rhyming love and anti-bigotry scribble

Peace Dove art by Picasso

rhyming love and anti-bigotry scribble …

We lie on a bed, stung by many an intolerant thorn,

our love dismissed with bigoted scorn,

rattling the foundations of every societal norm.

We scaled the hateful walls of divisiveness,

we banished the boundaries of race,

of gender,
class,
tribalism,
ageