Music: Weightless by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9092-weightless
License: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Music: Endless Expanses by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9124-endless-expanses
License: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

My Mother is Full of Water and Ready for Sonography

Sat, 22 Jul 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Our relationship to our mothers is a supple thing. Day to day, year to year, age to age, it changes. Beyond the evolutionary grounding, beyond the nurturing necessities, we are an amalgam of the obvious and the extraordinary. To be gifted the kind of unprecedented unflinching support we do get from mothers is a benediction of nature. Our steady rejection of it, and her holding tight to the tethers, is the obvious unravelling which this relationship goes through - her instinct becomes a need, the child’s need for her transitions to become a burden. And then there’s an inflexion point when things come to a head. Often in the teens, often later - it doesn’t matter when. What does matter is that it’s almost a rebellion of a kind. Things start breaking down as if everything was fragile to begin with, as if the relationship was nothing more than that of a food-provider and laundry-doer. And the tie is suddenly fraught with the consequences of unreconciled pain. Succour is often found elsewhere. And therein often lies the genesis of the fracture - the bird seeks to fly out of the nest, but the nester is still not done with the chick. But relationships are both the present and the unravelling. A lot of its pain is the passage, though it’s joy is retrospective. And though we might be nostalgic as we look back, we might actually have come out through a long tunnel of pain. But in spite of all its rockiness, a mother remains a symbol of our breath. The sooner we let that one thought overshadow everything else, we would have let ourselves understand the meaning of the most meaningful relationship in our life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on our times with our mothers:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: AnotherDramaticScene by Lilo Sound
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6137-anotherdramaticscene
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Of Rain-Engulfed Rooms and Lovers in Spate

Sat, 15 Jul 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Rain, amongst all seasons, is as much feeling as occurrence. In spite of all its deleterious effects - on roads, homes, countries - log-jammed lanes, traffic jams, leaky roofs, economic devastations! - it can never be bereft of its poetry, it’s memory of growing pangs, it’s matte occurrences of comfort, tea and satisfying dissatisfactions. Everyone has a rain-infused remembrance. The peerless newsletter ‘The Nook’ had a get-together to reminisce about people and their memories of rains - “One (of the participants) brought with them the rains of Kerala, with their many names and each a peculiar character. Another told us of the monsoons in the hills, of mothers and grandmothers climbing concrete roofs and fixing them while children hold buckets and gather stones that roll off. We shared stories of running across paddy fields, our feet tickling; tales of a small family on a three-wheeler devouring patties that we too could taste in our mouths. We were transported to a bustling street in Delhi brought to its knees by the rain. We became kids floating paper boats in puddles, lovers stealing a kiss in the backseat while the driver’s distracted by the romance of the windshield wipers and the rain.”

Indeed! For lovers, the rains are the perfect playlist. Gentle, harsh, insistent, soothing. The world inside finds a rhythm with the world outside. Being inside a time when time doesn’t matter is life’s finest benediction, one which lovers embrace with casual ease, knowing, possibly for the first time in their lives, that the world can wait. And that then is the bittersweet legacy of the monsoons. Of being so close to life that thereafter it doesn’t matter - and then to immediately lose that lesson. In living through the rains, we are filled to the brim with both life’s grace and possibilities. If only we let the aftermath be a continuum. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the romance of rain:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Parting of the Ways - Part 2 by Kevin MacLeod
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4196-parting-of-the-ways-part-2
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Yearning (and other things we carry in the journey)

Sat, 08 Jul 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Who are we, if not people who live on hope, thought to thought, day to day, year to year. Often knowing about possibilities, often just whistling in the wind. It could be a change of fortune, a lucky break, a chance encounter, a person we’d always loved. Everything, even what seems to be the minutest of an incident, has the potential to change lives, and more often than not, it does. And until it does, hope binds us to invisible tethers. Gurus talk about yearning, as they talk about the journey, and remind us not to lose the experience of what we go through. To know that the journey of feelings is often more precious than what we finally get. The untetheredness of anguish, the ecstasy of possibility, the world building, the smart turn of phrase, the laughter, the look, the sheer joy of something which could only be defined as tender. That is the road to finally getting something. Heartbreakingly , and retrospectively, when we finally get - what we wanted, who we wanted, how we wanted - it is often bereft of glory. Compared to the striving, what we finally get seems so much lesser - less glittering, less flawless, less satisfying. And thus go things in life, and thus do love stories find their beginnings, their middles and their ends. Too many affairs end at the consummation. And it would be a tragedy to have that as the only remembrance - and not the tease and the expectation and the imagination and the excessive giving and the extravagance leading towards it all. And because of that, every story stands stunted, it’s rich repository of the best of what we human beings are capable of lying discarded with a sheen of regret, as if it meant for nothing. When the truth is that this is what we actually live for. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the urgings and yearning:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Odyssee by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/56-odyssee
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Memory Keeper

Sat, 01 Jul 2023 20:00:00 +0500

The bane of my life has been my memory. I forget. I forget prodigiously. Names, faces, conversations. Don’t even get me to started on dates and numbers, groan. In office, at home, I struggle with narrating incidents, at remembering places, things we saw and ate at specific places. I had a girl who worked for me who, after a decade, still remembered the make of the shirt and the colour of socks I’d worn when I’d first interviewed her. I guess there are bigger tragedies in life (people are still dying hungry!), but more than a patchy whitewash of remembrance, this creates a strange spiritual hole in me, which I carry as regret inside me. But on the flip side, I have also forgotten grievances and regrets, I forget details of battles, I’ve forgotten details of when friends had tried to pull fast ones on me, the pain some had left, the times I’d weeped into the night because words had hurt. I’d forgotten the details, soon I’d forgotten who’d said or done what. Forgetfulness then is just another way for forgiveness. But there are deeper cuts. I’ve forgotten details of the afternoon when my son was born, I’ve forgotten the look on my dad’s face (ecstatic I’m told) when I’d passed my first professional exams. Or my mother’s hug (unending, I’m told) when she held the first copy of my first book. I’ve forgotten words spoken softly to me, poems written for me, silences I’ve shared, the memories of hands held in crowded rooms, playing the fool, the hi jinks. The entirety of what is gone is like a lost country of reminiscence. And that hurts. What then remains is an existential mystery, where I pathetically flounder inside the lost meadows of my own heart. My happiness itself seems ragged and pockmarked and I walk around within a permanent cave of dissatisfaction. I wish sometime I would have a memory keeper, like the old royalty had - someone doing a record-keeping celestially or by being beside me. This poem is then a seeking of a blessing, a gently yearning desire to remember, and if that’s not possible, have someone I love to remember for me. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the hauntings of memory:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Relaxation [instrumental, sounds of birds] by Edvardas Sen
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10002-relaxation-instrumental-sounds-of-birds
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay: Favourite People (Who We Love and Leave)

Sat, 24 Jun 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it! We are what we are. But we are also all the people who have arrived, moved on, stayed in our lives. People whose very touch may feel like a hug or an abandonment , a benediction or a scare. People we’ve loved and fought with, people we’ve been secretive about, those we’ve cried for, those who’ve cried because of us. Just as relationships change, we are changeable too. We are what we are. But we are also the slipstream of our old loves, the undercurrent of those who hurt us, the flotsam of those we wronged. We are also the pressed flowers of compliments, kept long after the fragrance has gone; we are the lees of the good times which make us remember springs and mists; we are the dregs of the nights of short tempers and long knives. There is so much that is extraordinary in mundane lives, that one wonders what is evanescent and what stays. Would the quiet moment in a sun drop count? Would a poem which made me cry stay? Would the fleeting memory of a summer love still overwhelm after years? How does memory work? Is it a crucible or a sieve? Does it hold what it does to keep it shimmering and intact for an insignificant day? Or does it let everything percolate down into a cesspool of oblivion, just keeping back those morsels which then find place in our souls. Every one of us then is an amalgam of the dullness and magic of every person we meet, every feeling we feel, every hurt we give, every bruise we carry. We are never merely the wind and the woods, the street and the home - we are also the stars, the black holes, the pulsars - we are the whole universe. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on resolving relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Rising Sun by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/86-rising-sun
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Miles Apart

Sat, 17 Jun 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I have always wondered about those who are in love and stay cities away from each other, and colleagues who are ready to stay apart for their careers. And I’m gobsmacked at how they make it happen. I’ve asked several of them about it, and the answer is always accompanied by a sigh and the answer “Life.” As if what determined their choices was something out of their control. Which was of course both true and not true. But I was more interested in how they made it happen? How they kept their feelings of tenderness and care alive, how did they show their best and their worst to each other, how could they bridge the gap of physicality and touch - all the ingredients which are so essential for a relationship to breathe and exist. Can sulking have the same impact across zoom? How can kissing on phone substitute for the real thing? Without a body beside you, do you slowly start preferring your solitary conquering of the bed? Whom do you turn to when nightmares or worse crises hit you? Do you discover that an empty home has teeth and too many dark corners? Does a conjoined love story finally find its own solitary life story? It is easy to promise to each other that you are the start and the end of a tie, that when the moonbeam hits the pillow beside yours you are filled with an ache which just doesn’t go. Because distances erode. Because nothing can substitute the look of an eye, the deep hidden ring of a guffaw, the comfort and continuing thrill of a safe and familiar touch. We are finally physical people, who flower in presence - there is one sun in the sky to fill the world with its nourishment but one in our lives to fill us with the glow and nurture so essential for our souls. However much our hearts are full of what we mean for each other, there’s a point where our yearning will ask a question - and with great chagrin we will discover that the answers are no longer clear. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the difficulties of relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Memories by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/8554-memories
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

One Quiet Woman is Much Like Another

Sat, 10 Jun 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Agency! Agency! That’s what people would say - women lack agency, that self-respect, which would allow them to accept no nonsense from their partners. Violence? Infidelity? These were lines which once crossed were unretractable, unforgivable. But women do the unthinkable - they scream and shout, but they also forgive, they also stay on. And in that one decision seems to lie embodied their helplessness, as they sacrifice their intrinsic force, jettison their innate power, lay down their weaponry without stepping into the fighting ring. Or - is that true? Are these the contradictions which women of our age display - strong in peacetime, weak in battle? Brilliant in picking out the diamonds, floundering in the play in the dirt? But here’s the catch - are they ironically being stronger for it? Because when you step back, and look at people like you would look at stars - with both wonder and perspective - you realise that maybe, maybe, it all matters so little. Foibles are weaknesses, the one who is beautiful in body is often the weakest in spirit, that however gnarled the deed, human beings are also intrinsically gorgeous. That from a past fraught with conflict, there comes a realisation of the most soul-searching kind. That in the universe of people, there are bound to be hurtling comets along with the stars, out of control, with strange inner workings, but who also might be gentle souls, whose generosity makes them leave their light behind, long after they are gone. And through the pain of being taken for granted, of being cheated, of facing inequities, there is a dawn of realisations and reconciliations. Because people change. Because couched in the worst of us, often lies our most vulnerable parts which might be the reason for what we do. For when people crack, often it lets out the acid, venom and bile which was poisoning everything inside, by accumulating without any way to run out. People change. There are multiple dawns inside them. And reincarnations. There’s so much which burns up and burns out. They are often destroyed before they re-emerge as the best versions of what they always were but did not - maybe could not - show. Often there is no patience for this, often no scope, no width, no chance. Often the tidal waves of distress and pain of loved ones are enough to inundate whole lives. It’s a valid reaction. They are consumed by circumstances. And find their best selves compromised by the worst their partners can show. Maybe, maybe, that is fine too. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on truth and untruths -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Atlantis by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/8784-atlantis
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Compatriots of Trust

Sat, 03 Jun 2023 20:00:00 +0500

It’s so easy to say that trust is absolute. That what is trustworthy has to be fully so, or not at all. In the grey complexities of life, it’s both the toughest give and often an unreasonable ask. Humans are fragile, they are also duplicitous. They lie, betray a trust of years, but are ironically ready to lay their lives on line when it comes to things they care for - and for those whose very trust they may have betrayed. Ensconced in the biggest tragedy of human nature often lies it’s gold mine. Because if there’s one truth which sustains our relationships and keeps things afloat is our changeability, our evolution. We learn, we relearn, as life goes on we rediscover priorities, within our wounds we find the kernel of redemption. But the tragedy lies with the victims, the ones whose trust is betrayed. Because they lie injured, hurt, their belief in tatters, and their very core shaken. For them to go back to a more pristine time in such a relationship is asking for the impossible. How can such a person ever trust again? And that is where we have to steel ourselves. When I stand in front of someone who has betrayed me, these are the two thoughts I hold inside. Will my trust be again forsaken? Can I be the same again with this person? Time will tell. But I will force myself to give it a shot. I will set up a personal ecosystem of forgiveness and communication. And I have the company of author Maya Angelou, who in her inimitably gentle and forthright way said “Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.” But author Shannon L Adler said something very revealing years back which I haven’t forgotten - “People that have trust issues only need to look in the mirror. There they will meet the one person that will betray them the most.” I have held that thought as close to my heart as I have Jesus’s exhortation “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone.” Life's navigation through trust issues thus find its granular path to resolution. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on things which wound our souls -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Weightless by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9092-weightless
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

If I Commit Suicide

Sat, 27 May 2023 20:00:00 +0500

If I commit suicide, it will be on a happy day. I would wrap the day as efficiently as I would wrap my life. Instructions clear, bank accounts safe, investments earmarked. I would make your favourite dish (stuffed aubergine with sun dried tomatoes), serve it with garlic bread, call in your favourite ice cream (Jamoca Almond Fudge) and have a glass of chianti on the side, as you look on in wonder. I would watch you with pleasure as the sun sets and fills you with its glow. In the end, I would have attempted to give you what neither you nor I could give each other - care. Oh, I am not fussing the good things, which we performed with discipline - we would always end our days with our duty to each other completed to perfection. But we would also be - polite but insidious, thoughtful but sarcastic: we would hollow each other, tired of figuring out each other’s metaphors. For we had become proficient in knowing what hurt both of us, as we talked of making sense and losing our minds. We always thought we would find love right in front of each other, preordained, either as a beginning or as a finality, but instead we found storms brewing in living rooms and broken teacups in the backyards. What is it about ordinary lives that it’s intimations of helplessness are far more severe than the defeat of a cherished dream? Thought by thought, remark by remark, word by word, we were chipped, alienated, distanced. Until we were frightened of ourselves, doubtful of our very place in the universe, and felt undeserving of the sheltering skies or the unquestioning beauty of the world. There’s so much I will miss. Stories of others where they’d found the meaning which had always eluded me, empty chairs left behind after the music was over and we overflowed, the slant of flower-laden boughs as they smiled and encroached into my walk, the careless spread of broken blossoms lying as inspiration, the warm glow of evenings without chatter or insistences. But then it would all be overlaid with the intonations of familiar voices as they slowly entangled me as aural nooses. That’s when I knew it was time. It would be appropriate that I would leave so serenely, as my entire life has been an exercise in evolving quietly in the backyards of my own despair, so much so that I would bleed and I myself would not know. Who says suicide is drama where the protagonist doesn’t know the end? I know. I know you will break, you will be inconsolable - but not irreparable. You are strong and practical. And you will find solace in my note which would unequivocally say it was not your fault. That it was my choice, my choice alone. You will be massively inconvenienced but not irreconcilably. You will regret my guts to give in fatally and finally to my anguish - after all, we had our own happy metre to figure out who made the other more melancholic. I will probably play Maksim’s Hana’s Eyes, as I would lie back and let my life leave me behind as a shell without any sense of presence. I was always a murmur, I will leave as a whisper. I hope I will finally come home to me. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on death and its redemptions -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Heart Love by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9259-heart-love
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Music: Sunset at Glengorm by Kevin MacLeod
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4437-sunset-at-glengorm
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finding Home in Broken Places

Sat, 20 May 2023 20:00:00 +0500

It’s one of the ironies of life that we spend more time searching for what’s wrong and flawed in those we love than on the pleasure their presence provides us. We are crotchety with praise. We could be pillows or doors for them, we could be their skies or their earth, their truth when they require it, their boost, their grace, their heft. We forget they are breathing masses of soul, liable to be torn, likely to bleed. That they need to be embraced more often then turned away from. And I wonder why are we like this? Why are we hard, unrelenting, unkind, with those who deserve the best we can give, the finest of what makes us loveable and liveable. Is it something in the bones of our species that we hold ourselves back - see danger first, untruth, a selfish play, a ploy? Instead of belief and warmth, we first walk through the ugly and the unlovable. It’s almost as if we are going towards something which would put us into a path of perdition/engulf us with distrust, as if we expected it, almost wanted it. That is how strong our primordial instinct to be wary is. And we are ready to be hurt, we want to be proven that people are the worst versions of themselves, irrespective of how we might have been otherwise. Cynicism it seems is hardwired into our DNA. And in that one tragic bent of thought, we lose the gold-flecking possibilities in our relationships. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems about the places we consider home -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Medieval Love by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9366-medieval-love
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay : Come When The Heat Of Noon Has Still Not Dimmed

Sat, 13 May 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it!

"Come. Come softly. Come when the heat of noon has still not dimmed. Come when the streets have stopped asking questions. Come when the world has left its own care to us. Come." In anticipation lies a whole universe. In the waiting lies the shape, the sound, the colour, the contour of beauty. In a world strewn with disappointments, of truths with no spine, and lies with fashionable make-up on, often the only solace lies in the wonder and the dream. And particularly in love, anticipation is often the beginning, the glue, and the end. Particularly, as we wait... Because in that hiatus of restless emptiness, our heart and mind have conversations, nay, battles. There are questions asked, doubts raised, admonishments given. With great rapidity, joy and misery tumble around in a struggle for supremacy - there’s nothing real, but everything seems real. We dread excuses, we anticipate excuses, we destroy excuses. In a span of few moments - minutes - which have the jaggedness of hours, hearts are deciphered, conclusions are drawn, decisions are hewn into stony consciousness. But everything seems fragile. And then the wait finishes. The nervousness melts. Questions are unquestioned. Answers no longer require stilts. There is light. There is air. Before it all ends, there is life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on conundrums of life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

I Fell In Love With You (Again) Beside The Tin of Sardines

Sat, 06 May 2023 20:00:00 +0500

People who are permanent fixtures in our lives still have that unique ability to make happiness spring upon us. It could be something big like a surprise party, or it could be something infinitesimally small like quietly following you to the mall so you could then have a quick happy moment over coffee. Loved ones know how to pull in disparate threads of our being, and weave an ordinary but extraordinary hour out of it, the way we gather the scattered beams of dusk and find a quiet sanctuary in it. These slivers we steal from our daily routines are the ones which give meaning to life. Business, work, our daily responsibilities are what give us a means to live, to find a place in society which often defines us with what we do, but the private time we can steal to be with a loved one, the visit we make to an art gallery on the way back home, the poem we write as an overflow to a haunting of the night, the music we turn to when we seek answers - these are things which give meaning to our existence. Time and again, whenever I have sat back and thought of the times which would probably flash through my mind in the last seconds of my existence, they are invariably the seemingly meaningless ones - standing at the window watching the setting sun reflect on the ponds beside my house, seeing a TikTok video together and laughing uncontrollably, reading something moving and sharing it immediately whilst glowing inside to have added a dollop of sunlight into someone’s ordinary day, talking quietly about how much we miss someone we’d loved with equal immensity, seeing a painting together and then turning to see tears in each other’s eyes. The memory of happiness on each others faces when we meet after a long parting, the sound of her voice saying “I will take care, don’t worry.” People sometimes tell me they haven’t taken a holiday for years, and I silently wonder - haven’t they gone back to a loved one every night? The things which enrich us are often the things we label as ‘boring’ - before we know what’s better. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems about people we are lucky to have in our lives -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Open Sea (Piano) by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9420-open-sea-piano
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Music: Relaxation 3 by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9629-relaxation-3
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

As We Meet Again At The End of The Day

Sat, 29 Apr 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Come evening, I am breathless to come home. Nearer I get, faster the knots in my shoulders ease. I turn my car into the driveway, a few floors below you, and start to forget what I thought I would carry as an elongated wound of the day. I think we make too much of the world’s tribulations and deprivations, as if we are amidst the most dire times of all centuries put together, straining to find equilibrium again. We both carry enough balm in the history of our sharing, to self-heal. I know you would have already unburdened yourself of your day, to be light for me. I enter the glow of our home. You are in your favourite chair, your feet tucked under yourself, your phone at a 45 degree angle as you read your book on it. You look up and give a small secret smile which only I am able to see. I know I’m inside a perfect moment. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the unexpected tenderness which ordinary days bring to us -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Cheezy Piano Medley by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4833-cheezy-piano-medley
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When Words Despair For Stories

Sat, 22 Apr 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Can you believe the fact that there are people who go out for a full day and come back home and say there’s no story to tell, no incident to narrate, nothing magical to report. Of course, there is. It’s just that they do not wish to share. It could be disinclination, it could be the hangover of a recrimination, it could be tiredness. After a full day of words, maybe all one seeks at the end is a spot of silence. That it has to be the time when your closest and most loved ones are there is a misfortune. Here they are, home bound, captive to a routine, grinding the relentless machinery of a home, and here you are wanting nothing but a time to yourself, after mortgaging your time, soul and throat in the service of someone who has bought your life out by providing you a livelihood. And then there’s the contrarian tragedy. The day is often a pressure cooker because you have not been able to say what you wanted or fought your battles the way you might have wanted to. And when you are finally in your safe zone, you burst out. Irresponsibly, with limitless capacity to let go. And everything goes still. Hurt. There was no battle and everyone stands bruised. Because words have an unparalleled capacity to tear the untearable, split armours, break hearts. And as human beings we are masters at destroying. I have often mused on this almost unseemly power of words. They are mere wisps, created just there and then, like smoke, like breath, they are just a combination of syllables and vowels and abbreviations and intonations, things which have no stinger to sting or teeth to bite or touch for tenderness built into them, and they still have this illimitable capacity to comprehensively change everything around. It’s so easy to say - it’s just words. But it’s never ‘just’ words. It’s like breath from inside, an amalgam of our feeling, desire, anger, passion which alchemises into something heated, cool or plain. Words are never words, they are our footprint on the soul of the one who listens or reads us. It is our foray into the heart and body and soul of people who care to bother with them. Even strangers are not immune to their power. Other people’s words are important for us because we internalise what others say. We take words spoken to us as opinions about us. Breath transmutes into life. The power of words can make. Words can also break. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on tiredness -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Emotions 2 by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10547-emotions-2
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Music: Violet Sky by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10591-violet-sky
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Gather Me

Sat, 15 Apr 2023 20:00:00 +0500

One of my life’s ongoing struggles has been not to let myself dissipate such that little of me remains for me to enjoy myself. Even worse, as the pieces which the world loves of me gets grabbed, and I stand helplessly as a bystander seeing the world take its fill, and I know myself as empty, not even sure if I remain with my heart intact. Worse - we become strangers inside, trying to keep up with life’s vicissitudes and changes. And then there is a moment when we see our face in the mirror and realise - we know the lines but not the person within those lines. As life and people make their demands on us, it is upto us to see what part of our being and our time do we let go. For within the complexity of life lies the opportunity to find the simple ways of finding our own core. It could be with realisation, it could be with the love of someone close. So much of our lives is a litany of breaking ourselves up for the world and then putting the broken pieces together for ourselves. We are lost children and found souls. In our brokenness we seek someone or someway to complete ourselves and instead gravitate to what’s also injured. So much of our lives is spent in reclaiming ourselves in ways beyond what we do, what the world sees us do, because this is mere mist behind which lies a person desperate to know herself. I have spent nights struggling to see myself beyond what I write, what I think, what I do. And I have asked myself if this is what I am, my definition, or am I someone beyond, something else? Who is the true person? Behind my laughter and irritations and gifts and words, what really defines me? And how do I even get to know that person? Because my thoughts are the offspring of the moment, my feelings are born of wounds. Are adjectives my true self? He’s kind, they say, he’s talented, funny, considerate, loving, insightful, but I know I’m also irascible, hard-headed, self-centered, and blunt. What defines me then? Who am I? I know when I look at some people in my life, I know that beyond their proclivities and demands, they are often someone else - innocent to a fault, emotionally rich beyond age. And I love them for that intangible quality which they never overtly display but which I know defines them for me. What am I to such people? What is that essence beyond talent and my nature, that core which says - THIS is what you truly are, when I think of you beyond everything else. I will sit down today and gather every little piece I can think of me - try to put them together and then look behind them to see - if there is someone or something beyond which exists - something which I can say is truly me. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on people struggling with themselves -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

For The One Who Found Her Silence

Sat, 08 Apr 2023 20:00:00 +0500

How can we ever be prepared for the inevitabilities of loved ones? Our being mortal, our knowing of it, and our facing up to its ascendancy, are all different dynamics. We are never spared it’s agony, it’s feeling of leaving us bereft. As if the death of a loved one was a conspiracy against us, a punishment, maybe, of not paying enough attention to them, of taking them for granted, of giving precedence to the insubstantial over the precious. The amalgam of grief and guilt breaks us, often irretrievably. Often in lethal ways. As news breaks, of an immutable illness, an irreversible ailment, we are suddenly face-to-face with the cruelty of time’s progress. Because when we calculate the number of hours we actually have with them, after deducting all that we spend in our other necessary or trivial pursuits, the number which emerges is small, infinitesimally small. And we panic. And with thudding realisation we try to put a cessation to our small meannesses, the tragedy of picking fights on insignificant slights, of carrying scratches as wounds, of mistaking carelessness as intent. The compendium of love is a checkered compilation. It is replete with stories of madness stuck in a morass of misunderstanding, of wonderful people lost in the gracelessness of presumption, of being able to forgive the world but not the one who deserves it the most. Who are we if not fools who fool ourselves and think it’s for the best - we bring about the harakiri of relationships through senseless ego skirmishes and unsubstantiated assumptions, and realise, much later, that it was actually for nothing. Alas, it is often just too late. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on passing on, gently, bravely, gorgeously -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:

Music: If There Was A Bit Of You by Reegs'B
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10491-if-there-was-a-bit-of-you
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Music: Deep In The Soul by Reegs'B
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10278-deep-in-the-soul
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Letting Go (A Childhood Song)

Sat, 01 Apr 2023 20:00:00 +0500

We would finally find a new home.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the love, longing and loss of childhood -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

Tenderness in The Pause

Sat, 25 Mar 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I read this incredible poem today. And I weeped at its infinitesimal beauty. Tenderness by James Crews. Here it is - . Tenderness You know how a half-buried stone in the yard will clear all the snow from around itself, little by little, leaving only a hollow of warmth and a cushion of moss you want to rest on, until winter finally ends? That's how tenderness works in us, some heat rising up from beneath, then spreading outward to touch the lives of anyone who comes near - slowly, softly, making a safe place for them to stand in, melting away the coldness that gathers around us. It’s remarkable the way anger and desire and desolation and longing and love work inside us simultaneously. It’s a unique human ability to hold all of this inside at the same time, wrapped, more often than not, in an envelope of tenderness. And I think the only thing which makes us go on, in spite of all the hardships of heart that we face, is with that amazing hope that life will sort it all out for us. But the fact remains - to believe in this living is a hard way to live. What makes people to persevere through their exhaustion, when in the name of hope there is nothing more than a recurrent duplicitous (dub plis I tuhs) dawn? What makes people to keep their believe intact? That there is a road which they will turn and there will be different outcome to look out for? Why are there not more suicides? There have been tropes written on dimly-lit lifes which seem to be forever on the edge of insanity. But which look normal in their daily breath, the illusion of ordinariness making them mesh into the continuum of quotidian grey. This is normal - until it is not. Suddenly there is an explosion- people snap and destroy things, lives - often their own. The alternative is even worse, there is an implosion, and aching bodies become islands of doom, as they suck all that is good and bountiful into their black hole. Entire landscapes of hearts stand barren - eviscerated rather than destroyed, rendered hopeless than killed. Cruel men know this. They know the power men have on each other, how controlling lives is often only a factor of knowing what they care for most. It could be livelihood, it could be dignity, it could be trust, it could be faith. The lowest blow is always to the highest ideal, the deepest cut is always to the most transparent belief. We, who are the simplest in our exposition of what we care for, are the most vulnerable to wounds. There will always be someone ready to exploit our guileless openness. That’s why we require protectors of flames, the wise innocents, those who have been attacked but are still not cynical, those who are wounded but hold their scars as medals they’ve got for lost battles - for their richest lessons have come from their bitterest experiences, and how it makes them resolve to save those who are not able to fend for themselves. And that’s why they have to be “half-buried stones in the yard” with their growing circle of tenderness, for good men to find their refuge. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the tenderest feelings we feel -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Wide Worlds by Tim Kulig
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10273-wide-worlds
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Music: Deep In The Soul by Reegs'B
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10278-deep-in-the-soul
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Dysfunctional Families (and other joys)

Sat, 18 Mar 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Who are we if not products of the first quarry of breath - the family? Raw, unmanaged, planned or perchance - we are babies who enter the universe with our lungs ballistic, versed in the art of annoying everybody, with our insistences and our demand for unwavering attention, but also to beguile. Whether we are a chip of a dream or the product of a ritual or the gift of a drunken night, we are realities in the lives of a couple which looks onto us, sometimes with wonder, more often with unmitigated exasperation. We are cradled with care, often as a result of a personal sacrifice, a priority over oneself. We are babies - we coo on recognition, we reach out for their faces with our little hands as if we are reaching out for light, and we smile on hearing their familiar voices. And however slowly it might be, we find places in our parent’s hearts. But things change as we grow. We have a rough patch with our sister, scalding acrimony with our brother. We start seeing our parents as flawed human beings, people less invincible and more tired then we’d ever imagined. People we are ready now to judge, people we now find easy to be cruel with. Suddenly the dynamics of our relationships change. We move closer to other lives, and drift away from our primary caregivers, our first loves. Our needs change, our cravings are discoverers, and we open some cupboards in our soul to shelve a heap full of memories away. We move closer to other people, we become other people. But our past is a forever undertow to our lives. And the strings pull us back - often for festivities, often for tragedies: sometimes as compulsion, often reluctantly. And we discover our heartstrings start to play again. Old joys well up, old griefs too. What we’d been told, when we were ignored. Slights we didn’t know we remembered, heartbreaks which still had fracture lines. But beneath it all, our blood remembers it’s moorings, an old affection slowly blankets old afflictions, and we realise we’d deserted them, but we’d never left them at all. We were carrying them inside as simmering geysers, as dark rivers. But they were also breath, they were also our first joy. And we move towards each other as long lost magnets, And we know that maybe our blood finds its own tributaries, but that we are the same river moving towards the same sea. Our waters reflect the same sky. We are family. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the difficult art of surviving those closest to you -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Untold Stories by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/5844-untold-stories
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

This: One Grace

Sat, 11 Mar 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Sometimes, without asking, we are gifted grace. It could be the strumming of a guitar from a neighbouring house some lazy afternoon, it could be the first sighting of a butterfly after a harsh winter, it could be a shared glance across a crowded metro coach, it could be the morning sun seeming to bend to greet you as you step into the street, of entering a lift and recognising the song seeping out of someone’s earphone. These are dollops of sundrops left on our soul’s doorstep, almost to remind us that there is much more to life than only it’s mangled drudgery. But the tragedy is that in our misconception to liken life to a race, we ignore these minuscule benedictions invariably strewn in our paths. And we miss out the chance to experience life’s stranger fullness, which says you take care of the big things to steady your ship, but if you ignore the little things you will go through this world empty. And then there’s the karmic law of grace. What you give is also what you get back, often in multiples of abundance. Are we the one with the glance? The progenitor of a secret note, the one who secretly funded a dream, the one who moved the curtain so the winter sun finds its way to the body of a loved one, the one who canceled a meeting to hear a little one’s incredibly important tale, the one who doesn’t remove a bloodless arm from beneath someone fast asleep? In our willingness to go on a limb for a loved one or a stranger, we are plugging into the blessing of a mysterious force, the power of a spiritual community, a universe which always gives back. Because love in its purest form is finally service, it’s our ability to find the finest parts of ourselves and make a gift of it. And this is invariably the unwritten history of our lives, which comes back to us, as a story of survival - and often to lighten the deepest darkness of a stranger’s life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the grace of love and life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Liberty Quest by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/293-liberty-quest
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Aaschi

Sat, 04 Mar 2023 20:00:00 +0500

'Aaschi' is a beautiful Bengali word. It’s used when you are leaving home - for work, for pleasantries, for whatever. You say it to the folks you are leaving behind. Instead of saying “I’m going” you say “Aaschi”, which means “I’m coming back.” And this one simple word becomes a promise to return, a pledge that the parting is temporary. In its intonation, meaning and feeling, it’s an intimacy. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the tenderness of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Village Ambiance by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6586-village-ambiance
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finding Ways To Survive (Each Other)

Sat, 25 Feb 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Some relationships are doomed. They get off to a bad start, and never hit their stride. Or find their autumn of distrust early, and see no reason to change the season. Often a passing reaction is presumed to be a permanent opinion. Sometimes it’s something shallow, but in the face - hair in the sink, slurping of soup, insensitivity with a joke. The reasons can be myriad. But the rusting which sets in starts its irreversible corrosion. But relationships have their own dynamics. And often circumstances erode jointings, but do not snap them apart. It could be habit, it could be compulsion, it could be happenstance, it could be forbearance, it could be foolhardiness. But some relationships sway like trees in storms, bend, go wild, but are not dislodged from their moorings. Something mysterious holds them down, refusing to let them be dislodged. And that’s the alchemy of bonds, the mysterious gold dust masquerading as rust. A glue. Is it the effulgence of time, a passage of conciliations, or the despair of circumstance? Who knows. But in the midst of mayhem, there could be a grudging unobstructive growth of recognition, tenderness - axis aligned! - love. Because the awning of love offers shelter even though it not be a place of safety. We risk loss, hurt, pain. But those are things already encountered, faced, survived. What remains then is a mysterious island of light and tranquility. As Bell Hooks said “Living in a culture where we are encouraged to seek a quick release from any pain or discomfort has fostered individuals who are easily devastated by emotional pain, however relative. When we face pain in relationships, our first response is often to sever bonds rather than to maintain commitment.” And that’s when we “flee from love before we feel it’s grace.” Pain may be the threshold we must cross to partake of love’s bliss. But if we continuously run from the pain, we will never know the fullness of love’s pleasure. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of surviving love's inequities -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Relaxing Guitar by Liron
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/7722-relaxing-guitar
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Replay: Lose A Lover Not A Friend

Sat, 18 Feb 2023 20:00:00 +0500

This is a repeat of one of my more popular poems, replayed here with a hope of getting a new audience, who might have missed it!

Too little, I feel, is talked about heartbreak which arises from friendships which come unstuck. It’s almost as if it doesn’t require comment or commiseration if it’s not love. There’s injustice there. When the truth is that closely wrought bonds which are non sexual often give more shelter to the soul than love can ever do. Friendship is a live-in relationship for the soul. Where everything precious holds true, but no bond paper is signed. Friendship often frees you more preciously than how love binds you. Vikram Seth wrote in his poem, A Style of Loving - Light now restricts itself

To the top half of trees;
The angled sun
Slants honey-coloured rays
That lessen to the ground
As we bike through
The corridor of Palm Drive
We two

Have reached a safety the years
Can claim to have created:
Unconsummated, therefore
Unjaded, unsated.
Picnic, movie, ice-cream;
Talk; to clear my head
Hot buttered rum - coffee for you;
And so not to bed

And so we have set the question
Aside, gently.
Were we to become lovers
Where would our best friends be?
You do not wish, nor I
To risk again
This savoured light for noon's
High joy or pain.

Love seeks adventure, friendship is already one; love is cautious as there is so much breakable which is at stake, but friendship thrives on risk - without it it withers, dies. There is reverse alchemy in friendship. What would life be without the wild indulgences with friends - the late nights, the drives, drinking binges, closing up to each other’s secrets, opening up to our black holes. There is a bond of shared blood between friends which no amount of shared intimacy between lovers can ever be able to replace. Friendships do turn to love affairs. And if expectations don’t drown its unfettered madness and outrageous indulgences and intravenous bonding, it would be the greatest love affair possible. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of possibilities of friendship and love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Zone by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/270-the-zone
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Love Story of An Accountant & A Poet

Sat, 11 Feb 2023 20:00:00 +0500

I have often looked at couples who are so different from each other that together they seem to move like oil and water. And then I blink and look again, and I see a strange alchemy at work - a layering more than a blending, stitched crochet then a cocktail, a sun-entrenched day than smog. And they progressively look like a gorgeously-knitted piece of warm-wear together. How do people who seem to have nothing in common get attracted to each other, and then find that balance which is the merging of maps and diversities? How do heaven and earth meet? It’s simplistic to say that if someone loves talking, the perfect match is the person who is a great listener. Or the aggressive one needs the calm presence beside her. Habits can be nature, but they need nurturing to be character. And people who gravitate towards each other do so because something in them has transcended the constraints of skin-deep deterrents and found something subtler inside to connect to. A poet might then be drawn to the accountant, because both recognise they are artistes, merely writing on different media. An actress can then be seduced easily by the sportsman because both revel in the creative and the risky. The social butterfly might love the slow retiring kind because she finds her resting space in him. The ties which bind have roots deep in the chemistry of our beings. Contrasts also gravitate towards each other to fill unseen emptinesses inside. The man tongue-tied and tied up because of being shut up throughout his life is completely blown away by the brazen and the bold. The woman surrounded 24 hours in a vortex of talk, energy and confusion will plunge headlong into a man who seems to be an ocean of calmness and gravitas. Often such contrasts turn out to be false manifestations of shallow beings, and the bond crumbles in the face of revelations. But when it conjoins into a fulfilment of what a true seeker finds, it is like a holy union, an alliance made in heaven. Angelita Lim said "I saw that you were perfect, and so I loved you. Then I saw that you were not perfect and I loved you even more." Maybe, then, the dynamics of relationships are the universe’s tease, it’s magic to make life an exhilarating and often unexpected trip. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the ironies of love:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Toccata and Fugue in D Minor by Kevin MacLeod
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4533-toccata-and-fugue-in-d-minor
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Passage Of Time by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10005-passage-of-time
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

For Nothing More Than A Look Of Me

Sat, 04 Feb 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Don’t we complicate our lives too much?

With our desire for more, and then for much more, for affirmations, and then reaffirmations. For a continuous acknowledgment that not only do we matter, but - that we matter more than anybody else. It’s not enough to be together; we want words which confirm that our togetherness matters. We want cards, messages, heart-shaped emojis, birthday presents, outings, likes to our posts. Things which can be seen or talked about. Our feelings can’t only be felt, they need to take the route of the tangible.

We exist in a chaos of desire.

And. In the process, ignoring, time and again, what comes unobtrusively, on soft padded paws, in ways which often can’t be seen - but can always be felt, if we only stop to breathe and notice,

Both of you quietly reading your own books, as she slowly slides onto your shoulder into sleep. She working on her desk on a Sunday, and you walking upto the door, checking her out, and leaving quietly. Both of you listening to the same music, one AirPod each. Holding hands because they are there to be held. Looking at the same painting for long minutes and then turning to find that both of you have tears in your eyes. Turning back in the middle of a fight into a hug.

In our litany of anguish we are often in search of redemption, but stay to linger in wounds. So how do we acknowledge tough times?

By not bothering her when her brows are knitted, to not admonish him when things go wrong, to listen (really listen) when he complains, to be a weathervane to moods, to be grateful for the good times and see one’s being fill up with grace.

The little things, the smallest littlest things. To be alive to their possibility and their manifestation. To know that if you have to think about the last day of your life, it would be no more, and no less, than spending time with both your feet out in the sun, dozing sporadically, but her hand in yours, and talking of what passes as feelings, fleeting, of how through the drudgery and heartbreak of life, both of you are still able to find each other's simple beauty of presence.

Love really is the quietest feeling in the world.

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the tenderness of love:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: About Moments by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/235-about-moments
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Ruins Have Permanent Flames

Sat, 28 Jan 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Old age is often a sadness, not so much for the slowing and breaking down of the body’s machinery, but because how it brings invisibility to the aged. Because if there is one section of people who are ignored, as if they don’t exist, it is often the aging. As the world swirls around them, with all it’s passion, conflict, confusion, interaction, conversation, they are there, in the middle of the whirlpools - they are seen - and then unseen. Nobody seems to have time for the old. There they sit, quietly, often in a corner, observing the drama, silent with their opinion (maybe they were once told roughly not to interfere?), thinking of how they had faced similar situations, knowing how things would turn out - but, alas, never turned to, never asked for. By being ignored, they are rendered static in the daily flow of life. They are bathed and alert, seated and waiting, looking tentatively into the busyness of their loved ones’ lives, asking softly what was up, what was the rush, if there was any help required - but are brushed off - gently, by a good soul; not so gently, by the one who thinks them to be a waste of time. And they sit quietly, with their newspapers and memories, hushed tones and shaded looks, both proud and concerned. They see the living dynamos, with their blood in them, making a life of their own, with their own choices and decisions; but often immolating themselves in self-lit fires. And then unasked, they get up from their wheelchairs, and break open the glass door of the fire extinguisher, and save the souls of their offspring, the way they did when they were young. And suddenly, the invisible become visible. The useless become useful. The extinct become extant. I remember Almodovar’s Talk To Her, where a male nurse spent years talking to a woman who was in a coma, who probably did not comprehend a single word of what was being spoken, who probably had little chance of recovery, but does so because he loves her. I often wonder what stops us from doing the same with the elderly in our family, when they are not even comatose, and would be absorbing of what we say, observant in what they give. In our hierarchy of choices, we would rather exult in the digital euphoria of social media than have the slow patience to savour the quiet delight of a life fully-lived. If only we go beyond our professed love for our parents and other ageing loved ones, and actually spent time with them, with words or merely sharing silences, we will come back, awash in light and drenched in gratitude. Attention is the soul and water and sunshine for an ageing soul. As the sun sets, and we revel in its afterglow, grace fills our soul, and the tenderness of what we give comes back to us and makes us malleable and alive. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the inevitabilities of life:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Relaxation [instrumental, sounds of birds] by Edvardas Sen
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10002-relaxation-instrumental-sounds-of-birds
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

She Held His Hand As He Drifted

Sat, 21 Jan 2023 20:00:00 +0500

The irrevocability of death is a given. Even as I can't ever reconcile to it, I sit in awe at its messy discipline. It tears worlds asunder, leaves pain in its wake, splits, often destroys, but moves unreconciled and unrelenting. Sometimes it gives a little air, some space - not a dawn of hope, but a sunbeam - as a vestige, but then again moves across the firmament to find its west - and waste. As we sit beside the hospital bed of a loved one, and pray, even if it’s for one more breath, deep inside we know it is against all natural laws. But hope is what we live on. I still remember the story of the Mughal king Babur, whose son Humayun was lying nearing death, and he went around his bed three times, praying to the almighty, for the exchange of life for life, to give his son's illness to him in exchange of Babur’s health, and it happened, his son was saved. It’s a desperate thought for a despairing heart. Just as death is really a passage through life, for the surviving - the bereaved, the ones left behind - death of a loved one is a transition, from a sensory world of togetherness to an estranged world of isolation. With a numb realisation we realise how much we are made, of what we get from those closest to us. Their demise then is like the opening of a yawning gap, something which often never fills again. It’s the absence of a voice, a touch, a quiet glance, a secret smile. It is the thinking together, it is the sharing of silences, of a bowl of soup, of seeing a sunbeam together. Of shivering in the cold, of finding warmth, of drinking coffee, of arguing, of hugging, of saying goodbye on the doorstep knowing, come evening and you would meet again. And then all of a sudden, we realise how the absence of one life diminishes our whole world. Our accomplishments are not enough without the ardent cheerleader, our presence is not significant without that someone’s acknowledgment, a life we might be living in multiples is forever laid to rest as a lonely singularity. A loved one's mortal body dies once, and we, the survivors, die multiple times inside. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on death's call:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The music is a mantra for the peace of a departed soul, performed by Sahil Jagtiani, from the album "Om Namo Narayanaya Chanting".

No Revolution Is Complete Without A Ruined Soul

Sat, 14 Jan 2023 20:00:00 +0500

"I look back to see if I had left behind trails of my voice, as if that mattered more than if they had reached." I stay in Calcutta, and wherever I walk I know I do so on hallowed ground, unseen but still fallow with the blood of revolutionaries. It’s another matter that whilst some of it was a fight for freedom, some of it was misguided, for things which revolutionaries themselves lost sight of. The fight was for a cause - but often for the fight itself. But, foolish or brave, nobody could doubt the valour or the intensity. At the beginning of this year, I looked back with some despair at my fraught world, and I looked forward with some trepidation. And what emerged in me was a memoir of times I had trudged through, as also a strange memorial for things still to come. But I had promised myself something a long time back - on that quibble called hope. Friends told me that hope was a fool’s lifeboat, riddled with holes, forgone to disaster. But I had always held that it still floated, and to mix metaphors, it was still sweeter than the acid of cynicism, which corroded even as it breathed. But what the despair made me do was to doubt my voice, question it’s potency, ask about its reachability. What it made me do is to question if everybody’s pain needed to be seen with the same heart, if one wound needed to be tended and another ignored. What would this world do to my soul? And that’s where I want myself and this world to again seek innocence. To trust, to have faith, to laugh, to love - and maybe get destroyed in the process, but at least live what is left of life in the high castle of hope. It’s a beguiling wish from a fool. But there are too many stories of fools who have been destroyed but whose mere idea has made us live with love, dignity and passion. A life lived with this is no mean success, however curtailed it might be. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on identity and hope:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Stormpath by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9816-stormpath
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Comfort of Her Being

Sat, 07 Jan 2023 20:00:00 +0500

Life is a pean of reaffirmations. In its hurly-burly urgencies we often forget that what anchors us is often the humdrum boring comfort of relationships which let us be what we are. We can say anything knowing our love won’t be questioned, we can take people for granted without our intentions being put into a dock, we can let silences surround us knowing them to be as potent as a conversation. But to get to that state is to first embark on a journey. Relationships take time. They have to be transversed through the hills and valleys, yes, but also through the pots and pans, of life. There are glorious sunsets to get lost in but also the harshness of singular floodlights. There are triumphs of togetherness to hold on to, as also the bouts of lonely lookouts. There are the warm summer evenings to linger in but also the biting cold of an aching heart. There is time seamlessly bequeathed but also the tiptoeing when none is given. The irony of relationships is that if you survive the scrounging of lees in an unending chasm, you will enjoy the riches of the rocks of togetherness. Because what sustains a couple is a mysterious alchemy of the understandable and felt, shown and realised, the brusque and the smooth. With the ones closest to us, too much is often made of too little. The challenge is always then to not mistake the ephemeral for a fact, just as we often mistake the windblown emotion as a determinant of intention. Though the longevity of a relationship is scarcely an indicator of it’s quality, the long trudge HAS to be undertaken to understand every strand of a person’s being. It takes time to understand that couples are conjoined not only because of what they are but because of what they have survived, which, in the schemata of engagement, often means surviving each other. Victims of love always bleed. But the survivors are the ones who hold their hands and find the sun burnishing their skin into gold. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on yearning:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Satisfaction by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/339-satisfaction
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Falling Into A New Year

Sat, 31 Dec 2022 20:00:00 +0500

A new year is just an artificial break for us to catch our breath, simmer down and look back to see the terrain we have travelled. There’s nothing good or bad - there are only things to either celebrate or to learn from. The wisest of us has done the stupidest of things - and are often better and happier for it. In thought, word or action we have all transgressed - we have sinned, plotted, cursed. The steam of our desires, obsessions, yearnings have found its outlet. We have some ashes left behind, some remembrance, or just that guilty happy feeling, which somehow fills our life’s crevices. What we can’t do is to live life with cracks, regrets. To look back or forward and only see impossibilities. There are too many slivers of light surrounding our days for us not to find one to hold onto and climb out of this grim world. All we need is faith, the belief that at the end of the shaft, the bottom of the chasm, or where light turns to darkness, there is something which awaits us, something which we will fall in love with, which speaks to us. Where we can let go, and know there is nothing but a flight ahead. So onwards, my loves, there’s always something left to celebrate and fall in love with! Revel! If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on how time adn tides wait for none:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Rising Sun by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/86-rising-sun
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Truth of Lies

Sat, 24 Dec 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I will learn someday that truth is a flight from penumbra to light, from the man scared to show his scars, to the child I can be to the world; there’s innocence in truth, it makes others reveal their wounds." The biggest truth of lies is also the most uncomfortable - we tell lies to deflect our truths, not only from others but also ourselves . If we are sensitive to ourselves and our worlds, we find a twitch in our conscience. If we are inured and leathered and layered, we ski over the the thinnest ice with complete elan and disregard. What makes us tell lies? Of course, when truths are uncomfortable, if we are revealed to be perpetrators, when the charter of accountability is much greater than the act’s payback. More debilitatingly, when we wish harm unto someone, or are not ready to reveal the truth of what we are. Ensconced in the thin layer of a lie is the desire of image or deflection. So much of what we are is predicated on what we say - we naturally believe each other, and to lie is to create an image of others or ourselves which is skewed as per our own warped imagination. What of the discovery of an untruth? We are intrinsically innocent to belief, which is also why when our trust in the other’s truth is broken, it is nigh impossible to put it back into a pristine state again. Lives change with one untruth - battles are won or lost, relationships sustain or don’t, courage is found or varnished. But what does it do to the perpetrator of the lie? From time immemorial, the hauntings of lies have destroyed men, as they have not been able to see their own ugliness in the mirror. A man with a conscience is a man forever vulnerable to truth's perpetuating call. Because that’s what it really is. Truths are never clarion calls, they are never drumbeats, they lie quietly as facts, without squealing, without prancing. But - away from the deflection, away from the glare - they grow in size, in stature, as prosaic as fact, as quiet as an ambush. And when they are revealed, they unwittingly explode, besmirching the ones who ignored it, wounding the ones discovering it. What about people who boldly ignore ramifications of revelations, who start and end from an instinct of self-preservation or self-aggrandizement? When they embrace untruth with aplomb and carry it through with bold disregard to anything and everything. We all know such people - bold, brazen, ballsy. Likeable people too, powerful ones often, but purveyors of stories. Perpetual liars, often carrying it as a pathological disease. Is there an Armageddon for them, a final retribution, something which brings back the balance to truth? Much as we might wish for redemption, the fact is that the world celebrates the bold, people who can get away with anything if they are brazen enough. It is the nature of the beast that with aggression, one can hold on to one’s lies and ward off truth’s gentle assertions. Liars persevere, they even prosper. They find their suns and preen in their shadowless brightness. We can wish karma to find them at some point, but that is in the air and often wishful thinking. Truths and lies are personal choices. Their ramifications can torpedo targets or self-inhilate the purveyor. If people can risk relationships for a simple lie, then possibly there is a backstory and they were victims first; if they can risk reputations, they are probably blasé in thinking that nothing can destroy them. Either way, a liar is risking a lot with no line of sight of the harm he creates. Wittingly or unwittingly. What the worth of a lie is often sought to be found in the value of its intent or its history. Like everything else, it is but a reflection of every person's owned and personal integrity. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the beauty and heartbreak of life:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Mystical Autumn by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9755-mystical-autumn
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Let Life Break Your Heart

Sat, 17 Dec 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Each one of us is such a complex mess. Even the most sorted of us passes through noisy bazaars of wavering decisions, competing choices and moral dilemmas. And we invariably are victims of our own pitiable choices. The right and wrong of things is often simpler to decipher than what is right or wrong in the moment. Our ethical dilemma is often a post-act regret or engendered by the heat of revelation. We slip, we regret, we get punished. Then we either move on - or rot in the prison of our conscience. But it’s a tragedy of our times that we are often characterised as the sum of just one mistake, just one proclivity, just one flaw. There’s a judgement passed. And our place in the sun is snatched and we are relegated to the darkest recesses of the universe. Every good we have ever done is subsumed in the tsunami of one deviance, one error. As we sit at the wrong end of a poorly-defined and often hypocritical judgement criteria, we find ourselves judging ourselves and sinking into a cesspool of self-incrimination. Life presents itself in its darkest hues. We are often our worst not because we are but because the world expects it of us. What is the road to redemption for us who’ve given up on ourselves? Standing in the glare of judgement, we often forget that on the margins of life are waiting it’s grace and kindness. It could be in the form of a person, a poem, an incident, a purpose or a remembrance. That’s life’s hidden sunbeam. The one which is our ladder to reclaim ourselves. Finally, we have to give meaning to our own lives. Those who stand in judgement are only reflecting their own shadows, and we have to emerge out of those. When we step out of the minefields of our mistakes and the world's opinions, we find endless fields of flowers and sunlight. We would finally be home. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the beauty and heartbreak of life:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: You Can't Stay Here by Michal Mojzykiewicz
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10070-you-cant-stay-here
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://soundcloud.com/michaldrums

A Guide To The Difficult Art of Life (Whilst Making Love)

Sat, 10 Dec 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"We made love in our own way, not calamitous, not celebratory in the end, she didn’t relent, I didn’t fail, my love redeemed at the altar of sex. I held her close, more comfort than desire, we both knew we’d now reached a phase - for love is a feral cry in some throats, and in some it survives with a gentle ache." I think too much has been said of the sublimity of lovemaking and too title of it’s difficulties. The mechanics are intuitive, not the art. There are subtleties which makes the endeavour one of discovery. You can very well put your foot on the pedal and race the car away, but to drive whilst appreciating the passing scenery, to manage the bumps on the road, and to reach the destination drenched in beauty is an experience which goes beyond elemental understanding. And what about the time when the body ages and desire doesn’t? Or when you age and your partner doesn’t? Lovemaking then is both a rare whiskey and a marathon. When you get there, it’s a relief first and then a celebration; if you don’t, it’s a recognition that time and tide always have their sad messages. But more than anything else it is an insight into the kindness and affection of partners in love - how do they face changes of diminishing desire or sheer inability. The broader lesson is how relationships need to be open to change and find ways of resolution rather they letting issues overwhelm them. The tenacity of a relationship will be tested, time and again, in all kinds of ways - and one of the most moving testaments to it is of acceptance. When we love the soul of a man, small things are quirks, big things are quiddities, and everything is an opportunity to again find grace in the enjoined life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on finding grace in lovemaking:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Hopeful by Phat Sounds
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10130-hopeful
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PhatSounds74

Music: You Did This by Phat Sounds
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/10132-you-did-this
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PhatSounds74

How Can I Remain Calm

Sat, 03 Dec 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I have seen the future hold stars

in its hands not knowing how plastic were dreams. I didn’t want the sound of my breaking heart resound such that the solar system be proved wrong but I have seen seamless skies filled with light and wonder to be only refractions from the jagged shards of broken hearts." I have seen the most deprived child dream. Dream to become an astronaut, nothing less. Her family eats one meal a day, sends her to a school to give alphabets to her dreams, and tells her in the night before she goes to sleep hungry that this is her life, there’s nothing beyond. But nothing can stop her from dreaming. When I talk to her, her eyes have still not dimmed of their stars, and she speaks in broken English and tells me why she loves the school. It is her escape from reality, which she hopes will be the wormhole out of her black hole. Into another dimension, into another realm, into another world. At what juncture of their lives, do the dreams of children start to break? As I try in my own ways to find a trapdoor to get them out of the swelter of their hopeless basement lives, I know it’s a battle. I focus on one, and the faces of a multitude appear - with the largest eyes and the brightest dreams you can imagine. And I’m overwhelmed. And I lose focus. And I lose sight of the fact that change occurs one at a time. One dream at a time. One pair of bright eyes at a time. In the infinity of inequities, what might feel like the Sisyphean rock, is actually the journey inside - because destinations are never reached through a single highway, but invariably transverse the small dirt tracks and country roads, where we drive through clouds of dust, hoping to find clear skies and pellucid streams. As we work together, they holding on to their dreams and I seeking out roads from reality to find the highway to their dreams, I often find the enormity of inequity. But what in our lives, if ever, is easy. And I can only tell, about ageless truths which say - if you hold on long enough, if you badger the universe inexorably, if you keep battling bad fortune with your sweat and blood pouring out of you, something will change - maybe as a principle, maybe as luck, maybe as a mere dent. And I will tell them each battle is an opening, a ladder, a progression into a different future - and nothing ever goes waste. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on childhood and its dreams:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: The Song Of Sirens by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9663-the-song-of-sirens
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/

The One Who Left (Herself Behind)

Sat, 26 Nov 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Life pauses when heartbreaks occur - and then it doesn’t. It’s the nature of the beast that nothing stops. But momentum is often not a substitute for reparation. Time sutures wounds, but the scar is insubstitutable - and it often glows when we are lonely. And as memories tumble in, we tumble down. What comes as a rush are gestures and flourishes, the quirky and the infinitesimal, and the forgotten becomes unforgettable. We remember nothing huge but remember her hugely. For the fact is that people remain as traces, as the fine dust which settles on furniture and can clog our system without us being aware of it. Nostalgia, thus, is more insidious than presence. What is it about those who depart or leave us? Is love forever an interruption? Is it’s value always attached to departures and heartbreak? Is it the universe’s way of redeeming our lives but also punishing us for our non-attention when it might be needed the most? Is love’s exposition - as we see it in our peripheral vision - the one true measure of its bounty? The tiny unasked for gestures, the tea, the pat, the hug, the laugh. The light which comes from silence, the comfort which comes from presence. We are engulfed in the generosity of people who we unrelentingly take for granted. And whose grace, tragically, lies unrequited till it is just too late. No wonder, nostalgia is finally tragedy couched in a wistful smile. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on leaving and staying -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Rising Sun by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/86-rising-sun
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Infinite Tenderness

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 20:00:00 +0500

One of the abiding joys of growing old together is to remember insignificant minutiae - some which hurt like pebbles in a shoe and some which effortlessly made us remember why we were together. To persevere in the complex dynamic of personal desires and conjoined plans is itself a triumph. For if there’s one thing which relationships demand - after they’ve concretised the shaky foundations of love and blown apart its airy notions - is to see each other with new eyes after years of togetherness. To jettison back-stories, to wipe out bad behaviour, and to sit firmly on the conjoined hard earth, and look at the stardust (even if it’s a fistful) which got made together. Possibilities of persistence lie embedded in the ephemeral and the insignificant, which we take the trouble to notice. What gives us joy is not emblazoned in the skies. It comes unexpectedly as teardrops, and finds its way into us as a brook. We have to know how to lean in and how to linger, we have to know how to let the fragments pass us by - as is their won't - but not to lose the grace they invariably leave in their wake. So much of what we are is predicated on things we don’t even notice - things which pass through the slivers of our thoughtlessness. It could be the cup of tea appearing before us every morning, it could be the slant of winter sun straining to reach out to our cold body, it could be the whiff of perfume which leaves us in restless anticipation. But these are the things which goldplate our brassy days and render magic where we think none is possible - if only we have the eyes to see it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the tenderness of love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Paradise Of Love by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9358-paradise-of-love
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

The Life & Times of a Song

Sat, 12 Nov 2022 20:00:00 +0500

I can never forget the Sharukh Khan movie, Main Hoon Na, when a celestial orchestra comes in and he automatically starts singing , as soon as he sees the gorgeous Sushmita Sen being her ethereal self in incredible sarees. And I remember thinking - this is a superb idea, and what wouldn’t I do to have this facility from god?! But, alas, as the heavens never listened in to my desires, I curate my own music for my variegated moods. I play music to the beat of my breath. As I brush my teeth, as I move from one place to another, as I work on a desk. It’s soft, When I want to concentrate on other things; it’s loud, when I’m drifting through life’s unavoidable drudgery; and the decibels become ruthless, when I’m head banging with issues. Every morning as I go out for my jog, I run into an orchestra of shrill joy! I doubt if anything ever receives the welcome which birds give to every dawn. It’s the universe’s urging to living beings to realise we are alive - which also means being alive to all possibilities. When I was growing, and had a house in Tribeni in Bengal and had the dark river Hooghly winding by, every night at nine I was out in the verandah with my battery-operated radio, to hear a sampling of old and current Hindi songs. It was always curated for a dulcet mood, just right for the time before bed. I used to put the radio on the concrete balustrade, and then jump to sit alongside. And I knew in the rows of houses, demarcated by flower beds and vegetable patches, several of my friends were doing exactly what I was. And the river flowed by silently behind me, as both of us eased into the folding night. In my school and college days, to discover a song which we fell in love with meant we should know the lyrics to hum along with. Remember, those were pre-internet days, and there was nothing available on tap. But for a buck we used to get cyclostyled booklets, printed on the most abysmally cheap paper, with the lyrics of the songs of the particular movie we wanted . And we used to memorise the l to heart. And that’s how I discovered songs to be poetry set to music. Today, for this poetry podcast, I cannot think my poems without a musical underpinning. If the musical notes and my poetry mesh well, I feel heady. I love hearing Call Me By Your Name or Bringing The Storm Home, for example, because the music seems to have been created just for those poems. (I feel this! Do you too?) I see musician friends create music the way I write poetry - as a calling, as a compulsion, as survival. And I can imagine the experience of writing musical notes and lyrics to be as gorgeously uplifting as finishing a poem, making its way into tunes, after working out of split arteries. As I hear the incredible thump and vigour and magic of ‘Varaha Roopam’ from ‘Kantara’, as I sit on my desk and write this, I know music as transcendental - something from beyond, something to take us beyond. The poems mentioned here, where I feel the music magically meshes into the words are -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. Illustration - Giselle Dekel The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Odyssee by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/56-odyssee
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: The Way To Kataka by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/11-the-way-to-kataka
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

In the Winter of Our Relationships

Sat, 05 Nov 2022 20:00:00 +0500

NOTE - There are some recording audio disturbances in the first minute. Do excuse. What is it about conversations, that the ones most essential, are the ones we avoid the most? With our anger or distress brimming over, are we afraid to show the power the other has over us to leave us with such vulnerability? Are we just frightened of the uncharted route the conversation might take? Are we afraid that however tenuous the fraught relationship, this was still one precious relationship, and why should we ruin it by cleaving it apart? Or are we simply afraid to face our own truths, in the voices we still love or once loved dearly? I’m personally afraid of strong reactions, of reactions which start at point a and then proceed to reach point z in a rush, annihilating everything in their wake. Conversations have often turned to slugging matches, and invariably resulted in arteries of our inner being being torn into shreds. So many of my conversations have got completely emotionally wrought, where views are construed as accusations, where thoughts to resolve are taken as signs of intolerance, where everything ends with the words “You hate what I say and think and do. I will just withdraw into myself and not utter a word again.” Conversations seeking reconciliation have ended in more distances. What do we do to have conversations which bring us closer, to have distrust change into trust and our relationship to then build on that, to see honest feedback about the other’s characteristics, not as things we dislike but as the desire of a loved one to help the other. I have realised that the depth of a relationship doesnt have a natural correlation with its width. Often the longest bonds are deep in habit and shallow in their richness. It is not a question of seeing each other’s best and worst and knowing each other inside out, but a simple question of respect. When you try to understand what the other means to say, when you try to know what makes the other do what they do, when you have faith enough to know that listening and absorbing are more difficult but more rewarding than merely reacting. The persistence of a bond is a miracle, but seeking its depth with grace is a bigger one. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on collapsing relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Primeval [Electronic] by Banjopickerdee
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9988-primeval-electronic
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

And I Know These of You

Sat, 29 Oct 2022 20:00:00 +0500

One of the unending and unerring charms of knowing people is to know them as flawed people, whose very kinks make them the weird loveable irritating entities, who infuriate us but equally make us caring custodians of them. The particularities of their weirdness is not meant for history books. It is often no more than the whimsy of habit, the caprice of reaction, or the peculiarity of a stand they take - nothing which takes away from who they are, nothing which requires a shovel to check their depths. Ever so often, relationships get predicated on these quirks, which are no more, or less, than the ripples on a pond from a wind which decides to blow on it. If we reject the pond, we lose the treasures which lie in its depths. To know, to understand, to adopt (and adapt to) each other’s quiddities is to have character and latitude, because it entails that we have the ability to look beyond the obvious brass to see the gold inside. And to realise that we are equally flawed and, in our peculiar ways, fun. If only someone could look beyond. And to meet someone who gives us a glimpse into the gentle and the outrageous, the tangy and the plain, the obvious and the awesome, is to have encountered a whole universe in a person. To reject someone like this because the odd thing makes their heart go a-flutter, or they slurp soup in hideous ways, is the biggest injustice we can do to ourselves. Groan, growl, but persevere. There’s too much richness inside, which would require years to explore, and a lifetime to savour. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the lovable weirdness of people -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: From my Heart With Love by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6267-from-my-heart-with-love
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Such are Such Days (or the days I make love to her)

Sat, 22 Oct 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Making love can be the tenderest experience of a day. Truth be told, the day should start and end with it - with nothing, nothing else to take away from its tangy exuberance. Those moments should be the day. But - we have to move on. There are things to be done. There are commitments to fulfil, a job to go to, groceries to be bought, a plumber to be contacted. And suddenly such days get redefined, the Northern Lights lose their effulgence, not only by contrast, but because everything humdrum brings its drama into our senses. And we lose the one thing which should have been the only thing which was defining life that day. What is it about us that, time and again, we lose sight of the ethereal and the beautiful. That we take lovemaking - this experience of life, death and rebirth - as a commonplace occurrence, as an ability available on tap - and hence lesser for it. Why do we human beings always diminish our own worlds and find ways to move on - when we should be hiding, lingering, treasuring. And not letting go of these moments where meaning is discerned, and everything else falls by the wayside. Making love is our wildest and tenderest manifestation as sentient human beings. And for us to let an occasion pass or devolve into insignificance is nothing short of a tragedy. We speak too much of work-life balance and too little of work-sex balance. As one fully-alive philosopher once said - “Make love not war.” It might not solve the world’s problems, but it would definitely send us out into the world wishing for only good things to happen to it! If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on making love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Sailing Through The Wide Sea by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6243-sailing-through-the-wide-sea
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Ceremony of Longing

Sat, 15 Oct 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"Often I see myself hiding inside myself wondering how many biographies of pain will I see as my own." It’s almost a cliché to say that we are much more the reaction then what we are in the action. It is not ideal, but it is a reality. Our lives are touched at a million sensory points throughout the day. Stories, requests, exhortations, kindnesses, things we say which boomerang, acts we do which come back to us as benediction. We are an amalgam of what we give and what we get - and what we make of all of it for ourselves. And what drives us ever so often is longing. A longing to connect, a longing to be the chosen one, a longing, very often, to be at the wrong end of the stick, but to have known that we were, in some way, the chosen one. And in that recognition often lies the leitmotif of our lives. How can we transverse this earth without being noticed? Without knowing that we meant for something. Knowing that what we wrote, thought, said, did, did make a difference. Our lives then are a combination of curiosity, creation and craving. Our connections build on that. There’s nothing extraordinary which our lives then seek. Just that we notice, get noticed - and find out peace in that ordinariness. Note - The name of the poem is named after a performance piece curated by the exceptional dancer Diya Naidu

If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on questions relating to the meaning of longing and attention -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: Sleepers by Sascha Ende

Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/3232-sleepers
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

The Passing of Autumn

Sat, 08 Oct 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"There's no love like the hour, and when noise swirls in the world, it's the companionship of breath which saves souls with its being" We are blessed that seasons - and the seasons of our lives - are marked by the pomp and grace of festivities. We welcome and we let go, we conjoin and we celebrate. And in both the comings and goings, we are left forever changed. What is it about the passages of rituals that we are never left unmoved? As if it is not just Diwali or Id or Christmas, but an important rite of passage, which even if bereft of its symbolism and allegory, becomes the time to come together, to revel in something essential inside us, which often lasts dormant, but finds an awakening and leaves us rejuvenated. But even more than that, these marks in the calendar, these pauses, are rewinds to simpler feelings, as we find meaning in the ‘again’. The times when loved ones got together, to swap tales, to intertwine lives, to revisit old joys - and often festering wounds. It is the time to exchange familiarity and at least THINK of forgiveness as an option, to at least remember that seeking unfiltered joy is nothing but the soul aching for a return to innocence. In the liturgy of our lives, this is the familial moment - private with those who care, festive with those we revel in, revealing with those who are tender with our softest parts, and being a different person to ourselves. More than opening up, we involuntarily crack open. We are better for just being. And then the aftermath. The unwinding, the closures - and the closing up. As if the festival was an event and not something which changed Iives. Something which we carried as a memory which mixed with other similar memories of revelry and became generic rather than being tagged as the time when we sprouted flowers from the cesspool of our deepest selves. We could well be the goddess left adrift in uncertain currents or a fir tree abandoned in a mothballed attic till another season. Or we could let the passage of the days go right through us. Without making us feel abandoned as detritus but helping us blunt the shards of our hurts with unquestioning presence. Deep inside, we are ever so often only the hurt child who finds solace in an abandoned church, realising in time, that god also fought battles in the universe, and the church was also his resting place. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the hurt and glory of seasons - •Dancing in the Rains •Waiting for a Storm •Those Days of a Lost Summer Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Music: Majestic Autumn by MusicLFiles Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9662-majestic-autumn License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Finding Parking Lots (for Love)

Sat, 01 Oct 2022 20:00:00 +0500

The passage of time and the passage of expectations are inversely related. So much of what we hope for slips through the sly slivers of time. What we dreamt of is folded quietly, and put beneath our heads, for us to sleep on in seamless blankness. All exhortations for destinations result only in unspecified directions, and a future rife with its own life. We are rarely given what we desire. But therein lies the universe’s ironic dilemma. Embedded in the mystery of choices, lies one for us. Not chosen for us, but meant for us. Within the dynamic of what we are, what we think, what we feel, there’s a mysterious algorithm which puts our destiny into place. The underwhelming present of choices and our disappointments at how things seem to be turning out is only a question of a passage of time. For later, much later, we look back and see how things really fitted in. Life’s vicissitudes and our fortunes conspire to gift us a life which we can make something of. In our desire to seek parking slots in life, we often forget that first there’s a road to transverse. Someone WILL rashly park where we thought we would back in, but going around the block or parking in a No Parking zone has its frustrations but also its own zen charm or delicious mischief. Once we make the choice, or one is made for us, leave aside parking lots, our need for cars will disappear by itself. For we would know the secret of levitation. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on questions relating to the meaning of love and life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: New Sky by Rafael Krux
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/5693-new-sky
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.orchestralis.net/

How I Stumbled in My Search for Eternity

Sat, 24 Sep 2022 20:00:00 +0500

What are we if not morsels in this universe searching for meaning? If we are alive to the moment we float through life; if we battle with time to get its predominance, we find passages with hurdles; and if we search and mull and have conversations with life to figure out it’s import, we find false endings. What are we to do if not wrestle with ourselves, to give credence to our struggles? We face life with our hands curled into fists, battle-ready, already battle-weary. We think it is a race to hit the tape, a game of dominance, to be something called the best. We get entangled in trappings and on a daily basis we diminish ourselves in a desperate bid to be a beast. We forget, time and again, that we merely need to be the best of ourselves , to know the best of life. To know generosity, to know giving as the only way to get, to face vicissitudes with the excitement of a scholar discovering new principles. But, over and above everything, to know that in seeking meaning, we give meaning. And nothing, nothing, goes waste. Everything we give of ourselves into the universe has a legacy, the fruits of which we might or might not see in our lifetimes. It could be tangible as art or the written word, or it could be amorphous as a thought, which still gets transmitted to the world in mysterious ways. We are magicians. We should never forget that. But are we the ones who bring awe and wonder into the world or are we evil, using our talent and clout for personal gain which the universe deems as unwieldy and unsustainable. The messaging is clear and unambiguous, it’s we who are arrogant enough to ignore its signs. Untimely sickness, pain, loss. They all find their way into the vacuum which evil leaves. Generosity fills, and there is no space left for anything at all, because happiness is expansive enough to fill the universe. The thunder which reverberates in our skies could bring rain which nourishes our soul further - or it could bring storms which destroy everything which we built because we’d already destroyed the foundation on which we built our home on. Eternity then is nothing more than the innocence of our souls and the embracing of the thunder which engulfs our life perforce. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on questions relating to the meaning of life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Relaxation 4 by Frank Schroeter
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9834-relaxation-4
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/frank.schroeter.52

When I Hear the Whistle of a Passing Train

Sat, 17 Sep 2022 20:00:00 +0500

The passing of a speeding train. It’s whistle from afar. The smoke from the now-disappearing steam engines. The rapidly decreasing chug-chug as it leaves a railway station. These sounds and images are sepia-tinted in my memory, fraying at the ends with passing time. But making me remember - what a time that was. And I drown so heavily in the past, that I wallow and I wonder - is nostalgia a benediction or a curse? Writers extol me - don’t drown in that lake, or your words would forever be cursed by mush and sentimentality. My heart says - linger, a little longer, before climbing the mountain of today. When has a poet ever listened to his head? I fallow. I sometimes think the wonder which filled our Iives in our childhood had more stars than the skies - the innocence of growing up allowed anything and everything to fill its illimitable space. And as time passed by, the skies drowned in the depth of minutiae’s ocean. Till memories surfaced like flotsam when an ancient breeze came by to ripple the water’s surface. And we asked ourselves “whither?” Life’s trajectories always seem to take us away. Away from what we love, away from what we cared, away from things which made us the persons we were, away from what we now call ‘our roots’. But by then we are far gone, foregone. We are the rubber band which has been pulled beyond shape. And we look back, stretched and irredeemable, with yearning and regret. I now know what the writers meant - and what they missed. Nostalgia is a country for the tired soul. Its revisitation is not a weakness, because it is primarily a resting place. It is to do with standing at one’s own window, letting either the winter sun in or the falling dusk, and remember what it all meant, at a time when we were not in search of meaning at all. And how those times mean the world to us now. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems steeped in nostalgia -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: The Train in the Darkness by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/7240-the-train-in-the-darkness
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Music: Autumn Dusk by chilledmusic
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9843-autumn-dusk
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

On Some Additions to Introspective Psychology

Sat, 10 Sep 2022 20:00:00 +0500

We lose out on so much of life because we know lesser and lesser of lucidity. We find knots where none exist. We tie ourselves up when there is nobody out to do it. What is it about the wiring of our brains that we revel in complexity and then dream of a simpler life? It is the nature of the world we live in that pushes us towards choices and then watches in glee as we careen over the cliff. But life is nothing if not of the present and the persistent. As a species we want to hurry - noodles in two minutes, love at first sight. Impossible deadlines and divorce in a jiffy. Impatient to reach, desperate to get out. We have forgotten to linger, to let things find their own resolutions. We force issues, we lean into people. We seek marathons and then want to run them as 100 metre dashes. And in love? In love we want eternities in our honeymoon, and honeymoons for our lives. There’s nothing which can possibly stop us from the enormity of life being taken as condensed editions of time itself. But the dynamics of the evolution of anything are only revealed to the one who’s patient. Relationships evolve not over days, months or even years, but over lifetimes. Finding familiarity is a function of patient excavation and not a case of fast dating. We need the night, we need the sunbeam, we have to weather the storms and seek shelter in the rain, we have to cook terrible meals and see sublime sunsets, we have to be terrible lovers and caring compatriots, we have to have a difficult child who we raise together to figure the blessing in our lives. The journey has to find the terror of the Tibetan highlands and the grandeur of the New Zealander passes. It has to take in the best and the worst. To find us naked and clothed, to see us alone and with witnesses. And then, and then only, can we say that we’ve found life in all its myriad shades and have known people as the stones or jewels that they truly are. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on life's lucidities -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: E.C.H.O by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9762-echo
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/

Flutter

Sat, 03 Sep 2022 20:00:00 +0500

So much of what we do is a matter of awakenings and slumber. Literally and figuratively, we go to sleep in doubt and awaken with certitudes. But ironically the importance lies in the drift. Because that’s when we are true to ourselves, and not berating the universe for its shingle or rust. The magic is in the moment. To love, to ease into lovemaking and then to sigh into remission, are life’s unasked-for gifts, for us to know that whatever the flutter vicissitudes would bring into our worlds, there is always the concomitant joy of paradise found. Because there are truths to discover and reconfirm, lies to uncover and not pay attention to, a life to ease oneself into. We are always afraid of the first time. The anticipation ties knots inside and the expectation of disaster shackles our nerves. It’s a worn-out cliche now to talk about finding excitement beyond the pale of risk. In reality, there’s just one moment which could turn our life over. To be present. To be available. To let ourselves be the handmaiden of the moment. We are changed merely because we let ourselves ease through closed doors, with the believe that the arc lights were always ours. As author Anne Lamott says so eloquently - “Grace always meets you exactly where you are, but does not leave you where it found you.” If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the joys and exasperations of lovemaking -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Imagefilm 015 by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/296-imagefilm-015
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Heart Love by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9259-heart-love
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Of Bodies in Bed & Uncertain Joys

Sat, 27 Aug 2022 20:00:00 +0500

A marriage is already beset with contrariness in its very idea. They say, anthropologically, a marriage is against man’s overriding instinct to rampantly spread his seed, to ensure progeny from someone at least. Nature-wise, it goes against the principle of seeking fulfilment, because one person can rarely, if ever, fulfil the myriad parts of a person's needs. I can be gregarious but end up with a self effacing private wife. I’m bursting with the need to reach out, talk, swap tales and have a drunken Saturday night but end up with a husband who only wants to watch sports on tv. I might be spiritual in an unending search, and be with a wife in need of unending conversations. And that’s when we start aching with the gaps inside. Of feeling life out as a ragtag enterprise with little redemption. One damning relationship is an irredeemable scar sometimes. And solutions are invariably forked. Friendships made as an individual and not a couple or falling in love with another whilst married, are often two sides to a hard line - one side is sexless, another is not. For embedded in the institution of marriage are trust, hurt and jealousy. And none of these can be easily brushed off. As it often determines what can be embraced and what cannot. It is easy to find reconciliations and touch points of comfort as one ages, if a couple has survived the vicissitudes and the incessant rambling of youth, because reaching a plateau of acceptability is itself an arduous task. But there is a stillness to be got, and a distillation of instincts which emerges as one grows old. For our needs, which have wild compasses in youth, finally find a North Star as age and time catch up. After shrugging off the hunger for variety and the search for the verity, there’s a plateau a person reaches, distilled of distraction, a clear distillate of failed attempts, derived realisations and evolved priorities. We are finally reconciled. And know what’s important. Maybe it’s after having all experiences, that we are able to denounce some, maybe it’s after burning our relationships to near charred state that we realise what is most important. But irrespective of the genesis being hypocrisy or awakement, there is a peace which emerges. Of knowing that what ensues is distraction-less, of knowing that like so much else, life is also an emblem of perception, perjury, preparation and peace. We complicate things needlessly when we have the strength to realise and redeem, we search for the new when our curiosity burns like the Northern Lights, we are ready to commit to the foolish when we have the time to live out its fallouts. But it all passes. Marriage, which we enter sometimes duty-bound, sometimes as a mistaken culmination to love, is itself a complexity. But if we emerge from its initial skirmishes and subsequent battlefields, without fallen bodies and fatal injuries, we will find beauty embedded in its gashes and scars. Like so much else, two people together are a lesson in finding zen in unwashed dishes whilst standing on the corpses of past selves, smiling into the joint journey of survival. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the joy and challenges of marriage -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Epic Intro 2017 by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/558-epic-intro-2017
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Die Unendliche Geschichte by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/512-die-unendliche-geschichte
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

For Anyone Who Bleeds

Sat, 20 Aug 2022 20:00:00 +0500

These past few days, I’m thinking a lot about the reality of a nation, and time and again I’m coming back to the idea of a nation. I talk to people who love this country - possibly can die for it - but when questioned about the state of the nation, are either heartbroken, broken, or ready to break something. There’s an atlas of indignation inside them and they follow its contours whenever the country is discussed. The atlas has only troughs and heights. But the tops are reached with difficulty and rarely, and they languish in the valley of their anger and despair. They conceive of the entirety of a nation’s complexity in a few algorithms of politics and society. Their mood is driven by the headlines, and the headlines are driven by the nature of the publication they read, and the publications are driven by what is most sensational on the day. Regardless, our hearts are broken every morning. Even as we breathe it’s air, and hum it’s tunes, even as we transverse the streets which we love as our own back door, and spend an evening with those who give meaning to our existence, we focus on our idea of what we think is happening to the country and hate half its politicians , and more debilitatingly, half its people. Who are we judge? Who are we to judge people? Anyone as deeply flawed as we are, anyone with the prejudices we carry inside of us, is in no position to cast aside the belief systems of the other half. For in doing so, we are compromising the diversity of thoughts and beliefs of a mass of our brethren, we are rejecting them not for their humanity or generosity but because of what they believe in politically. There are some wrongs, which are in the realm of black and white. But others are our ideas of situations and people. Nothing more nothing less. All we need is a quietude and a question, to reach out, to reach in. And then to walk side by side, comfortable in the knowledge that we both believe what we do, and are still terrific people to know. The day we find our bridges over our most deep-seated resentments, we are on the way towards finding our nation’s true DNA and not get lost in our idea of what it is. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the triumph & tragedies of a nation:

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Gracias by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/260-gracias
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Farm [full version] by Alexander Nakarada
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/8206-farm-full-version
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/

Windblown Om

Sat, 13 Aug 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Mornings are strange places. They are an urging, a calling, a welcoming. But often they are a desperation, a question, a challenge. We define it, the way we lean into it. But by its mere presence, it provides space to our lives. If we seek to be presences, knowing how to let the universe pass through us such that we can be witnesses to our own lives and to the world, we can let the morning be a blessing. But if we seek to fight battles with its incessant periodicity, cursing it for its quotidian challenge and insistences, then we move into a war zone, battling the spear of our despairing hope with our armour of resistance. In a mentality which sees change as a needless challenge, each day is a burden to be carried through. We often wake up with either the hauntings of the night or with the dread of having an endless day. But. If you flip a switch inside and see the abundance being laid out for us, daily, day in day out, our lives suddenly fill up with an aching extravaganza. The question then is - how NOT to waste this blessing. What we really need to do is to lean into the morning with a mind clear of of everything. We just need to listen to the morning sounds, just see it’s colours, run our fingers through its textures. We just need to let the universe frame our questions and give us the answers. When we let the world carry our burden for us, then mornings are a prayer and the day a benediction. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the magic of mornings

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Cruising (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/3140-cruising-romeos-erbe
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Season One Intro by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/254-season-one-intro
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Let Everything Else Be, Let It Be

Sat, 06 Aug 2022 20:00:00 +0500

The what-ifs of life are a perennial enigma, a source of continual fascination. What touches us does change us, what passes by always leaves it’s fragrance. The possibility of the butterfly effect - where everything changes at the flutter of a butterfly’s wings - and the intrigue of the sliding doors - what if the metro you were running for slides shut just when you got to it. Would your life be different if you’d reached a destination earlier? What if the delay caused made you to meet someone you connected at an immediate subliminal level? Everything is speculation - but everything ELSE looks so much more promising and enticing. Our choices, governed ostensibly by our thinking, are often themselves progeny of chance. I remember Tom Tykwer’s immensely philosophical and fascinating Run Lola Run, where Lola’s minutest action changed her fortune and those of everyone her life touched. So is there a lesson in all of this for us? For love? For life? Possibly there is. Does it seem to say that life is not in the passive acceptance of what destiny throws at us, as if it’s an inevitability, but in an intense striving which then results in inevitabilities. For then it is time to be at peace with what one gets. But much more than anything in our lives, the thing which is most difficult to accept is to know when to stop spinning and to stop and gaze at the beauty of bustling flowers. And to fall in love with what one inevitably has. The adequacy of love is a perpetual quibble. There is nothing which satiates. Everything is an imbalance, everything is a quest. We mourn the absences in the person deigned for us. We hate the design of our fortune which keeps us out of introductions and charmed circles. Within that disfigured womb of our expectations, we have to work out the contours of beauty if we have to maintain our sanity and find the stunning fulfilment which minutiae could confer, if only we had the eyes to see it. We would then be new people, happy to say - let everything be, let it be. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on love's rocky terrain -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Imagefilm 015 by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/296-imagefilm-015
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Mellow Sweet Traditional Piano by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/8885-mellow-sweet-traditional-piano
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

Sad Cinematic Background by MusicLFiles
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/9230-sad-cinematic-background
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles

When Breath Becomes Air

Sat, 30 Jul 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I muse often of his being and his departure, missing the softness of his glance. He’d looked at me with happiness, as if my presence itself was good news." So much about life is to know about death. In its very concept lies life’s only immutable truth. As our days drift into countable numbers, we can either lean into the reality and wait, or fight the Dylanian battle of “not going gentle into the dark night”. But ever so often, there is no option. We become fortune’s arbitrary choice. We can only hope for painless exits. But regardless of what happens to us, death leaves behind a form of spiritual debris - the ones who loved both our silence and our chaos. What is it, to be still alive when someone you love no longer is? What are the stories which now remain silenced? What are the changes we would have wrought in each other’s lives? Because relationships are forever budding, always a passage to something new, always gravitating to the other with new cells, if not new eyes. So much of what we lose, when someone dies, has to do with things we were not always aware we cared for. The loss is greater for that late realisation. So it comes back to our present with the ones we love. The only thing we can give - or receive - is companionship, presence. On Sundays, as I sit at my desk, finishing my editing or writing my newsletter, I see my dad silently stand at the door and look at me. When I catch his glance, he smiles happily, and walks back to his room. As our needs leave the bastion of greed, our simplest desires are enough for a comfortable easement into serenity. The ticking bomb of our mind finally finds a resting place There’s something to be said about easing into death with equanimity. Everything falls by the wayside, only space and light remain. And in that peace, even the people we leave behind find their reconciliations. The drift stops. The breath which ceases finds a new breath to breathe. Life finds fresh renewals. Death finds a new life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on being alive to death -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Lonesome by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/51-lonesome
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Gracias by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/260-gracias
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

One Morning, The Ants

Sat, 23 Jul 2022 20:00:00 +0500

I like people who do their own thing. The youngest of the young, the maddest of the mad, the dreamer in the group who gets ribbed, the one with the wildest theories, the one who always has the last laugh. I love the ultra sensitive. The one whose heart breaks when she inadvertently steps on a tiny monsoon snail, the one who gets lost on the way to familiar destinations, the one who picks only fallen flowers for prayer, the child who goes into the meadow on the way to school. These people are made of glass and heart, the strongest fibre and the most breakable material. Because all such people go against the grain, against the accepted, against the norm. And that is what makes them precious and dangerous and endangered. For to be different, is not to be of this firmament, is to think radically, and know the secret rules of flying. Such people are one with another realm. Such people need to be held close and, paradoxically, to be given their space - so they know their genius is not scorned into ash, or hastened into oblivion. If as people we have to have inspiration, if as civilization we have to have radical minds, if as the human race, we need to figure out the unfathomable, these are the flames which need the cupped hands of all humanity to save them from extinguishment. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on being alive to life -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Lonesome by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/51-lonesome
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Favourite People (Who We Love And Leave)

Sat, 16 Jul 2022 20:00:00 +0500

We are what we are. But we are also all the people who have arrived, moved on, stayed in our lives. People whose very touch may feel like a hug or an abandonment , a benediction or a scare. People we’ve loved and fought with, people we’ve been secretive about, those we’ve cried for, those who’ve cried because of us. Just as relationships change, we are changeable too. We are what we are. But we are also the slipstream of our old loves, the undercurrent of those who hurt us, the flotsam of those we wronged. We are also the pressed flowers of compliments, kept long after the fragrance has gone; we are the lees of the good times which make us remember springs and mists; we are the dregs of the nights of short tempers and long knives. There is so much that is extraordinary in mundane lives, that one wonders what is evanescent and what stays. Would the quiet moment in a sun drop count? Would a poem which made me cry stay? Would the fleeting memory of a summer love still overwhelm after years? How does memory work? Is it a crucible or a sieve? Does it hold what it does to keep it shimmering and intact for an insignificant day? Or does it let everything percolate down into a cesspool of oblivion, just keeping back those morsels which then find place in our souls. Every one of us then is an amalgam of the dullness and magic of every person we meet, every feeling we feel, every hurt we give, every bruise we carry. We are never merely the wind and the woods, the street and the home - we are also the stars, the black holes, the pulsars - we are the whole universe. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on resolving relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Music: Rising Sun by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/86-rising-sun
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Dancing In The Rains

Sat, 09 Jul 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I can see the wind pick up it’s pace. The skies have turned moody again. Will it be a blizzard, she piped in her little voice holding tightly to my hand, lest I be blown away." In life we are both the flow and the stock. The flight and the roots. Logical and unhinged. Reasonable and petulant. Generous and anarchic. We are all this, we are all this together. Often in seriatim, more often overlapping. When a child quizzes us on the ironies of nature or the dualities of the universe, we realise how much of a paradoxical concoction we are. And not only do we hold these contrasts within us, we also get by with a balancing act. We are a miracle, of dreaming of rootlessness while working hard to be rooted. We sometimes fail ourselves by swinging one way or the other. But if we’ve nurtured ourselves well, we would not let strong winds blow us away, and still get to enjoy their breeziness in our hair. A tree is an easy analogy. But how do you explain to a child that if the tree doesn’t let it’s fruit fall or let go of the pollen in its flower, it will not spread out its goodness. That sowing your wild oats, with all its negative connotations, is also the way to expand your world. That being rootedness is a virtue but it should not translate as being stuck in the mud. That a mind has to be open and free, to let the winds from all directions to flow in, and out, and to take one to mysterious places. Because the roots have to be inside, to be the gyroscope when the compass goes wild, like the metal spine of a roller coaster which can throw you in all directions but will never let you fly wildly in thin air. To be steady is an art, but to fly is the only way to grow. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on rains & storms -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:

Music: Flight Pack 1 - 4/6 (Segeln) by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/179-flight-pack-1-46-segeln
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Music: Childhood by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/448-childhood
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

And She Waited For My Call

Sat, 02 Jul 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I have woken nights thinking of her and then turned into myself to dream other things. She’s in my mind but like shifting sands." 'Belonging' is a word which fills us up. It gives agency to us, a sense of community. We feel attached to kindred souls. It could be with people who we connect with because of a commonality of interests or service, in which case we would be driftwood, sailing where our proclivities take us. Or we could belong to a family, which gives our heart a hearth, and our souls a conviction of acceptance. This is where we return even after misbehaviour, where our warts are not necessarily ignored, but are not put up as premier exhibits. But the belonging to a heart is different than anything else. Because, more than acceptance, there is a sense of fusion. Where the veins and arteries connect inextricably, in ways that, after a while, one cannot make out the beginnings or the ends. Partners, spouses, lovers, friends - they are worlds, but who individually are separate universes of meaning and worth. They are the ones who go beyond being caregivers - they are crucibles. Because in that melting-pot, our miscibility is such that though our life’s rhythms might not be determined by them, our inner worlds are. In infinitesimal ways, we change with each other, we change for each other. Until we overlap such that we rejoice and give hurt and take injuries such that when we bleed, we find the blood coming out from the other’s pores. We bloom together and we disintegrate together. We are both the flower and the dust. No. We are not permanent. Nothing in this ageless firmament is. But we are the best till we last. When we belong to a heart, we ironically our our best self, even as we subsume our identity and dignity - and are blissful. It is not a euphoric state, but one where our sense of the moment and the truth of evanescence is enhanced by its incomparable and enduring beauty. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on distances -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com.

The following music was used for this media project:
Music: Rising Sun by Sascha Ende
Free download: https://filmmusic.io/song/86-rising-sun
License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Artist website: https://www.sascha-ende.de

Difficult Child

Sat, 25 Jun 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"And then I tell myself - he didn’t ask to be here." An obedient son is an oxymoron. Each one of us has rebelled in our own ways in our youth, and have generally not been worse for it (though who’s to say?!). But each story has its variations. And parents have their own tales to tell. And as one myself, I have my tales - and travails! A life is a gift in so many ways. And much more when you see the gifts which come unasked for. And the giving to one’s child has a tender inevitability to it, which makes it both a duty as also an unburdening - it’s a relief to be able to pass on what one has garnered in one’s life, for the simple alternative is to take it with oneself to one’s grave. But the corollary which haunts is - why is this passage of rites so fraught? But then I realise that I generalise, and there are so many imperceptible ways children learn - direct, osmosis, eavesdropping, whilst rebelling, whilst being rejected, when pushed away, when held close irrespective. Our relationship to our children is a lifelong work-in-progress, till the time (and even whilst) they start to tell us what to do. Because there are no templates for care. And then we understand the irony that we learn more as we seek to teach. And in that one realisation lies the light which then shines equally on both of us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on children -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - End Of Summer by Frank Schröter
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6633-end-of-summer
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Things We Become When We Leave

Sat, 18 Jun 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"I have gone, love, now let me go." We are all changeable creatures. 50 billion of our cells die every day, physically we are not the same today as we were yesterday. And that irrefutable truth seeps into the very core of our beings. Every day, we change as persons too - imperceptibly, almost surreptitiously: the people we meet, the experiences we stumble into, what our senses see, what scares our heart. If our beings revel in the scars and bleed in the unexpected, we are already what we were not. And we start looking at everything and everyone with new eyes. And often the direction of our life changes, the people we thought were inseparable to the importance of our lives, now look like milestones - without the love dimming, without the care diminishing, we know we have different directions to take. And we drift. We do not break off relationships only out of bitterness or regret. Sometimes we also recognise that we have moved on, and moved in different directions. And we know it’s time to part, and we know the hurt we will leave behind. We know explanations might sound lame, and to say “I love you” whilst leaving, is contrarian and often unexplainable. But our heart knows the truth - it often says that there are bigger issues than love, when our very existence is at stake, when the space we need to find for ourselves needs to be unencumbered, when what we stand for or seek, needs solitude because we’ve already crowded it with personalities and our own personas which require either recognition or elimination. We do not leave anybody - we are only in search of a new self. And to find a new nook which says -“Stay”. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on departures -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

An Onanist’s Guide to Loneliness

Sat, 11 Jun 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"Someone brought wild flowers home, and their pungent sweetness was a trauma and I walked naked in the house, till I threw them into a bin with three Hail Mary’s." Self-gratification is a lonely enterprise packed with people. It is our encounter with fantasies but starts with a conversation with our loneliness. We are often left alone, or are merely alone. While the world celebrates together, we are left with an aching need to connect. In reaching out, we reach in; in finding purpose we find pudenda; while banishing wayward thoughts we find the wilderness of brambles. There are ways to be, and be with, our best selves. As we explore our minds with books, or extrapolate our feelings to film characters, or discover levitation with music. But when we want everything together, bunched together with a promise of iridescent colours, where our agonies sing, where our driest lands grow moist enough for spring, when we know we have visitation rights to heaven - that’s when we choose ourselves over others. To say it’s pleasure on tap or bliss in passing is to miss the point. The enormity of an intimate relationship with ourselves just cannot ever be undermined. For those short moments of ecstasy make us forget - however briefly - the extremity of the barrenness which invariably is the bane of our lives. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on intimacies -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Dragonsong by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/9301-dragonsong
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Ouroboros by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/9370-ouroboros
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Garden of Departures

Sat, 04 Jun 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"The thorns sting, my palms bleed, the blood stains the acquiescent leaves, the morning breeze passes by, whispers - don’t hold on to anything so tight." I walk every morning on this walking path in the gated community I stay in. It’s an arboretum of colours and aromas. But much more than that, it is a passage of evanescence and disappearances. That gorgeous gladiola? Won’t be there the day after. The blazing gulmohur - here only for the summer. The yellow chandelier blossom - too fragile to even last a storm. The fragrant jasmine - empty after giving the entirety of its cachet of scent. The yellow-breasted frangipani? Hardy to look, easy to fall. Everyday I see the shapes - bells and funnels, flutes and trumpets, cups and hearts, bowls and spheres - and I see their glory and their fall. I see how they find meaning in their being, an elegance in their stature - and a quietude in their demise. Their existence itself is drama - they don’t need to do anything to draw attention to themselves. They are touched by the eye which seeks pleasure - hidden or visible, they throw the same aroma, and preen quietly within their deep-seated beauty. For me, every walk has meaning - a revelation, a realization, a reaffirmation. I learn - to pass by rather than hold on, love passionately but know the truth of passages, live every stage and love the demise, there’s beauty in the withering just as there’s tragedy in the beauty. I come back from every walk alive to life because I have experienced the truth of departures. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the evanescent -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sunset Fields by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7979-sunset-fields
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Waiting For a Storm

Sat, 28 May 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"It's a moment before. The stillness is of a zen monk, the heaviness of a misdemeanor unconfessed, the puddle is a pool with the sky in shame, the renegade vine mumbling Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité." A storm as as much an anticipation as it is an occurrence. And as in all things which we expect, which we wait for, there is endless trepidation, an asymmetric thudding, an irrational prescience, and an almost-joyous fear. We know it will change things, we know it will break the breakable and bend the bendable - we find hiding places, corners away from the airstream, we want lesser impact, we seek status quo. And then we open the windows, and ourselves, to the storm. In the schemata of willful resurrection, there is no sweeter joy than to find oneself in smithereens, to know we will find ourselves broken into pieces and nothing, nothing will put us back together in the same way. And in that broken down situation lies the promise of regeneration. Whilst we force ourselves into survival mode, if we are alive to storms, we will seek its destructive power. We will know that the storm will pass, we will know that we will survive, we know it will leave us cleansed, we know it will leave us changed. So, I open my window to storms. I open myself up, to find a new me. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on storms, summers and other life-affirmations -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Landing On The Spanish Lands by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6223-landing-on-the-spanish-lands
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Tragedy of Seeing Life as a Broken Enterprise

Sat, 21 May 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"Why do we complicate the nature of flowers, even as they sway flawlessly on branches unencumbered as they are with either our memories of storms or visions of a merciless autumn. Maybe, maybe, I'm not ignited enough to burn out visions of life which find fears where I should have found the air to soar." We see the world through the lens of our brokenness. Every time our mirror cracks and pieces of us lie at our feet, we scream into the elements. Much before we understand the potential of solace in the world's unflappability, we find symbols of intent and hurt. We lie bruised and we see blood in the claws of the skies, our hearts crumble and we find the miscibility of dust as perfidious, the world grows intractable to our desires, and we have problems with the hard ground we walk on. Time and again we weep and see flooded rivers in our rivulets. What is it about the world that we first see it as an opponent rather than a facilitator? What is it about nature that we ignore it’s nurturing and only sense it’s destruction. As we walk through the fallen flowers of a storm’s aftermath, we could drown in the incessant floods of grief, or make our peace in the infinite tenderness of a sky which still glistens. And learn that light is inside what might lie ruptured and torn. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on complexities of relationships -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Golden Journey Under The Sky Of Autumn by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6202-golden-journey-under-the-sky-of-autumn
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

In The Drift We Will Find Our Certainties

Sat, 14 May 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"We walk under boughs heavy with fragrance, petals touching our cheeks with infinitesimal tenderness, and think back to how meaningless was what we’d said. In a universe of a million possibilities, we could be a certainty, but we suffered our uncertain inequities. We should have found tenderness like kittens venturing into the world - with fright and wonder and the ability to believe. Alas, we stopped at our conceptions of each other." They say “The only real battle in life is between hanging on and letting go.” In that one coruscating truth lies the crux of relationships. The question then is not of doubts or misgivings or dwindling love, but it is - have you given yourselves enough time? In that one question lies an irrevocable truth - things take no time to unravel but take time to settle. You have to keep examining, you have to keep asking. Why don't you care? Why did you hurt me? Why did this happen? Why do you believe this about me? Why did you do this? The answers would be unsatisfactory, they will be evasive, but though they might not bring clarity to you, they will make the other think. And they will understand why you hurt, where you hurt. The shrapnel will be blunted. At the same time, you are embracing your own strengths, the preciousness that you bring, the value of what you are, and it nullifies when others attempt to make you think less of yourself . You will not like everything, but you will understand a few things. You will be able to cut through the fluff of your own misconceptions, and theirs, to understand the truth of what makes relationships work. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on complexities of relationships -

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Come When The Heat of Noon Has Still Not Dimmed

Sat, 07 May 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"Come. Come softly. Come when the heat of noon has still not dimmed. Come when the streets have stopped asking questions. Come when the world has left its own care to us. Come." In anticipation lies a whole universe. In the waiting lies the shape, the sound, the colour, the contour of beauty. In a world strewn with disappointments, of truths with no spine, and lies with fashionable make-up on, often the only solace lies in the wonder and the dream. And particularly in love, anticipation is often the beginning, the glue, and the end. Particularly, as we wait... Because in that hiatus of restless emptiness, our heart and mind have conversations, nay, battles. There are questions asked, doubts raised, admonishments given. With great rapidity, joy and misery tumble around in a struggle for supremacy - there’s nothing real, but everything seems real. We dread excuses, we anticipate excuses, we destroy excuses. In a span of few moments - minutes - which have the jaggedness of hours, hearts are deciphered, conclusions are drawn, decisions are hewn into stony consciousness. But everything seems fragile. And then the wait finishes. The nervousness melts. Questions are unquestioned. Answers no longer require stilts. There is light. There is air. Before it all ends, there is life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on conundrums of life -

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What Do I Leave Behind?

Sat, 30 Apr 2022 20:00:00 +0500

What do I leave behind? A folder named 'private poems' full of diatribes against life, a bunch of diaries full of tales of unfinished love, a half-eaten apple thrown carelessly into the bush, a spaniel with warm eyes who will wait for my morning pat. As I grow older, I often think of the legacy of me. Will I be remembered at all, or not; if yes, for what? Or is that even important, for I won’t be there either way - to see the inevitability of the human drama, and how we are but a traveler in everyone’s life. We WILL be forgotten, we will be ashes and dust in people’s memory. People we love will find other people to share the tales of their breath and time. Apart from my breath, nothing else will stop. So how will the worth of my life ever be garnered, known? And what would it mean to me? What would it mean for the world? I have lived a life I have filled with listening to the softest of tones, the pause I have revitalized with the feel of skin, the breath I have rediscovered in the euphoria of a note, the careless trails of things I have loved which I leave behind as discoverable secrets. And my refrain reaches a realization. If it matters to me, it would just be enough. Because a life well lived requires no legacy or memory or remembrance. It is self sufficient in itself, it is its own cache of fragrance and song. And traces of such a legacy will find its own place under every sun - like pollen which is unseen but remains in the sun to slowly descend into the beings of everyone who passes by. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on yearning -

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Subscribe to my incandescent and poetic newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Francescas Story by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2981-francescas-story
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Flucht (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3146-flucht-romeos-erbe-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Complexity of Simple Lives

Sat, 23 Apr 2022 20:00:00 +0500

An ordinary life is so complex. In its unending inevitabilities and Gordian knots it is both an unravelling puzzle and an enduring mystery. To mesh our life’s experiences with those who we love, is itself a quotidian Everest to be conquered. And we slip, and we fail, and we try valiantly and fail miserably. And then we pick ourselves up and start all over again, and then we fail again. And then we find a rhythm and we lose it. Recriminations and regrets galore come into the equation, and we again seek balance and again find ourselves in the deep end. What is it about ordinary lives? Why does nothing find an equilibrium? And why, when it seems tranquil, it sinks in a morass of habit. What is a complete life, and how does a couple find it? Does it exist in sacrifice and adjustment or does it reside in the brave singularity of lives which happen to find togetherness. As love stops being a wandering minstrel and works towards finding tranquility in the domestic, the lines of everything gets blurred and within its confined confusion lies the truth of two fully alive people living half lives. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of ordinary lives -

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Those Days of a Lost Summer

Sat, 16 Apr 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Youth is so wasted on the ones who carry it as a burden. The changes which wreck havoc to the body and heart are later looked back at as the sweetest damnation possible, irreplaceable but never ever lived through fully. We all know and understand the alchemy of a moment richly lived, but still let it pass us by ruthlessly, unthinkingly. Why do we consider time as a rich man’s wealth, when it can’t be hoarded or spent endlessly? In its strange and beautiful equalities, we realise it is the only thing bequeathed equitably to all. But we are fooled by time’s serene passage, lulled to forget its irrevocability. And in that lassitude we end with half-lives. In our puzzling pursuit of things which finally matter little - lucre instead of light, breath in lieu of breathlessness - we take away the most precious gift we could give ourselves. And when we realize our folly, often it is with nothing left in our banks - not health, not inclination, not circumstances - and what is lost is a glow, and the possibility of finding light - and being it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the summers of our lives -

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The Complex Algorithms of Giving

Sat, 09 Apr 2022 20:00:00 +0500

People may love to give but they hate being asked to give. It’s almost as if there’s something accusatory about being asked to be generous - as if so far you weren’t, and here comes this person saying, gently but firmly, “why don’t you at least do it now?” It’s not that people can’t give - they can and they do. But there’s generally a calculation, a quick mental reconciliation of give-&-take, of subjective and objective returns, and a decision which is derivative - if the net result is a dopamine high, go for it. Else prevaricate. More insidious are the false promises, people who can’t say no on the face, because they are feckless, and can’t face their own truths and enunciate them. These are people who can, who should, but won’t - they fudge, they lie, they want the proposal to die out of sheer tiredness. But what about the time a person is duty bound to lend a hand? When morally, as a countryman, as a co-citizen, a co-human, as someone who speaks out against injustice, as someone who commiserated, who shed tears, about what can and what should be rectified, what about such a person? What do you do with them, when they refuse to reach out or reach in? In the schemata of life, one needs to simply go on and ask. Show, talk, make aware, and then again - show, talk, make aware. Often, change comes in tiptoes, it enters hearts like a whisper, unheralded, suddenly. A continuous litany of no’s suddenly opens a corridor of acceptance - asking you to walk in. Why does it happen? Why does a person change? What makes a person change? Deep within the complexity of our beings lies the tenderness of our essential goodness. We often ourselves don’t know our mind, or it’s mindfulness. Even as a person seems to be closed to us, there's a quiet awareness, a forever openness. And it requires a happenstance, a feeling, an experience, a sharing, a word, an unsolicited kindness, to suddenly open the person up. The revelation is not of a change of heart but a revelation that the heart always existed. All that this inherent goodness requires sometimes is a mirror to go behind the façade and show the person that he’s a much better person than he himself knew. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk about generosity -

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The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Betelgeuse by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5780-betelgeuse
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Winter Night by Frank Schröter
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6910-winter-night
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

He Made Lasagna Before He Left

Sat, 02 Apr 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Heartbreak is often an ailment which is never prescribed for, but the one responsible for so much of what drives a person, often off a cliff, often into darknesses. In the stories of our fallen leaves lie traces of heady summers and barren winters. We are what we are, but so much of the blood we spill is because of the shrapnel of a broken heart’s pieces. In the morning of realizations lies the barrenness of what we could have been. But the deepest cut is when the person we love - who we thought loved us too, no, who we KNEW loved us too - now says she loves ONLY someone else. Is it a lapse of the flesh, is it lust masquerading as love, is it a discovery of a truer love? Is it a drift away from me, or a choice made in spite of me. How much of what she was then a lie, how much a transformation? Is there the possibility of one heart holding two loves? Is that acceptable? Is it real? The real challenge is to know it’s she - not me, if it’s perfidy, it’s a lesson for me not to be her, if it’s a change of heart, to learn grace instead and kindness, to learn and know what moving on means. To know that to be hurt might not be right, but could often be inevitable. But the universe always has something true for the truly hurt - the possibility of survival, of finding grace in the deepest cut. And in that one benediction lies the possibility of finding the best in life, of finding the best in ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk about love in trouble -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3232-sleepers
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Blood & Light in the War Zone

Sat, 26 Mar 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"The dirt-encrusted tanks rumbled in single file, the first driver, fatigued, suddenly braked, as he saw a man kneeling, his hands out to stop the tank, the driver looked down and wept, so did the man." Chesterton said “The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.” What do we gain from war? The answers are all to do with geopolitics, belief, commerce or fear. What do we lose from war? The answers are so many that they are lost in the multitude of count. In these lands, which were bequeathed to us as borderless and boundless stretches, men first came and claimed ownership. They then built barriers to differentiate and dissuade encroachment. And in one stroke, all kinds of barriers got established. And everybody was ready to defend or expand. And war was enacted on the foundation of fear, of losing hegemony, of showing a perverse machismo, for power, for commerce. Man was ready to die in the firepit of battle, than be seen as weak for trying to save the earth from its scorching end. Man's massive ego rises and dies on the edge of its limitless foolishness. As Eisenhower once said “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.” And the stories of heroism and tragedy never end. May it be Syria, Palestine, Iran, or Ukraine. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk about the tragedy of conflict -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Final Countdown by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/125-the-final-countdown
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license The March of the Hope by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8055-the-march-of-the-hope
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Imagefilm 040 by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3151-imagefilm-040
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

In the Darkness of Our Autobiographies

Sat, 19 Mar 2022 20:00:00 +0500

We are often our own worst enemies. One mistake, one misdemeanor, and we hang ourselves before the world does. We deflate ourselves, we berate ourselves, we compare and invariably find ourselves falling short. Why? How can many of us find nothing right in ourselves whereas there are people in the world who can find nothing wrong in themselves! And in this game of self-obsession, where people are either the best or the worst, we bring into each situation not a recognition of its zen but our own stunted self-perception. Dynamics of action are then driven not situationally - what the time and happenstance demands - but what the person wants. It’s a difference which makes the dynamics of results uneven and unpredictable. And each one of us more prone to our own vulnerabilities, and the situation to collapse within the black holes of our personalities. But that’s the truth of us and what we touch. We can only be a sum of our heights and recesses, the obsessions of our successes and the forceful blackouts of our failures. And we wish to revisit the glory of the same path for every endeavor and invariably encounter the pitfalls of commonality. Darknesses are then an accumulation of too many bright spots. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk about self-discovery -

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Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Betelgeuse by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5780-betelgeuse
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lose a Lover Not a Friend

Sat, 12 Mar 2022 20:00:00 +0500

To the top half of trees;
The angled sun
Slants honey-coloured rays
That lessen to the ground
As we bike through
The corridor of Palm Drive
We two

Have reached a safety the years
Can claim to have created:
Unconsumated, therefore
Unjaded, unsated.
Picnic, movie, ice-cream;
Talk; to clear my head
Hot buttered rum - coffee for you;
And so not to bed

And so we have set the question
Aside, gently.
Were we to become lovers
Where would our best friends be?
You do not wish, nor I
To risk again
This savoured light for noon's
High joy or pain.

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Sounds of Living and the Dead

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Do human beings only want graveyards on the face of this beautiful earth? With just about any reason to justify it. It could be religion, geopolitics, hegemony, hubris, world domination, strategy, business. Even if it entails sacrificing a whole populace, a country, people? Render devastation, and look at the lurid satellite images and say “It’s a small price to pay.” And if it’s a difference in colour of the skin - it’s no price at all. And if it’s someone who takes the name of a god you don't believe in? Huh, why ask? If it’s the west, the reason is commerce and supremacy; if it’s central, it is religion and angst; if it’s east, it’s an ancient philosophy of power; if it’s the far east, it’s simply a place in the sun; If it’s up north, it’s what you do to keep one’s power circle intact. There are as many reasons to kill as there are people. We, the ultra-ordinary are the simpletons, crying over poetry for the right reason, directing our angst in erroneous directions. At every point in our lives we are dispensable, our nullification rendering not even a murmur beyond the next spring. All we can hope to do is to seal our ears and turn to the ones we love the most, and bless ourselves with the air and the light and drifting leaves and shifting seasons and find our joy. Everything can be, and is, vapour. We should walk our hard ground till it lasts. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which are steeped with anguish -

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Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Evacuation by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8118-evacuation
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Midas Touches Himself

Sat, 26 Feb 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"... freedom is never wrested away, it is forever a choice which we just gift away." The tragedy of the modern day work place is its uncanny ability to numb souls. Oh jobs give purpose, direction, sustenance. But the price to be paid is often exacting. It’s a dichotomous entity - both a portal to freedom and an entrapment, a privilege of accomplishment and a secret that erodes, a means to stability and an illusion of permanence, the shimmer of independence and the reality of a cul-de-sac. There is so much which we demand of a job forgetting that it demands equally of us. There is no free ride in this world and the money, perks, and position which are required to put one’s body and soul together in fact delinks the body from the soul. What is this dichotomy, this reality of heights attached with acrophobia? What is this desperate need for power and privilege and the inability to hold on to the spoils? The desperate cry to be held when the heights bring distance without the insight, when the hunger to be understood often leads to a life full of hiatuses. What are we if not beings subsumed in the search for meaning? To earn is often the mistaken first step to fullness, without knowing that it is also the first step away from fulfilment. What is it about the modern work place that it erodes our souls so? That embedded within its necessities is the entire armament of destruction. It is so easy to live wrapped up in the beatific illusion of privilege with all its accruements, when the very marrow of our souls has been exacted as it’s price. We often don’t even know what we’ve become. On the wings of accolades, we mistake living for life. Are we fools to be fooled or we know no other way to approach life than what we’ve been trained to do? We are often no more than what our jobs demand and give. The fog inside us grows so thick that we don’t recognize our own charred selves, as we put ourselves on a mantel covered in gold and silver. We are our very own Midas. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of sublimity and improbabilities -

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Uncut Poetry Salon featuring Soul Poets Kashiana & Indran

Thu, 24 Feb 2022 21:10:09 +0500

You have to hear Kashiana speak about the sensuousness of bitter gourd curry or the Zen of belonging, to understand the delicate relationship she has with words and how she captures the fragility of beauty. As a counterpoint we have Indran, with his muscular poetry which combines indignation, despair and angst into a poetic tapestry of aching pulchritude. Both Kashiana and Indran are terrific poets based out of USA, and came together for a lovely chat with Uncut Poetry on their new poetry books. They spoke about the genesis of their poetic journeys, of memory, of displacement, of processes, and why diaspora poets possibly have a more universal view of the countries they settle in. Kashiana Singh is from India, lives in North Carolina and embodies her TEDx talk theme of Work as Worship into her everyday. She is a management professional by definition but a poet practitioner by personal preference. She proudly serves as Managing Editor for Poets Reading the News. Her poems can be found on Rattle, Poets Reading the News, Oddball Magazine, Café Dissensus, amongst others. Kashiana says that she carries all her geographical homes within her poetry. Her first two books were Shelling Peanuts and Stringing Words and Crushed Anthills. Woman by the Door is her latest collection of poetry. Poet Usha Akella says this of her book - "Singh’s poetry universe is one of hidden corners, apertures of light, and the liminality of experience verbing into memory. A poetry replete with metaphors of passageways and openings, personal myth making is alchemized from the pixels of memories to define what it is to be woman in this world." Get Woman by the Door here - https://linktr.ee/kashianasingh Indran Amirthanayagam's newest book is Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant. Also recently published is Blue Window (Ventana Azul), translated by Jennifer Rathbun (Dialogos Books). In 2020, Indran produced a “world" record by publishing three new poetry books written in three languages: The Migrant States (Hanging Loose Press, New York), Sur l'île nostalgique (L’Harmattan, Paris) and Lírica a tiempo (Mesa Redonda, Lima). He writes in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Haitian Creole and has twenty poetry books as well as a music album Rankont Dout. He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly and helps curate Ablucionistas. He hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube. He also publishes poetry under the name Beltway Editions(www.beltwayeditions.com) and their first published book is "Our Ancestors Did Not Breathe This Air", which is an anthology of poems by six Muslim women poets who wrote together at M.I.T. Get Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant here - https://www.broadstonebooks.com If you liked this interview, consider listening to these wonderful poets speaking about their poetry, life and times -

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Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Rustic Ballad by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/4720-rustic-ballad
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

A Summery Love Story (in the middle of winter)

Sat, 19 Feb 2022 20:00:00 +0500

And then she falls in love with a girl. She reads about it and she discovers she is ‘queer’, which is odd, because she feels normal, in fact is feeling as normal as is possible. The excitement she feels to be in the company of the girl she is falling in love with is as natural as possible. Everything about her is magical, her laughter, her hair, the intensity of her eyes as she listens to her, the excitement with which she looks at her when she goes near her, her stories and the way her eyes fill up. And her abandon. What was odd about it? What is odd about falling in love with all of that? Just because somebody sometime, some law somewhere, decided what is natural and what is not - here she was feeling odd, god forbid, feeling guilty. As if there was a wrong being committed, as if some law of nature was being broken, as if she was, without doing a thing, but just for feeling a feeling, was bring prosecuted and standing guilty. If love itself was not overwhelming as a feeling, here was a world calling this feeling - queer!! What was she to do with this conflict, this battle of her feelings and what the world felt about it. How she was being judged without even opening her mouth about something so …pure, so special, so transcendental. How could something which seemed to have been ordered in heaven and ordained by the gods themselves be wrong, be bad. She was all of 15 years old, and here she was - feeling the worst at this best time of her life. Alas. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of love breaking barriers -

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Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Betonwaldromantik by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/374-betonwaldromantik
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finally Home

Sat, 12 Feb 2022 20:00:00 +0500

The concept of home is such a simple complexity. Is it a presence, a search, a destination, a desire, a lover or a DIY? Are it's contours predetermined, a work-in-progress, a shallow end of the pool or the deepest part of the ocean? It it a place to rest before the next bout of restlessness or is it the place to determine destinations? How does its being get significance - by a mere return every evening or a filling of space or a collection of accoutrements? Does it come with a character predetermined or is it a mere reflection of what makes the universe inside us? Do adventures end in a home? Do they get beget here? Do they find their demise, their resurrection, their meaning and their scripting here? Or is it a mere cemetery, where everything is laid to rest, albeit with tenderness? What is a home? Do we require it only for replenishment and shelter? Or is it something which is a part of what we are , and in turn makes us what we are? What is home? If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the warmth of a home -

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Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - BRIO 1 by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/232-brio-1
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Never Wanted Parts of You Which Were Easy

Sat, 05 Feb 2022 20:00:00 +0500

I Never Wanted Parts of You Which Were Easy* * From a line in the BBC serial "Vigil" "There are always some bits of light for both of us to take away, but you do want the entire buffet of effulgence." Time and again relationships slip into presuppositions - and we start taking the ones who are closest to us for granted. We find our own needs overriding our sensitivity to the soul-twitches and mood-swingers of our loved one's aching hearts. So much of what is good in us is drowned in the morass of the quotidian. We deflect, we ignore, we stop noticing, we stop holding, hugging, caring. All that matters is our anguish, our petulance, our paraphernalia. We are lost in our own contracted world. And the ones we ignore because of our self-obsession, quietly suffer on the fringes. We fret and we wonder what went wrong. Till the realisation sinks in that though we profess to love somebody, we are only in love with ourselves. We then realize that much of life’s meaning, and often our own worth, is derived from others. We understand ourselves better, through the wisdom of others, our arrogance is softened when we encounter the simplicity of the truly wise. We are overwhelmed with light when we crack the hard exterior of our self-centeredness. When we draw people we profess to love towards ourselves, only when our lives are buffeted by freezing winds, or when we realise that the world's adulation is a fickle being, we stand the danger of being rebuffed in turn. Nothing is static in the universe, not even love. And as we pass from one mirror to another, we finally come to the one which is cracked. And in the tragedy of this realisation lies the irrevocability of love which has now given up. Churn always brings change, and the power of the anguished ‘no more’ has reverberations which can shake our universe. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the strains in relationships -

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Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Mandela by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/209-mandela
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Atomic by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/119-atomic
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

New York: Concurrently Schizophrenic.

Sat, 29 Jan 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Whenever I travel to USA, wherever I might be, I try to come back through New York. It is a magnet to my senses. I could stand for hours in its art galleries, but also days on its streets. Sometimes as an onlooker, sometimes as a part of its unending swirl. The city's smoke and movement, it's glittering heights and its grimy innards, its populace with purpose, the hopelessness of its hobos. Its glass, its ostentation, its purpose, its hope, its possibilities. The way the city assimilates me into its poetry, the way its hardness empties me and its art fills me, New York is a sensory overload. And it changes hues, borough to borough, bridge to bridge, suburb to suburb. And as I travel, I am filled with the confusion of the person who wants to pin down a city into a pithy phrase. For within this one city lie a hundred possible faces. The arty, the grimy, the soaring, the sparing, the vulgar, the simple. And the definitions come as a smorgasbord of meanings and possibilities. The way we are, the way all of us are - never one, always multidimensional, always a contributor, always a purveyor. Often a victim, often a voyeur, often a little bright, ever so often unmitigatingly sad. New York, concurrently schizophrenic, indeed. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems with a city as it backdrop -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Nu Jazz Lounge Vol 2 (Mondtanz Edit) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/141-nu-jazz-lounge-vol-2-mondtanz-edit-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Capturing the Feeling

Sat, 22 Jan 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"...the cold's mood would be agreeable as it opened its vulnerabilities to the warmth, and she would lay in it, like a cat in nirvana, and I would be beside her, looking at her, knowing her presence, her silence, as just persuasions for me to be with her." We often forget people, we forget their faces. We forget the cut of his jaw, or the slope of her breast. We forget the texture of her hand as it held ours, the pucker of her nose as she laughed, we forget the galaxy of freckles on his back, or how her skin folded next to her thighs. Time robs so much away, often with heartbreak, often as a healer. But what we don't forget about people is how they make us feel. The warmth she spread with that laugh, the quiet recognition of worth he gave with his being, the comfort in her steady voice as the world crashed around, the definition of value embedded in the aromas of his kitchen, the magnetic charm of her mind as she spoke of a book, the serenity found on her breast after a long day of sighs. Life's trajectory is determined not by the events or the crisis or the highs of happenstances - these are a given, a must, if you live life long enough. A person's memory, her longevity in our blood, the persistence of his lingering trace, are all factors of what we know about ourselves whenever we were with them. The legacy of people is less a cumulation of our experiences with them, and more a residue of their dust and stardust. The tactility of memory is an algorithm of the pleasure, hurt, ache, tenderness, ruin, cheer, kindness, bruising, which life's trajectory leaves in its wake as remembrance. The true worth of life is in what it makes us feel. The true worth of people is what they make us feel. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on the beatific beauty of the sun -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - The Way To Kataka by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/11-the-way-to-kataka
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Who Do You Choose to Become When Alone

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 20:00:00 +0500

If there's anything I've learnt in these hurting times, it is how bruises crept into me, unawares, unannounced. Here I am one day, coping up famously, and the next minute I've collapsed within myself, in a paroxysm of uncontrolled depression. Without raising a thought, I'm hurt grievously. The world just doesn't understand. Nobody can see a hurt - hence I can't be. Whilst, in the meantime, I am sinking, sinking, in a morass of undefinitions. There's no end to the depth, there's no recognizable sign of what drags me in, what is the nature of climate change that it is both a famine and a flood, where I'm empty and swollen, where I want to grasp whatever I can, as if it's the last straw of the world, and when unable to hold anything, I just let myself go. I rage and cut myself, and break glass, and hurl myself where there is empty space, I can visualize the worst and know it's the end of the world for me, I don't expect understanding, I don't expect help, I don't recognize help, I know my life to be in the hands of something without definitions, unloved, unappreciated, hung in the middle of nowhere where nobody visits, a place of abandonment, where only the rejects reside - me, me , me. And I ask myself, why am I needed? What am I worth to anybody? Why is a life of value, why is anything of value? The flowers, the breeze, the insects, the eagles, the flies, are paraphernalia to create a world of falsehoods, where everything is marketed, and everything sold is instantly useless. And I say why do I exist, why do I live, why am I here, what can I contribute, what do I matter. What do I matter? What do I matter? And I tell myself goodbye. I'm not sure if I appreciate myself leaving myself alone. But that's the only place left to go. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on loneliness and desolation -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Subscribe to my newsletter The Uncuts here - https://theuncuts.substack.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Blockbuster Atmosphere 3 (Resolution) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/130-blockbuster-atmosphere-3-resolution-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Sometimes by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/142-sometimes
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Stopping by a Café to Drink a Poem

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 20:00:00 +0500

"How do you choose a poem to write? she asked. How do you find the pulse of that vein, that something precious which is nowhere?" Where does a poem come from? Where is its birth place? What is its ancestry? I have found poetry as a wound finds its scar, or a plucked flower finds an altar. The process is organic like breathing and unstructured as a heart plunging. It often starts as a curiosity to know deeply about something, a desire to unravel, to understand. But quickly it becomes an investigation, an overwhelming desire to unravel light. Fingers become a conduit, ink is the blood which starts flowing from the wounds which burst to reveal truths. And I see myself clearer, and I see myself uglier. I might not realize that deep inside this ugliness lies the ultimate secret. Because till then I have not realized that all truths are beautiful, however hideous they might seem. And that's when poetry enters it's most tremulous state - that of healing. For a poem, finally, is a true friend. It is both a mirror and a hand. It jolts you at the same time as it holds you. You will know whether you've encountered a great poem when you emerge from it fully drenched, lacerated, scarred - but strangely, strangely, alive. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which are rich with the aroma of coffee & love -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Falling Star by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/90-falling-star
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Angels by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/53-angels
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

New Year Special! Top 5 of Uncut Poetry!!

Sat, 01 Jan 2022 20:00:00 +0500

Hello all you lovers, of poetry, of good things, of love itself. As we start a brand new year, we can only hope to dig out joy out of the debris of despondence and despair. I hope my poetry has been a companion to you, week after week, on all things hopeful, zen-like, heart-breaking but heart-healing too. Every page of my poetry is a survival manual of sorts for me. I hope I have made you come alive too.

I thought it would be a good idea to hear the five most downloaded episodes of Uncut Poetry. So, with new introductions, please find the top 5 of Uncut Poetry! The poems featured are -

I have dipped my pen into my bruises, I have laid down my scars as lines. The music is often a celebration of being alive, and often because I have survived. This journey of thoughts and feelings will continue, and I can only ask you to walk with me, step-to-step, word-to-word, heartbreak-to-heartbreak, healing-to-healing. I promise I will walk on. Can you in turn promise to be with me?

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - On Fire by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5147-on-fire
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Lockdown by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7658-lockdown
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Sentimental Travel by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6968-sentimental-travel
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Slant of the Winter Sun

Sat, 25 Dec 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Much of the world has dug deep into the quilty warmth of bodies, wishing the winter to find its way away and let sleep wrap them in its insidious ways. And the glory of sun lies lost outside, wasted in lighting corner dustbins, and nooks where spiders glisten as anointed lures. Winter mornings are glorious. If only we get to see them. Ensconced in our blankets, our bodies held in the warmth of other bodies, the seduction of status quo is overwhelming. But there's too much which is lost even as we gain in our winter sleep. The winter chill is just a presence, benign, expected, there. Nothing can match the sudden bite of it's wind, the cold regality of things in a state of temporary rigor mortis, the infinitesimal beauty of a dewdrop freezing in its track - and how everything dissolves in front of our eyes as the sun rises. For embedded deep beyond in its cold touch, is the magic of it's warmth. The winter sun often feels like a touch, evanescent, too gentle for a cruel world, too soft for impact, too fleeting to lay a mark. But it has magic. It's presence is alchemy. Everything opens up to it, everything raises its face to it, eyes closed, trusting it for rejuvenation, resurrection. It floods the world quickly, looking in askance where it can't reach, lying silently beside dark corners to let them know it's here, coming as hope to those clenched deep into themselves. Like love, it's presence is more consequential than its persistence. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which take you back into the sunlight -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

A Home as An Open Dream

Sat, 18 Dec 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"We would talk of the day to make the outside world our own, and lay joint claim to our individual memories." A home is of so many definitions. The place we grow in, the place we get our first intimations of the living world, the place we are desperate to get to at the end of a day - but also the place we are desperate to leave as we grow. Often a shelter, often a prison, often just a roof, often the very symbol of unquestioning acceptance. We learn the meaning of bruises from those in the next room, and the ill-imitable depth of love from those further down the hall. We learn there is often no difference between the command of an elder and the confines of an ego. We learn of chains of command and of the subtle exertion of real power. We learn how some of the hardest decisions come from the softest heart, and male prerogative is often just a cover for cluelessness. We leave home for pilgrimages, when actually we are in search of a home. Home is deep nights and late escapes. Home is often of going away without looking back. And to die in peace often only means to have found that address which we can finally call home - and to have that address find us. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which take you back home (and its strange dynamics!) -

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

I Am a Residue of Life

Sat, 11 Dec 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I'm a multiplier of the breeze and the sunsets which have moved through me, I'm a quiver of hurts I can ruthlessly give. I'm withdrawn without reason, I can be generous without a reason too." Anyone's identity is rarely singular - it's a bunch of elements, and mostly, a bunch of contradictions. There is never a case of knowing oneself, but only of accepting oneself. But accepting oneself is a phenomenon. Within its largeness lies the acceptance of others also, as they are. Messy, volcanic, turbulent -whatever everyone is, to accept each as manifestations of the universe, representation of life itself, each one a part of a whole, who we can puzzle over for a lifetime, or simply enjoy as they are. But more than anything else, each person in our life completes us, with their peculiarities and quiddities. Each one, however small and short their presence in our lives, is a part of the jigsaw puzzle that we are. We can never be complete on our own, we can never discover who we are, alone. We are a community, we work with others, for a reason. We are thrown together with all kinds of people, with a purpose. To know what is despicable and not go on that road, or to find a mirror in someone else, recognize ourselves for what we never knew ourselves to be, and know the truth of ourselves. And to learn to be gentle with ourselves, within the trauma of revelations. We then, finally, fall in love with ourselves. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of self-determination -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - 1000 Lichter by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3161-1000-lichter
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license 5 vor 12 by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2973-5-vor-12
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Improbability of Wishes

Sat, 04 Dec 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"There's always a road waiting for one of the lovers to depart." The saga of love is a play of light and shadow. There is incident, coincidence, an assemblage of adrenalin, a bellowing of blood, a singling out of songs, a resurgence of senses. Love arranges it's own arrivals, often as a storm, frequently as a story, most often as winter sun. It rearranges parts of our life, it splinters our days in ways that distance hurts - the desire to be, see, touch, smell, immerse, borders on desperation. For deep inside, every lover knows that embedded in the ecstasy of a love story is it's extinction. Sometimes as slow burn, sometimes as a turn on the road, generally as gentle drift, often as an exercise of getting lost. And then the helplessness ensues. Compasses point towards the setting sun, the flowers coalesce into routine, the days stop beckoning, sunrises only show autumns. But it is as if it's preordained - just as love is as much a part of life as breathing, separation is it's conjoined twin. Why does love wither? Where does it go when it's gone? Are there secret burial grounds for love, epitaph-less, unmarked? Is there a floating cemetery of feelings in heaven for lost love - a consideration for the hurt, commiseration for the haunted, a soul for the homeless? Because the inevitability of drift is in love's DNA, it's loss is in its definition, it's celebration is forever aforetime. But we accept its inevitable tragedy, because our life is governed by its presence, and gets its mojo from its promise. The journey, in life, or love, then, is everything. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of poignant separations -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

When the Evening Drift Brings Him to Me (for Dad)

Sat, 27 Nov 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I see him standing with the skies, grafted into the clouds, the breeze resting in his hair, a black & white etching to life. I gently come behind him, put an arm around his shoulders, as his drift leans into me, he looks at me soft, soft." I have often stood at the window with my dad, as evenings have drifted in. We've not always spoken much, but after all our years, we are just grateful to have the time we have together. Whilst growing up, he was the person to whom I turned to for every question. For me, he could never have a wrong answer. My mum was my compass, but my dad was my guide. In a strange way, without expressing it, without saying anything explicitly, he became my embodiment of truths and life's fulfillments. I doubt he's ever said "I love you, son," to me. It would have felt, and would still feel, awkward. But the truth of those words didn't require their spelling out. It was there in his patience for me, his gentleness to me, his waiting for me, his giving his hand to me. My mum, on the other hand, was always in search of the 'truth' and 'meaning' of things. Swinging from one guru to another, one religious text to another, her quest was unquenchable. I loved her stories of the journey. And I realized much before she did (if she did at all!), that it was the journey which had meaning for her, not the end. In our search for the fount and meaning of life, we are often waylaid by those who complicate truths. When truly, all truths of life are found in just two things - gratitude and presence. We can be masters of life and love, if we can be masters of the moment. Embodied in that truth is the script of our entire life. And I see my dad saying 'I love you' to life with every breath. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which are a tribute to our mum and dad -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Elysium by Alexander Nakarada Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8451-elysium License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The 101 of How to Praise (someone you love)

Sat, 20 Nov 2021 20:00:00 +0500

To receive praise is a need and how to praise is an art. We tend to be so focused on fulfilling our own desires, that we forget that so many of these fulfillments happen because someone else went on a limb for us. Do we always acknowledge? Or do we just move on, unthinkingly? And the irony is that those who support us silently, who give the wind beneath our wings without being asked, are the ones who need acknowledgement the most. The strange thing about giving to someone you love is that you even give in the worst of times - and without any gratitude in return, and often it empties you, and you question yourself, but you carry on - you still find reservoirs from where you pour yourself out. And then acknowledgement comes, often as a look, often as a touch, often as a lump in the throat - and in no time you are full again. And how should we praise? How can something which is quietly done, often life-saving, invariably invaluable, be ever repaid? Nothing can match love's silent act in value, intent, or intensity. So you can only be like the winter sun - warm without being cloying, present in spite of the cold, generous because that's what your nature should be. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the gentlest of feelings -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Winter Night by Frank Schröter
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6910-winter-night
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

When the Goddesses Depart

Sat, 13 Nov 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"All the goddesses have upped and left, as they are wont to do. They fought a bit, showed a few dead bodies, got us to note the weaponry - the heads they'd severed, the wild rides they could summon - then dived into inescapable imaginations, depths they could escape only in a year. Beyond the sweltering of allegories and the heavy lifting of metaphors, in the dismal gloom of departure, will lay the memory of sweat - for the celestial after-smell is more dour than Dior. The goddesses herald hope, but with intimations of winter, with the message that battles could be won, but not seasons, and in the inevitability of a divine victory lies the onus of legacy left in our care. Embedded in the lights which show the way in the dark dawn lies the start of the real war - the daily common life. But as long as we know the goddesses as breath, there's both hope and despair - we will trudge home with self-injuries, but we will survive." As autumn begins, and winter peeps into the world, the goddesses begin to come to earth. One after another - Durga, Laxmi, Saraswati. The warmth and energy of their stories prepares us to withstand the rigors of a figurative and metaphorical winter. But in the aplomb, noise and glitter, we often forget that their battles are metaphysical messages and their victories are vision statements. They are celebrations but also reminders. And they are recurrent because man tends to remember the minutiae and forgets the essence. The richness of allegories is our cultural repast, and a yearly reminder that time could pass, but any particular moment is always the right time for new beginnings. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the divinity in various forms -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sehnsucht by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2922-sehnsucht
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

In the Softest Sunshine of Winter

Sat, 06 Nov 2021 21:52:51 +0500

"I'd think the time for recrimination is long past it's witching hour. Your hand is still a stiff board when I reach out to it, and your body is still your own when I embrace it. You've been an icicle all through summer, but the time for bonfires is in - you have to let your long limbs find their way around me again." The ebb and flow of love, the turning away and the turning towards its glow, the little angers, the tiny bursts of disappointments - love's hurts which linger as love-bites, it's fast-changing seasons which invariably segue into its winter glow - love should always land in soft places, however hard the terrain it transverses. Because you can't give up on love. You have to be sensitive to its changing moods. And you have to fall in love again and again and again with the same person. Because you are also a changeable being, and possibly becoming unlovable. But when you open yourselves up to the adventures of each other, of traversing through each other's changing landscapes, you realize that love doesn't want constancy, it seeks renewal, resurrection, reinvention. In one person lies the love of a multitude. You only need to recognize that. And work towards the greatest travel adventure of your life. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of the variegated colors of love -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Reaching The Sky [Long Version] by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6222-reaching-the-sky--long-version
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Door is Unlocked. I am Awake.

Sat, 30 Oct 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Endings are ruthless. They make you forget every bit of acid existing in relationships in a moment. Regret pours in like the flood of a broken dam. But when the last line has been crossed, when the artery is cut to kill, the path reaches a crevasse - another step is a step into the valley of death. Deep inside all lovers know when that point has been reached. But hope - that great harbinger of false dawns - persists. It attempts to give color to what is irrevocably grey. And makes the one who been walked out from, to wait, to think, of the strands of gold in the bushels of weed. But nothing works. Time slowly covers the one who waits in a thin coverlet of regret which, in time, becomes a thick blanket of bitterness. There's no "I'm glad you were here" which remains. It's only "Why did you even come into my life." If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of hope and regret -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - New Beginning by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5692-new-beginning-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Crimson Flowers in Jallianwala Bagh

Sat, 23 Oct 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Somewhere in the air, something whizzed past. I looked up to see Daar ji's kurta turn into a gorgeous crimson flower, with a small black pinpoint center." This poem is about what happens when a young child goes to Jallianwala Bagh with his grandfather on that fateful day in 1919. The Jallianwala Bagh massacre took place on 13 April 1919. A large but peaceful crowd had gathered at the Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar, Punjab to celebrate the important Hindu and Sikh festival of Baisakhi, and peacefully protest the arrest of two national leaders, Satyapal and Saifuddin Kitchlew. In response to the public gathering, the British Brigadier-General R. E. H. Dyer surrounded the Bagh with his soldiers. The Jallianwala Bagh could only be exited on one side, as its other three sides were enclosed by buildings. After blocking the exit with his troops, he ordered them to shoot at the crowd, continuing to fire even as protestors tried to flee. The troops kept on firing until their ammunition was exhausted Estimates of those killed run into 1000s with over 1,200 other people injured. Apart from the many deaths directly from the shooting, a number of people died of crushing in the stampedes at the narrow gates or by jumping into the solitary well on the compound to escape the shooting. 120 bodies were removed from the well. The wounded could not be moved from where they had fallen, as a curfew was declared, and more who had been injured then died during the night. The level of casual brutality, and lack of any accountability, stunned the entire nation. The ineffective inquiry, together with the initial accolades for Dyer, fuelled great widespread anger against the British among the Indian populace, leading to the non-cooperation movement of 1920–22. Some historians consider the episode a decisive step towards the end of British rule in India. Britain never formally apologized for the massacre but expressed "regret" in 2019. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of tragedies we all face in our lives -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

The Final Good-bye (or Why Lovers Decide to Die Together)

Sat, 16 Oct 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Keep looking at me as we die, let your look be in my final sigh, we've been compatriots of beginnings of which we thought there was no end - maybe, we'll be every love's destiny, a passing on, when there's no real reason why, except tiredness, tiredness, tiredness." Procreation is atavistic. But what about death wish? Not that point where a soul tethers at the edge of depression, but the one where you want to end things because there's nothing left beyond except pain, when life becomes a litany of diminishing returns. When looking back is the only pleasure left. And the future can't possibly hold anything more to revel in. Life comes time-stamped for its beginning. But why not for it's end too? That point when wishes are empty of their mojo. When bodies rediscover their frailty, and are forever at the brink of breaking, inside or outside. When you look at the one you love the most, and she looks back, and the same despair rises inside both of you at the same time - the preordained fact of one of you being left alone. Should ethics, should law, allow lovers to die together, when they want to? To find their peace just the way they find their love? Why should there be pain when there's nothing left to learn from it? When karma has nothing left to show or showcase? When the only questions left are of beauty created in togetherness, and the sheer meaningless of being left alone. There should always be a time to do the right thing. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of death and the spirituality inherent in it -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Fly by Luca Fraula
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8313-fly
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Searching for Coffee in Jaipur

Sat, 09 Oct 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Peacocks are raucous and find roofs with easy comfort - there is still place in this concrete jungle, even if some hearts go for a walk in search of a soul. Do we find comfort in the quiet disregard of the unfamiliar?" Our search for the soul of a city is ever so twisted, as it should be. A city needs to be lived in. On its streets, one needs to be mauled with aromas, with its obsessions, with its politics, with its unkindness, with its unseeing generosities, what keeps it awake at night, and what its mornings bring forth. A visitor passing by will only see it's freshly painted hoardings, not it's tiredness. It's facades and it's colors might give it the sheen it wants to project, but you often have to only turn a corner to see it's permanent shadows. So then, it's a good idea to spend time in a pavement tea stall or a café in the middle of its bustling heart, and immerse oneself in its cadences and concerns, it's voices and noises, what passes by, who stays, what sticks and what's evanescent, the words which are spoken and laughed away and the sentences which linger, coalesce and fall as hard as stones and refuse to be swept away. The soul is there for you to see. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of cities, and the love for them -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Adventure by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6092-adventure
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Finding Souls Between Their Legs

Sat, 02 Oct 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Come to my house one afternoon, my bed's unmade for all lovers of mine, we will find ourselves at our wildest & truest when we reach the third bottle of wine. You can kiss me roughly, and push me down, and I will tell you once more - though you know thirty per cent of what I am, tonight you can be hundred per cent my man." I've always wondered what happens when two lonely souls meet. Are they able to recognize each other through their masks - of verbosity or sullenness? Is there repulsion of seeing someone who also suffers? Or is loneliness a magnet? What ensues? Deep sharing? A slow fanning of embers, to seek life in what is moribund? Love- as something you can't help feeling? Or Lovemaking as an empty surrogate, which makes you lonelier after the act is done and done with? Loneliness is difficult to confess; difficult too to categorize. It can run deep in the being of a person, as much a part of one’s self as talking easily or having skin which glows. As Olivia Laing says in her haunting book "The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone" - "Loneliness is personal, and it is also political. Loneliness is collective; it is a city. As to how to inhabit it, there are no rules and nor is there any need to feel shame, only to remember that the pursuit of individual happiness does not trump or excuse our obligations to each another. We are in this together, this accumulation of scars, this world of objects, this physical and temporary heaven that so often takes on the countenance of hell. What matters is kindness; what matters is solidarity. What matters is staying alert, staying open, because if we know anything from what has gone before us, it is that the time for feeling will not last." Are you lonely? Write in. We'll share a poem or two. Maybe a smile. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of loneliness and yearning -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Misty Lights by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5686-misty-lights-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lost Atlas of Belonging

Sat, 25 Sep 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I am tired of finding you in places watermarked with our senses." The moment of change is a poem. The tranquil chaos of pain is a poem. The end of love is itself a poem. It's just that a poet can put it all into words. For a heartbroken lover, the city becomes a map of things found and lost at the same time. The heart becomes an almanac of bruises and scars. Everything precious seems to be lost, but there is still something which is held on tight. And nothing, nothing remains the same, even as life continues just the way it is. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of yearning of and in cities -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - End Of Summer by Frank Schröter
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6633-end-of-summer
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

These Darned Long Distance Relationships

Sat, 18 Sep 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I inhale the fragrance of lavender from a candle lit at 559, I know you'd call at 6, and I want to feel as if you're here." By itself, love is a beating heart. Never ceases, never stops. It's just we, who fill it with our own insecurities, our fragility, our loneliness. We doubt ourselves hence we doubt the other, and view love as a paradigm of insecurity when all it is a temple which awaits return. They say love requires oxygen, reaffirmation, rejuvenation. When the truth is that all it requires is faith. In the ebb and flow of our moods and the seasons, we mistake the passing feeling as a change of heart, and we take decisions of incompatibility and parting with such vigour, that heartbreak then truly ensues. And where a simple conversation and a recall of old pledges is called for, it's tragedy which befalls. So many lives are left to waste because they hear and believe the songs of a passing troubadour. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of difficult love -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Farm [full version] by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8206-farm-full-version
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Why Don‘t You Make Love to Me Anymore?

Sat, 11 Sep 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"There's so much I can give you yet, for I'm a poem you left three-fourths of the way, I promise I still have a syntax in bed, which might surprise the metaphor in you." What's love if there is no mischief in it? What's love of it doesn't become lazy sometimes and has to be given a jolt! In the infinite comfort of being the cynosure of one true love, also lies the seeds of it being taken for granted. As our soul preens in its attention, it also stretches like happy cat, and settles into the comfortable nook of warm laziness. And things slip. Dates are forgotten, attention wavers, things are forgotten to be told. Every morning you reach for the phone as soon as you awaken, rather than that warm body sleeping beside you. And you stop making love. And in that one silly aberration, slips away the connect which enjoins two people into something more infinite, where 'carnal' is spelt as 'constant' and 'lusting' as 'lasting'. All it requires is a nudge, often a metaphysical elbow in the ribs, and sometimes a literal kick in the pants, to bring each other back to the primal feeling - that strange world which only love provides - when the world gives you everything you've ever wanted, but there's just not enough of it. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of reclamation and right -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Warm Sunset by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8070-warm-sunset
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

It Takes a Long Time to Arrive From Not Very Far Away

Sat, 04 Sep 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Excerpt from "It Takes a Long Time to Arrive From Not Very Far Away"* "Why do we do anything for the people we love, you asked, isn't everything a poem we write for the other, every day, day in day out? Then why is love demanded as diligence, when you can have it as grace?" Hear the full poem in the latest episode of Uncut Poetry Podcast

We take so much for granted. The air we breathe, the flowers we touch, the curve of the path we walk on every morning, the very person sleeping beside us, who we profess to love more than anything in this world. Inherent in this are our years of upbringing, our lack of sensitivity to look at things differently, the daiquiri of convenience and disregard. And as our outlook gets fossilized, we steadily slip into the dogma of defense. We stand on the pulpit of so-called tradition and preach, we refuse to pay cognizance to the subtlety of changing outlooks, and how everything old wasn't holy. But change is inevitable - and insidious. It will come, it will happen. We can resist and have the spine of our tenet cracked, or change and let the fullness of a new creed flood us with its dazzling effulgence. (* this is a line from 'Plainwater' by Anne Carson) If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of reclamation and right -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Oceans Of Tranquility by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6869-oceans-of-tranquility
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Hope is Merely Fear With a Poor Choice of Lipstick

Sat, 28 Aug 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I am exhausted with mornings with their false pretenses and promises, and wonder what it would take to stop it from decorating itself with silver and gold and light and lies, and merely let us be the honest suicide candidates, who see every bright start to a day and know the hypocrisy ready to unravel as a brilliant bright day." Every morning we wake up with an array of feelings racing inside us, conflicting emotions, from fury to peace, from exhaustion to exuberance. And depending on what we focus on, our day takes on that trajectory - which merely means our life finds a direction in our daily choice. We can start being a Jackson Pollock painting, splattered with every color and hue, but something inside us picks one color and runs with it. Do we celebrate life - or hunt it down to shoot it point-blank, is merely that perchance choice, of a perchance emotion. We are left to regret at leisure. But what of those whose choice everyday is the same dismal refraction of life, when the shining truth of possibilities is always seen as chimera, and life seems to be a dark rabbit hole teeming with despair and cul de sacs. Depression ensues, suicidal tendencies set in. All the love and support of the world needs to be called in. Because, then, lives are at stake. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of despair -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Parting of the Ways - Part 2 by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/4196-parting-of-the-ways---part-2
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Uncut Poetry Salon featuring the Poetry Busker Ryan Tomlin

Sat, 21 Aug 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Ryan Tomlin, based out of Leeds in UK, became an author at the age of 17. He loved the experience so much he decided that being a successful and best selling author was his ultimate goal. He sent his book to publishers all over. Alas, the only one who agreed to publish asked for 2500 pounds in payment. After that he wrote four more books- all of them rejected by publishers. Till, on his 20th birthday he started writing what later became his 5th book - The Transition. He decided to self publish it on Amazon Kindle. But the way he sold the book was on the streets, with flyers and whiteboards, whilst talking to people and promoting the book. It became a self-published best seller. And then he hit upon the idea of an open air street Poetry Store. And he started selling his poems for 20 pence each. He didn't earn millions but enough for it to become his regular job. And then he wanted to do something bigger - and so he started poetry busking, performing his poetry on the streets of Leeds. And lo and behold, he's since performed at Farsley Festival, Yorkshire Day and in An Evening of Authors. He has been featured on the EPOCH documentary series PEOPLE, as well as Made In Leeds TV, BBC Yorkshire, and BBC Two's Politics Live. This week we've asked Ryan Tomlin to completely take over the floor. You can get more of Ryan's poems on his website or his Instagram account. His best-selling book The Transition can be bought at Amazon. Uncut Poetry has started a new Podcast called Red River Sessions (on Spotify, iTunes, Pocket Casts, etc), where we will talk to published poets, about their poetry, their craft and what haunts them. It is brought to you by Red River, which is the premier independent publisher of poetry books, and Uncut Poetry. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Melodic Interlude Two by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6394-melodic-interlude-two
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license 1000 Lichter by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3161-1000-lichter
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Flucht (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3146-flucht-romeos-erbe-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Imagefilm 044 by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3241-imagefilm-044
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

The Power of No

Sat, 14 Aug 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I was a survivor of religious texts which left morsels at my doorstep as they made their way to their lofty definitions." Big revolutions often have beginnings in nooks and crannies - a kitchen or a closet, a garage or a heart. To confront the world, a general could be less than five feet high, to have a voice which resonates through the world, one could be a tiny teenager speaking in the softest of falsettos. The power of what we want comes from intent, the wind beneath the wings comes from courage, and the impetus comes when we learn to say "No, no more." Many stories have ended there, being ruthlessly silenced. But even a single voice let go into the universe doesn't go waste. Another voice is raised, conjoined with another, and then another - till a crescendo emerges - and a cry goes out. And nothing nothing remains the same. The world then is on the cusp of change. The world IS changed. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of hope adn resistance -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Simone Zunterer (Main Theme) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/554-simone-zunterer-main-theme-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Love is an Unreasonable Yearner

Sat, 07 Aug 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Love is such an unreasonable yearner - full-hearted but empty-handed: it can give a treasure out of nothing, but can never ask to be gifted one." We are all, at various times, givers or takers. Giving is easy when we care, though not when we don't. But when conjoined with commitment, we can continue giving, through our anger, disillusionment or grief. But asking, in the best of times, can be an effort. In that brief interlude between desire and expectation, we have to put ourselves out, turn humbly, and ask for what we want. But ever so often, we can't. Is it ego? Is it expectation that we should be given, without being asked? Is it fear of being refused? Whatever the reason, that hesitation, that decision to keep quiet, to withdraw, to not ask, is the point from where distances start getting to be mapped. And the shifting of feelings is akin to the continental shift of geological plates. Slow but irrevocable. And in love, particularly, what commences to be suppressed, is the natural flow of lava, whose advent, if curbed, ends up burning the lover up. Yearning is an all-consuming fire, no less. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems which talk of yearning -

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Du und ich (instrumental) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2966-du-und-ich-instrumental-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Bringing The Storm Home

Sat, 31 Jul 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Passion as lust is so underrated. It is bequeathed to youth, dismissed as elemental, in passing, as age progresses it is assumed dead on arrival. It's somehow taken as recreational, it is taken as something which is done - and done with. It is taken as an aberration if it floods you, you are a mendicant if you can control it, a vamp if you let it possess you, an offender if it affects every part of your life. So much of passion is denigrated, even as we fall in lust before falling in love, even as we give in to it's call and it embellishes our commitment to the other, in untamed and undisguised ways. Love would be lesser for it. It's unpredictability is its source of raw charm. And when we let it lead us into its dark caverns, we find life's curtains drawn out to the end, and the sun streaming in, playing with the sheets where you lie, playfully asking - now once more, with the sun on us? If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems tenderly talking of the pleasures of love and love-making:

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Inspiring Teaser by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5672-inspiring-teaser-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Rise Of The Heroes by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/513-rise-of-the-heroes
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Uncut Poetry Salon featuring the Award-Winning African-American Poet Katerina Canyon!

Sat, 24 Jul 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Welcome to the Salon edition of Uncut Poetry. In the Salon edition, we will feature interviews of cutting-edge poets, readings of my favorite poetry, reviews of poetry books which I have fallen in love with, and pretty much everything related to poetry. Every month, once a week! In the inaugural episode, we feature the African-American poet Katerina Canyon. Katerina Canyon is an Award Winning Poet, Best Selling Author, Civil Rights Activist, and Essayist. She grew up in Los Angeles and much of her writing reflects that experience. Her first book of poetry, Changing the Lines, was released in August 2017. This book is a conversation between mother and daughter as they examine what it means to operate within the world as black women. Katerina Canyon is a 2020 and 2019 Pushcart Prize Nominee. Her stories have been published in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, and Folks. Her poetry has been published in CatheXis Northwest, The Esthetic Apostle, Into the Void, Black Napkin, and Waxing & Waning. From 2000 to 2003, she served as the Poet Laureate of Sunland-Tujunga. During that time, she started a poetry festival and ran several poetry readings. She currently lives in Seattle. She was featured in the Los Angeles Times and was awarded the Montesi Award from Saint Louis University in 2011, 2012, and 2013. She has published multiple chapbooks and an album. Katerina Canyon will be releasing her new poetry book Surviving Home in December 2021. Surviving Home is a reflection on African American heritage and up-bringing, racism, and abuse. It is a tender and heartbreaking exploration of growing up, observing, living through hell and coming out stronger. To learn more or to read an excerpt from the book, go to https://bookpublicityservices.com/surviving-home-katerina-canyon/ Readers can connect with Katerina on Instagram, Twitter, Goodreads, and Facebook. To learn more, go to https://www.poetickat.com/ Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. Uncut Poetry has started a new Podcast called Red River Sessions (on Spotify, iTunes, Pocket Casts, etc), where we will talk to published poets, about their poetry, their craft and what haunts them. It is brought to you by Red River, which is the premier independent publisher of poetry books, and Uncut Poetry. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Epic Emotional Positive by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7510-epic-emotional-positive
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Zum Kampf Bereit (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/4659-zum-kampf-bereit-romeos-erbe-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Abschied (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3148-abschied-romeos-erbe-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Begegnung (Romeos Erbe) by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2971-begegnung-romeos-erbe-
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Heartbreak

Sat, 17 Jul 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"You will seek other beds and alien alleys, and make yourself lonelier with every journey, as you dream of me in the false dawn of other arms, not knowing me as someone with a lonely soul." Every relationship is a journey. Where it starts is in a fuzzy past, but equally amorphous is how it ends. Because endings are never surgical cuts, but a bunch of tassels, each thread a possible way out - or way in. And that's what reality is. Because people change. How we feel changes. What we feel changes. And just like a poem never ends but finds eternity in the heart of its reader, love changes form and finds a cosy nook to reside. It moves to find meaning in life - which might have everything to do with love, but nothing to do with a love affair. And that's how life takes us in its palm - often with someone, often without. But there's always the walking, the movement, the bliss, the ecstasy, and the pain, the anguish, the residue, the remembrance.... It's the cross life bears - and is it's saddest but most sublime benediction. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems tenderly talking of heartbreak:

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Romantic Contemplative Nature by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/8033-romantic-contemplative-nature
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Tea With Naomi Shihab Rye

Sat, 10 Jul 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Naomi Shihab Nye is a Palestinian American poet. Her poetry shimmers with the anguish of a whole battered nation. But it is also full of gratitude, as she notices the smallest of things and urges the reader to find grace in them. For the last two months, every morning I read a poem by her. A single poem. It will probably take me years to finish all her books. But I don't care. Because this daily ritual cleanses me, readies me to face the world, with equanimity and thankfulness. I feel, now she belongs to me. She says - "Let me peer out at the world through your lens. (Maybe I'll shudder, or gasp, or tilt my head in a question.) Let me see how your blue is my turquoise and my orange is your gold. Suddenly binary stars, we have startling gravity. Let's compare scintillation - let's share starlight." She's a bridge, Naomi is. Her words are flowers and never rocks. And her world always urges us to be kind. Because with kindness, comes understanding, comes the stardust to change us, however small the corner of the world we might be staying in. "Only kindness, that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say it is I you have been looking for - and then goes with you everywhere like a shadow or a friend." If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating grace:

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Mystery Of Dandela by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2979-mystery-of-dandela
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Sehnsucht by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/2922-sehnsucht
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Mother's Rambling Lessons on Life Imparted in Morning Walks in my Childhood

Sat, 03 Jul 2021 20:00:00 +0500

My mother, like so many other mothers, is a treasure house of tales. But with a twist - she is the hero of all her stories. More than the classical tales of Mahabharata and Ramayana, more than the O Henry's and Guy de Maupassant's I devoured whilst growing up, her tales were the ones which had the deepest influence. How her resilience won over indignities piled on her in a traditional Indian family, how she turned the tables in favor of a charity she was working with when a government official poured caste slurs on her, how her relentless kindness won over a trouble-loving neighbor. A lot of what I am, I realize, is because of those tales. But here's what started happening as I grew. I thought the tales were narcissistic, as they only talked about the glory of her. For a time, I started to just walk away when she commenced her stories. Till one day, I was telling my son about something I'd done which had won me accolades in office, and in a flash of epiphany I realized what my mum had been doing for years. Our stories of victory or loss, of kindness and redemption, of things which went well, and which didn't, are our character sketches - where we could be either perfect villains or flawed heroes, but where we realize how our learnings are a talisman, and our stories of wounds our one true memorable legacy. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating our mothers:

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sunset Fields by Alexander Nakarada
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7979-sunset-fields
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Extraordinary Life

Sat, 26 Jun 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Even if we don't notice it, our senses never forget the value of the insignificant. Of the sun falling on our feet, of that one teardrop falling on our hand, of that longing which fills our world, of that single remembrance which is enough to destroy everything, before it attempts to build something again. But ever so often, our senses bring these moments into our beings slowly, gently, sadly, when everything around us is collapsing - and we realize that we don't miss the big celebrations or the grand entrances or the splendid sights. What we really crave for are the most ephemeral and trifling of things. Moments reduced to quietness, walks slowed into inner explorations, a touch made to linger, sleep becoming a travel done together. Finding life's significance might be your adventure; but life's meaning is sleeping in the crook of your arm with a serene smile. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating life:

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. Uncut Poetry has started a new Podcast called Red River Sessions (on Spotify, Pocket Casts, etc), where we will talk to published poets, about their poetry, their craft and what haunts them. It is brought to you by Red River, which is the premier independent publisher of poetry books, and Uncut Poetry. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - You and Me Forever by MusicLFiles
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7937-you-and-me-forever
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Tenderness

Sat, 19 Jun 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I fell in love with you

again in the soft foothills of this evening." The ebb and flow of feelings is the subcutaneous world of love. We are an amalgam of expectations, ego and confusion - and love for us is as much about the blood which begins to flow rapidly inside our bodies, as it is about the blood which we give to our relationships. However much we may wax about the selflessness of love, the heart craves for balance. Whilst the first flush of love is about giving, the second flush wants to fill empty spaces inside oneself. And that's when we need recalibration. That's when we need to realize that life or love cannot be a continuous test or a balancing act. Tenderness defines love, not touchiness. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating the grace of love:

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - When The Wind Blows by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/4622-when-the-wind-blows
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Lovers of Broken Mountains

Sat, 12 Jun 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Where do the boundaries of love begin - and end? Who is the arbiter of what's right - and what's wrong? For too long, rules have followed the drumbeats of arbitrary prejudices and preferences, bereft of personal choices. It's a tragedy that after centuries of literature, art and norm, there is still stigma, there is still disapproval, there is still the need for secrecy. As couples gravitate towards their desires and destinies, building defences, building walls, it is incumbent for the world at large to embrace them into normalcy, so they know they are part of the same loving community they have come from, and are not outliers. As Jake Gyllenhaal said about the protagonists in the film Brokeback Mountain - That what ties these two characters together is not just a love, but a loneliness. I think primarily it was deep loneliness - it is about two people desperately looking for love. To be loved. And who were probably capable of it. And they just found it with someone of the same sex. Hopefully it can create an equality of an idea: that it's possible that you can find love anywhere. That intimacy exists in so many places that convention and society won't always allow us to see. And we won't allow ourselves to see, because of what criticism — and danger — it might provoke. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating the Pride Month:

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Die Unendliche Geschichte by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/512-die-unendliche-geschichte
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Of the Moon (and Other Things Which Don't Know They are Beautiful)

Sat, 05 Jun 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"And as I lay on the bed, restless, empty, the moon poured her shimmering beauty, with the largesse of the caring. I knew it was fragile, I knew it was ephemeral, I knew it was ethereal, I knew it wasn't mine to claim, but I lay full fulfilled." One of the things which people often tend to minimize, or just don't realize, is the value of presence. An ageing father might not want a long conversation with his son - he might just want to see him, touch him, smile at him, and then leave. The aura which we bring into a room already speaks of the essence of what we are and what we mean to others. As we search for our meaning in this world, we cannot ever forget that we are also a part of what it means to be alive, to others. However little our desire to be present, grace, generosity and life, all demand that we intertwine our lives with those for whom we matter. Because giving of ourselves is the most unselfish gift we can possibly think of. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating the joy of giving:

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - A Sad Toy Story by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/563-a-sad-toy-story
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Making Love in a Cathedral on a Stormy Day

Sat, 29 May 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"When we knelt in front of Mother Mary, we did not ask for forgiveness - her consent was obvious, and what we did on the benches was a consensual sacrilege, which she seemed to let the mists hide." Lovers search for a place - and the occasion presents itself. In this poem, the fact that the couple make love in an empty cathedral, is a symbol of how love makes lovemaking transcend it's physicality to something meaningful. And when you do something which completes you, you are nearing a spiritual state of being. Too often, pleasure is denigrated as base, a basic instinct, but at its core it is a completion. The tassels in a rug, a painting on an empty wall, one small boat in a restless sea. Too often, only too often, do we say no to life, when what it offers is opportunity and what you deny is fulfilment. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating the indefinable magic of lovemaking:

Find other magical things, like a lovely free chapbook of poems, and other resources here. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup.

Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Epic Intro 2017 by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/558-epic-intro-2017
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Meditations On An Evening

Sat, 22 May 2021 20:00:00 +0500

The words "returning home" carry within them a full universe of meaning and feeling. And when evening falls, and the skies are in ruins, and, something inside us too - just the act of turning back and returning into a place which asks no questions, and folds us into its depthless warmth, is an act of saving ourselves. Who are we if not the unmoored boats let loose every day into the wild ocean of the world? Untethered and unfulfilled, we lose ourselves every day, and hence have to bring ourselves back every night. Home then is shelter, home then is a repair shop, home then is the place where we are loved however bedraggled with life we might be. If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems celebrating the indefinable magic of Evenings:

I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

1000 Lichter by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/3161-1000-lichter
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Call Me By Your Name

Sat, 15 May 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Strangely, I always think of winter as a presence and summer as an interlude. Summer is always a passage, to go from state to another, from one feeling to another, to make mistakes, suffer for them, and never regret them. So much of our lives is a litany of inevitabilities, and truthfully and figuratively, summers are when we let our souls seek truths, and however much the anguish, we look back at that time and have no regrets. Also - In my last episode I had asked you what are the ordinary things you miss most in these trying times. So many of you wrote in. And with such tenderness and nostalgia. Hear what you had to say in this episode! I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other Summer Poems:

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

On Fire by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5147-on-fire
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Vaccine (or Ways to Save Love from Itself)

Sat, 08 May 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Seeking normalcy in these incredibly abnormal times has become a task by itself. We hear the news with dread. We fear the very air we breathe in, we fear phone calls which come too early or too late. We fear those who come back home from outside. The yearning for normalcy is a yearning for the small pleasures of life, the ones we took for granted, didn't pay overt attention to, and now miss the most. I miss meeting my friends the most, seeing laughter in their eyes, sensing the indefinable crinkle in their voices, their embrace as we say goodbye. And I miss visiting places. And I miss eating out. Is the vaccine then the doorway for us to reclaim the life we always took for granted? What do you miss most of the ordinary times? Tell me, write into me at uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com. In the next episode, I will share it with the world. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgi vesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com If you liked this poem, consider listening to the following poems too -

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Hades by Sascha Ende® Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6903-hades License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Carry Love in the Hearse of My Arms

Sat, 01 May 2021 20:00:00 +0500

These are trying times. Tishani Doshi writes "You would have expected the clocks to freeze". In this once-in-a-century tragedy, when grief sits outside our doors, and then comes in without knocking, there's only memory, meditation or living in the moment which can sustain meaning. We all make mistakes. Alas, some mistakes are more expensive than others and get counted in human lives. Beyond the mistake, lies redemption and the cure. But true healing begins when we go beyond the blame, and realize we are also a part of the problem - and have to be a part of the solution. Reaching out is a way to reach the goodness inside us. And kindness, beyond ourselves, is the only poetry which can save others -and save us. Be there for friends who need you. Donate to organizations like Give India on giveindia.org. Be positive. Be active. Be available. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Artemis by Sascha Ende® Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/6934-artemis License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

I Think I Am In Love With You

Sat, 24 Apr 2021 20:00:00 +0500

One of the most revelatory things about any relationship, is how we discover a person, and in the process we reveal to ourselves things we didn't know about ourselves. The limitlessness of our generosity, the craziness of our imagination, the things we are capable of doing. We can be the balming breeze, we can be starlight, we can be the softest evening, we can be the sheltering sky. We marvel at ourselves, we are amazed at the things we can be. And we discover the most significant thing of true love - it's makes us fall in love with ourselves too. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The details of the music used in this episode are as follows -

Lockdown by Sascha Ende®
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/7658-lockdown
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Stories Which Survive

Sat, 17 Apr 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"And we sat in front of an / auburn sky / and talked of found-homes / and lost-loves. / We smiled at our follies & foolishness, / & with a tinge of regret (o yes) wondered / at where life had taken us."/ Is there any ending to any story, ever? Even if something ends, there is residue floating in the universe - or in the universe inside us. Because every experience, every relationship, every happenstance leaves either dust or ash, for our lives to deal with. It could clog every artery of our memory or mix in magical ways with our blood to render us changed. Either way we are rendered different, beyond imagination, beyond redemption.... I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

My Mother's Lines

Sat, 10 Apr 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"I touched a pulsing vein on her hand, & thought of the blood she shared with me: her legacy of pain & meaning, an inevitable gift to me." Our relationship with our parents is invariably fraught with tension and tenderness. We fight, we stop talking, and then, magnetically, without thinking, we gravitate towards each other as if nothing had happened. One of the comforts of this love is that we can take it for granted - until we realize we can't. Things pass - so will they. And we will discover what being left alone truly means. We need to be with them, we need to be the best to them, hopefully be the best of them. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

A Morning Ramble on How Love is Rediscovered at the Bottom of Rubble

Sat, 03 Apr 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"It's a lovely morning, she said, / as she drew out the curtains, / has the whiskey found a way out / or are you still in zombie zone? / It's been a while since we saw the sun rise, / it's been a while since we lingered. / Get up, my lazy disheveled love, / let's find something in this new world." / One of the most reassuring aspects of being in love is its ability to bounce back, to always find reasons to let go and to move on. Persistence is as much love's suspension bar - what props it up - as is the ability to forget and move on. Love could curdle and fall down. But before that, it has to boil, it has to rise, and if caught at the cusp, it will subside and be ready to give of its best. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Kintsugi

Sat, 27 Mar 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"She looked at the broken pieces / of the precious teapot, / a legacy from her ancestors, / from ten generations back. / And she looked at her trembling child, / standing contrite, with her head down, / waiting for an inevitability, / already on the brink of tears." / This poem starts with the idea of kintsugi which is the Japanese art of putting broken pottery pieces back together with gold. It is built on the idea that in embracing flaws and imperfections, we can create an even stronger, more beautiful piece of art. And for most of its length, the poem lingers on how perfection does not have monopoly rights towards beauty. But can everything broken be repaired? There lies the conundrum - it all depends on you. A fallen autumn leaf WILL crumble, but a seed which falls down can - and will - bring forth something sparklingly good. Beyond the fact of an imperfection, is the truth of what we do with that imperfection. We could build with it, around it, on it. Or we could simply sink into it - and dissolve. The choice, like so many things in life, is ours. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The Sublime in the Ordinary

Sat, 20 Mar 2021 20:15:31 +0500

So much of growing up is already burnt ground. Parents are didactic and seem more of a necessary evil, the body is unruly and doesn't listen, boys don't know what to do with their large hands, and whether they should keep or cut their soft moustaches, girls are embarrassed by the uncontrollable changes in their body, and then there are boyfriend problems and the fact that someone has an active sex life and you have none. Growing up then seems less a hope-filled vision and more of a car pile. Nothing ever seems to go right. In this scenario, to have one's head set steady and to figure out what is right, in all the wrong one keeps blundering into, is what sets the template for the rest of one's life. I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book is 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost'. Both are available on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Fallen Flowers

Sat, 13 Mar 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Some of the most enduring love stories are often the shortest. You meet. You part. There are a million reasons why.

But what these relationships leave behind are often impressions which are burnt into our beings. The awkward habit, the shameless bravado, the ribald sense of utter corniness - the unflinching freedom she accorded you just by her presence.

As times go by, and we accumulate relationships like trophies or seek people as refuges, these transient lovers are the ones who, in spite of their absence, have already given life its meaning, who make sure that whatever else might happen, or not happen, in life hereinafter, there's worth they've given which will never get lost.

I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based out of India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Broken Ribs as A Barometer of Love

Sat, 06 Mar 2021 20:00:00 +0500

"Here we are, individuals, / codified with an oath, / learning to be together and to / break free, at the same time, / but, generally, permanently / pissed-off."

Love comes in so many different forms. So many shapes and sizes. Symptoms of love are subtle, varied. They are often, in look and feel, just the opposite of what they actually mean. That's why love demands time, space, observance. It is often couched in hugs and kisses, and often in anger and aloofness. Sometimes it is unrecognizable, because it looks like clinginess, jealousy, even encroachment. You demand - I want space, leave me alone. When all that love is really asking for is comfort, clarity, coffee together. I am Sunil Bhandari.

Get the podcast, a lovely free book of poems and other resources here .

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Chemo: As I Battle Myself

Sat, 27 Feb 2021 20:00:00 +0500

It's startling to think how much of our life hangs on the incredibly thin thread of our breath. When illness strikes us, and there are battles to be fought, every bit of our resources - in our body, spirit, soul - fights and loses, fights and loses again. Often, a treatment like chemotherapy is itself a battle. As our skin gets parched, our hair starts to fall, as we bruise and bleed and vomit, it is easy to give up. Till we look into the eyes of someone we love, and we see the despair there, we realize that our lives are never only ours. Every breath is a benediction and our lives are also a gift to those who love us. I am Sunil Bhandari.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

I Don't Think Poetry Will Save Us. And Yet, and Yet...

Sat, 20 Feb 2021 20:00:00 +0500

I don't think poetry will save us. And yet, and yet... * * Quote from Sarah Kay's letter in Airplane Poetry Movement's "A Letter A Poem A Home" Why poetry? Publishers don't like it, people don't buy it, poets earn virtually nothing out if it. I can't day it better than what the amazing redoubtable poet Arundhathi Subramaniam said about "Why poetry?" "Because it is the art of the murmured voice. If it raises its pitch, it distorts its own reality, compromises its own integrity. It is a reminder of the magic of the whisper, the sorcery of the hushed voice. Because it disrupts all those snug oppositions I otherwise live by: day and night, precision and passion, mystery and illumination, work and play, truth and beauty. Poetry is about allowing lunar concerns into my day. About bringing question marks rather than full stops into my life. Because it reminds me that ideas are crunchy and things smoky. That there are passions of the mind and ideologies of the gut. Because of its suddenness, its distillation, its toxic shock clarity, its verbal single maltness. Because words don’t come easy. And when they do, they’re meant to be watched — not censoriously, with faith but also with caution. That’s because we don’t just use language, we’re used by it. " (Read Arundhathi Subramaniam's essay in full here.) I am Sunil Bhandari.

I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

How to Hold Love as it Breaks

Sat, 13 Feb 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Showing grace under pressure is love's ultimate testing ground and testament. There is nothing which shows intent, persistence and faith more than looking beyond the skirmish and the heartburn. You don't have to be deep in love or in a relationship before realizing that the real engine which drives it is generosity. Once we recognize that, it doesn't take time to realize that generosity is also what gives life its meaning. There remains very little difference then between love and the love for life. Today's poem is speaks of this. I am Sunil Bhandari.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

An Epitaph Made of Light & Air

Sat, 06 Feb 2021 20:00:00 +0500

An Epitaph Made of Light & Air I want to drift out of this world. Maybe a Cohen playlist in the background, or even better, someone reciting my favourite Mary Olivers. Let there not be pain, I pray, and let there be a sense of reconciliation, of everything being the way it was meant to be, to everything being left the way it was meant to be. Someone would crack a joke that I was always fond of the unfamiliar and this, my final foray into a mystery. And I would wonder what it would be like to carry my consciousness wherever I was meant to be, if only to embrace old friends who might be waiting knowingly for me. I would wonder if the words I leave behind would still ring true after me, and there would be someone who would continue loving me, and think - I know that poem was for me. Do put the cloth of my last journey in an empty room, in the sun's trajectory, let there be plenty of light and air, so those who understand would say what a wondrous poem to leave with. ~ Sunil Bhandari I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon. Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Sipping Tea in a Rumi Morning

Sat, 30 Jan 2021 21:23:13 +0500

I have so often sat down to write poetry, and all that I actually wanted to do was to sit quietly and do nothing. Sipping tea, getting into my routine, crossing a street, looking out of a window, untangling a small problem, pointing out something beautiful to a loved one.....as I sat on the edge of an evening, and watched a bird delirious in its abandonment and random flight, I knew - even an unwritten moment could be a poem. And our life is full of poetry, if only we open ourselves to it. This is Uncut Poetry's 50th episode. I've been with you every week with a new poem. And it's been a journey of discovery as much for me as it has been, I hope, for you. Thank you for trusting me, and returning to Uncut Poetry, week after week..... I want to give you a gift, absolutely free, a beautifully designed chapbook of some my poetry. Just because you have been with me. Do go to the link below for this - https://linktr.ee/UncutPoetry There's so much still to discover.

I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The Ageing of Love

Sat, 23 Jan 2021 20:00:00 +0500

Years go by in relationships, and sometimes we feel that this is the nook where we fit in perfectly, and then suddenly we are left bereft of an anchor to latch onto or a bank to rest our boat against. Why is there never unalloyed comfort even in a relationship of many years? Maybe that is the way the universe ensures we don't take anything for granted. Maybe that is the way we get to know that love with a little tension attached to it ensures longevity rather than the lugubrious version of love which takes itself for granted, and then finds itself alone. Lovers, the next episode will be my 50th in Uncut Poetry. I would like to thank you for being such an integral part of this journey. I am here because you are here. And I want to give a part of my heart as a gift. Write to me at uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com. I have a chap book of poems which I would like to send to you. For being with me, for being such a valuable part of my journey. Thank you. I am Sunil Bhandari.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

When We Were One With The Stars

Sat, 16 Jan 2021 20:44:28 +0500

"Heaven is above and I know where I am, At the corner of the interstate, I couldn't let you go, I could not let go yet." I have just collaborated with Alma Roxx in their new single "Interstate (when we were one with the stars)". My poem is embedded into this song. Alma Roxx is the brainchild of Oregon based producer/songwriter Renny Currin. Often times a genre bending sound, Roxx delivers infectious melodies married with sensitive lyrics. Ryan Minor states in his Bottle Conjuror music blog that Alma Roxx's sound is "as if Simon and Garfunkel, Animal Collective, Beck, Mac Demarco and Stephen Malkmus decided to do a collaboration with Thom Yorke acting as producer and beat maker." Alma Roxx calls their sound as something which is in the intersection of psychedelic pop and sheer chill. It makes for a compelling listen. This song - and my poetry in it - deals with death, remembrance, waiting and reconciliations. The lyrics, the music and the poetry seamlessly and tenderly explore loss. As Gabby (@oddgeezerfineart) says - "this tune will hit you like a sack of bricks, pick you up, dust you off and drive you forward." Catch the full song at the following links - https://almaroxx.bandcamp.com/track/interstate-when-we-were-one-with-the-stars-feat-sunil-bhandari or https://open.spotify.com/track/3rV5c5hlYBNxNqxcpM4cjv?si=viI8v3h9Qz2Z4aIXF8YK7Q I am Sunil Bhandari.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

A Love Poem to an Office

Sat, 09 Jan 2021 21:10:44 +0500

People who don't know me are surprised that I don't sleep with a blanket of moonlight and a pillow full of stars. But I have a day-life and it's in an office. And it's a place which has consumed a large part of my life - and, alas, is rarely acknowledged by me in my poetry. Even though it has given me a livelihood and a distinct place in the world. So I decided to make amends. Today's poem is a love song to my office. I am Sunil Bhandari.

Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Rediscovering the Flawed Beauty of Love

Sat, 02 Jan 2021 20:00:00 +0500

One of the abiding tragedies of love is the lack of breathing space between lovers. The freedom they experienced, and which brought them together to begin with, suddenly switches into ownership and expectations which can never ever match with what is ordinarily possible. People, more often than not, don't drift apart, they merely suck the oxygen from around the very person they fell in love with, because she was free.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.

Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Let Them Bring Any Year

Sat, 26 Dec 2020 20:08:51 +0500

"She knows love, / because love was an answer / sheared of every question / unburdened with doubt, / unremarkable as fact." As we come to the close of an extraordinary year, and wait for its end, we hope there would finally be a pause to the disruption of lives, families, places, things, routines. But when has the drama of life ever ended? And as someone I love dearly struggles, I turn again and again to poetry. In reading it, in writing it, to seek forbearance, to resolve reasons, to look back with fondness, to look forward for grace.....

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

My Little Zen Warrior

Sat, 19 Dec 2020 20:00:00 +0500

"Once, on Sundays, as I read the papers, I saw a sunbeam make its way to her, and her hair was suddenly aflame like a fuzzy halo, as she lay on the carpet, her face cupped in her palms, lost in the world of wizards - and the sun helplessly putting the spotlight on her, for the universe to gaze at her, and no one else." In Pema Chadron's exquisite and heartfull book "When Things Fall Apart" she says - "You are the sky. Everything else – it’s just the weather." This poem is about how children are natural zen individuals and how the universe recognizes them for what they are.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Kripa (a blessing from a daughter)

Sat, 12 Dec 2020 20:00:00 +0500

"I sit on the edge of the evening, as I allow you to find your way: the sea is low and I want you to know what it is to tread the skies."

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Indian Summers

Sat, 05 Dec 2020 20:00:00 +0500

Summer, of all seasons, is the one which brings us human beings into our most elemental state - frank, often ugly, always true. We indulge and never regret; we forgive and we mean it. We know that what happens to us, is what we do onto others. And in that strange steaming symbiosis lies the powerlessness of our appetites - we are what the air makes us - not good or bad - just stripped of everything, naked, true - and for once not ashamed, and for once refusing to be shamed. Summer is a body's sigh of being, as it realizes how everything is so fleeting.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Seasons as Consultations to Life

Sat, 28 Nov 2020 20:39:17 +0500

I am amazed how we pass our lives through the magnificence of seasons, and how we change with them, as if they were our partners on a road to nowhere, somewhere.. . Summer, winter, autumn, all come and go, as witnesses to our peculiarities, our small concerns, our happinesses which seem as tenous as sundrops , as also our sadnesses which seem to fill the universe... But we just need to be open to their messages, to their careful power and their sensitive tellings - and we will see them as pointers to life, as instructions to find our way, as friends who will not speak but will tell us everything..... We merely need to be aware, we merely need to be present. Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

The Girl Who Could Lose Everything For Hope

Sat, 21 Nov 2020 22:24:25 +0500

Hope is a strange beast. It is sometimes the only false note in our lives, and paradoxically - or because of that - is also the slender thread which keeps us alive to possibilities of life. Little things take on meaning - little actions, little thoughts - nothing seems untoward or wasted. Those who are too hopeful, are called foolish, sometimes foolish optimists. But when something is a lifeline and gives meaning, how can that be bad. Being foolish is a choice so many are willing to make simply because it gives an extra color to the dawn, removes the color of pain from an iridescent evening, gives something to look forward to in life when everything is gray and impenetrable and unreachable. Hope is that dream which one can tangibly feel, like the bird which flies by but drops a broken feather in your hands - the bird might go away, but it does leave behind beauty, and something to hold onto.... Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Love (then) Is Also Patience

Sun, 15 Nov 2020 13:01:20 +0500

There are two facts. One. Life is full of the unexpected. Two. It is long. These two facts are often forgotten when a couple mulls its differences. One of the abiding tragedies of relationships is when couples don't give each other's differences the space and time they deserve. But sharp edges find their corners smoothened with time; habits which were irritating become funny in nostalgia; wars become battles become skirmishes become peace summits with resolutions and amity. Two people brought together, irrespective of whether they knew each other for years or not at all, will always start with finding their personal space being impinged upon time and again. Decisions which were individual now need discussion and mutual consent. The air in the room is shared. And it's not always comfortable. But one day, years later, on a day of deep depression, you suddenly receive the warmest embrace possible; in a happy moment alone, you find you are missing her. She becomes more than a habit. She becomes a part of your being. And that and that and that often takes time... Love then is also patience.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

How She Knew (that he was unfaithful)

Sat, 07 Nov 2020 20:00:00 +0500

"Why do we cheat? And why do happy people cheat? And when we say "infidelity," what exactly do we mean? Is it a hookup, a love story, paid sex, a chat room, a massage with a happy ending? Why do we think that men cheat out of boredom and fear of intimacy, but women cheat out of loneliness and hunger for intimacy? And is an affair always the end of a relationship? "But as perpetrators have often said - it isn't always our partner that we are turning away from, but the person that we have ourselves become. And it isn't so much that we're looking for another person, as much as we are looking for another self. "As Marcel Proust said, it's our imagination that is responsible for love, not the other person." The healing, the renewal, begins there. The above commentary is an extract from Esther Perel's stunning TED talk.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

In Which He Cries. And She Clears The Skies.

Sat, 31 Oct 2020 20:00:00 +0500

Coupledom is a nation by itself, with its own laws, thermodynamics and compulsions of chemistry.

At every moment of a couple's existence, the dynamics with each other swing and change - and if each of them are sensitive and aware, they give into the necessity to be the one who leads at one point and be the one who follows in the other.

And if one of them knows the address of scars and the other knows how to clear the skies, it's then a couple made in heaven....

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

Perils of Breakup Sex (or Why I Can't Keep My Legs Closed for You)

Sat, 24 Oct 2020 20:00:00 +0500

Louise Gluck, the 2020 Nobel Prize winner, wrote a poem called 'The Encounter' - You came to the side of the bed and sat staring at me. Then you kissed me-I felt hot wax on my forehead. I wanted it to leave a mark: that’s how I knew I loved you. Because I wanted to be burned, stamped, to have something in the end... My poem today follows the end which Louise Gluck talked about.

She's a Fierce One, My One

Sat, 17 Oct 2020 21:14:08 +0500

When we are loved and cared for, we should be ready to fight, being fought for or being fought with. Often, our definition of what is right and wrong has to be put away, and we have to battle for what's ours and what's right. And if we are injured, as the one for whom the battle took place, or because we were on the other side, we must then know that some battles which are fought with us are often the ones which would also save us.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

I Should Have Loved More Wisely (They Say)

Sat, 10 Oct 2020 23:38:36 +0500

Happiness is found in extraordinary places.

The two who don't seem to ever match with each other, become the matchless couple. And The ones who tick every box, are the ones who find different paths and partners.

The alchemy of relationships is only a small-part nature and a large-part mystery.

But what is irrefutable to what lasts long - is the trouble each partner takes to figure out what hurts and what brings love.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

That Gorgeous Evening When You Left

Sat, 03 Oct 2020 22:52:15 +0500

Relationships always have departures. Temporary, permanent, simple, or heart-breaking.

Inherent in such partings is the inevitability of our heart's decisions. Sometimes it hurts - but there is a good which lies just beyond the realm of hurt.

And in that realm, a person departs, but love doesn't.

The gorgeous music in this episode is by Sayan Mukerji.

Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari.

I Surrender To That Feeling Again

Sat, 26 Sep 2020 22:15:05 +0500

Surrender is a strange word. It first and foremost denotes defeat. But couched in its shame are also intimations of survival, a love of life over demise, of abiding hope.

But, ironically, in love, surrender is the first prerequisite - it is love's entry point, the only way to live it's tumult, and survive it's caprice.

How Mothers are Nature's Return Gifts

Sat, 19 Sep 2020 21:13:39 +0500

The changing dynamic of relationship with our parents, in every age, actually defines who we are, & how we are changing. Often we get to know them as the ones we cannot take for granted, very late in our lives. We learn that the only constant in the changing seasons of our moods and age, is their forbearance, their non-judgmental acceptance. When the world outside & inside us is collapsing, they become our final and only refuge.

In The Nook (Special Episode)

Sat, 12 Sep 2020 21:15:03 +0500

We have a delightful little conversation with poet Riya Roy.

She has just launched a scintillating newsletter "the nook", which is choc-o-bloc with nuggets of wisdom, art, poetry and literary surprises of all kinds. We talk to Riya about her journey - and end with an amazing heartfelt poem by her.

"the nook" can be subscribed at "tinyletter.com/thenook".

Daughters Who Don't Listen (& Other Ways To Be Brave)

Sun, 06 Sep 2020 09:27:56 +0500

Khalil Gibran famously said "Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself… You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow…” So be there in the shadows of the lives of your children, as they find their way. Let them find their own ways to love, and be hurt....as long as they know you are there, a touch away, a call away, a look away.

Not Making Love; Only Being In Love

Sat, 29 Aug 2020 20:12:08 +0500

So much of what we are, is defined by who we are with. And that truth is germane to what gives us happiness.

Society, norms, mores ignore that basic need which makes us complete. They concentrate on gender, forgetting that love neither knows borders nor restricts itself within boundaries. The first liberation, the first freedom starts with that realization, that acceptance.

Love's Night of The Long Knives

Sat, 22 Aug 2020 23:38:27 +0500

Relations are discoveries, found after arduous journeys. Intrinsically, everything about love changes in time - the nature of love, the definition of love, the lovers themselves. Is it for good or bad? That can never be the question. Did you last the upheavals to reach the calm? That is the question.

On Breaking Up (Without Breaking)

Sat, 15 Aug 2020 19:44:35 +0500

"My capricious love of many moons, I wish I could meet you again - there's so much of you I have inside me, but out of so little of you."

We Looked Out Into the Fading Day

Sat, 08 Aug 2020 20:29:09 +0500

Clouds roll into every couple's life. Everything gets hidden - the planets, the shooting stars - nearer home, even fireflies go unseen. The worst is when love's clear skies get hidden. Love goes blind, it flounders. The importance is, of course, not in the clouds - because pain will come, scars will happen. The question always is - what overwhelms and what prevails.

Lovers In The Morning

Sat, 01 Aug 2020 20:17:46 +0500

And today, I introduce you to two lovers who finally get to disengage from each other's limbs and beings, and come out to seek some coffee and fresh air. Their smiles are soft, their skin glows.

And all I can do is to sit on the side, a grizzled veteran of many stories, and watch them with a peculiar sense of knowing and pleasure.....

How To Make Love To A Haibun!

Sat, 25 Jul 2020 22:10:23 +0500

Paresh Tiwari, Writer & Illustrator and Maestro of Haiku & Haibun, leads us into the minimalist, sparse, meditative and beautiful world of Haiku and Haibun.

Like the deep woods, it is a world full of mystery, seduction and contemplation.

Once there, you will not want to come out....

Love (After The Stories Are Told)

Sat, 18 Jul 2020 21:57:36 +0500

So much happens in our minds! Often, the adventures in our heads are more exciting than the ones happening in our real lives. But when our imaginings take precedence in our relationships over reality, and we conjure the worst, the die is cast for dire consequences.

Love can survive the worst, because intrinsically it is forgiving - but how can it contest the power of imagination? When what you imagine is worse than what happens, isn't the battle already lost?

One Summer

Sat, 11 Jul 2020 21:12:57 +0500

Growing up is a time of luxurious waste. And in that indolence often lies the true meaning of living in the moment. It's only in looking back that we realize how precious that time was, & how much of us has been built in the heat & the sweat & the coolness of that time. We are, in later life, what life gave us in those heady days - when nothing often meant everything.

Tea-a-Tete with Mum & Dad

Sat, 04 Jul 2020 20:37:09 +0500

So much of me is my parents. My love for poetry is from my mother. My practical life is from my father. And as I have conversations with them, I realize both of them are actually universe's first and the most beautiful poems gifted to me. No wonder, poetry is life. And today I have two poems, one each for the two who mean the most to me. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Childhood by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/childhood Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Distances: Kaifi Azmi Ke Liye

Sat, 27 Jun 2020 20:49:48 +0500

The gorgeous poetry in the song 'Main yeh sochkar' by Kaifi Azmi from the film Haqeeqat, has heartbreak written into its very fibre. The finality of endings is often unavoidable, often known, but never ever easy. Love's tenure is a story of irony wrapped in an unhealed scar which neither heals, nor desires healing.

Fear In A Prayer's Home

Sat, 20 Jun 2020 21:49:20 +0500

We are so quick to judge violence as communal, religion as bigoted, and protest as biased. But do we realize the person we threw our abuses at is also a person who trudges back to a home, tired, bloodied, pilloried. That this man does believe in the power of a prayer. And when he runs down the street with fire in his hand and screaming God's name, he is merely invoking the name to protect himself from himself.

Map My Body, Lover

Sat, 13 Jun 2020 22:42:52 +0500

What is love, or love-making, worth, if it's not mischievous? It's high is a question of physics and biology, but for it to be life sustaining, it requires playfulness, good old conversation, a lot of giving and a lot of taking. It's one of those strange things where you burn and then come out more alive.

In Concert

Sat, 06 Jun 2020 22:39:19 +0500

They say everyone is happy in similar ways, but pain catches everybody differently. Even when it is shared, pain is a burden which has to be borne alone.

But pain is also a doorway to compassion, to understanding, to appreciation. And life telescopes through pain, into its most elemental. We are truth, we are awake... even as things fade away.

Her Grace Without Notice

Sat, 30 May 2020 23:33:13 +0500

So much of our mental space is spent in recrimination of those who deserve nothing less than our deepest gratitude, and for what? Small hurts, a word we didn't like, a gesture which didn't suit us? But happily, we all have in our lives people who forget quickly and forgive generously. Their grace is what quietly gives our lives its rich textures. Can we be that person?

A Tragedy with Two Faces

Sun, 24 May 2020 00:45:06 +0500

Tragedy hits everybody. But it hits some at a livelihood level, others at a heartache level. We can sneer at rich - but we are in this world with our own destinies. To feel guilty about our luck is to deny the very things which give life its beauty. But when two worlds meet, grace appears in mysterious ways. (And welcome Tanuja!)

I Can Be Your Poem

Sun, 17 May 2020 08:29:10 +0500

So much of love is all about being in the moment. The length, paradoxically, is of little consequence. A lifetime together might have just a few memorable moments, but just a few moments might have a whole lifetime embedded in them. That's the joy, pain, and gorgeousness of this unhealed scar called love...

Departures

Sun, 10 May 2020 08:06:25 +0500

The relationship of a father and daughter is one of the closest bonds, almost akin to homespun spirituality. For a father, a daughter is someone so valuable, that battles could be fought for her with the whole world. But like all realizations, children often discover the indispensable nature of their parents just when the universe makes them realize how dispensable each life is.

Yes..

Sun, 03 May 2020 06:53:24 +0500

What is life without risk? What is life's worth if we haven't jumped into the dark not knowing anything more than that there is an invisible grace of something infinite out there which will protect us?

In the brave response to these fears lies the most beautiful offering of life we can ever hope to either give or get....

Rediscovering Heaven

Sun, 26 Apr 2020 07:17:33 +0500

So much of our life is spent in longing. But, often, we don't even know what we are pining for, there's just that feeling of emptiness, of standing at the edge of something unfulfilled.

Is it because we forget sometimes that all the important things are either beside us or inside us?

Coffee, You & Me

Sun, 19 Apr 2020 00:17:09 +0500

Don't we sometimes feel that we can talk with strangers more freely than we can with those closest to us? Is it because there's a strange sense of freedom with a stranger, because we know the person in front of us is not prejudging us. In those few moments of liberation, when we are free, not being appraised, we soar. We are our best selves.

Calcutta - A Lover's Epitaph

Sun, 12 Apr 2020 07:09:35 +0500

Our relationship with the city we have grown up in or know intimately is nothing less than a love affair. It is capable of bringing us ecstasy and disappointments just the way a lover can.

Calcutta for me is that loved one.

The Importance of Faith in Love

Sun, 05 Apr 2020 07:16:56 +0500

The tragedy which follows the tragedy of a broken heart is the subsequent denial of love, a rejection. The fear of again getting hurt is so overwhelming that the one who is scorned builds insurmountable walls around one's being. Nothing can get through. Until something does. The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Sleepers by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/der kristall the glade Licence: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

Missing My Old Chaos

Sat, 28 Mar 2020 22:14:42 +0500

In these chaotic and uncertain times, there is so much of recalibration which is taking place, even as we grapple with new realities. This incarceration has its terrible downsides, but for a person who loves to read and write , it's godsend. But it is not easy to delink an old life so easily. And the daily routine which we abhorred, suddenly looks warm and fuzzy through the lens of nostalgia.

On Social Distancing (& Other Ways to Come Close)

Sat, 21 Mar 2020 20:24:07 +0500

We are living in extraordinary times, when everything we know as normal is being pulled asunder. We need to desperately step back and relook at our lives with new eyes. And we have to discover how much we have lost to come so far. Is this grim time then the time to rediscover the pleasures of those pristine times?

A City Made of Our Sighs

Sun, 15 Mar 2020 19:15:45 +0500

Cities and love stories are so intimately intertwined that often the city becomes a character in the tale. With time, memory slips into wistfulness because every place the lovers had spent time in has a story attached to it. A journey through the city becomes a haj of love. The city becomes a map of unending unrequited love.

I love you

Sun, 08 Mar 2020 20:28:27 +0500

Which love story isn't tumultuous? And if it is a story which spans decades, the years of togetherness have necessarily to also be years of disagreements. But the will to ride over it all, irrespective, is a sign of incredible commitment.

When life ebbs, and what remains in the last moments are memories, it's always a 'feeling' which overrides all 'facts'.

The Immensity of Our Tiny Selves

Mon, 24 Feb 2020 00:39:32 +0500

This poem is about a friend who'd lost her mother - and then her father- in quick succession. And I asked her about what the loss meant. And she could only remember the smallest things of them which suddenly had the biggest meanings. And this is what love does - it makes us notice the smallest of quirks, which makes our loved one what she is. Alas, sometimes, after they are no more.

Introduction to Uncut Poetry

Sun, 23 Feb 2020 14:40:02 +0500

'Uncut Poetry' is a podcast featuring the poetry of Sunil Bhandari, a poet from Calcutta, India.

Sunil says "For me, poetry is a compulsion. It's the way I discover the world inside myself, sort out issues, and come to resolutions. In the very minutiae of my poems, lie the biggest answers of my life."

'Uncut Poetry' hopes its poetry will be the start of a conversation the listener will have with herself.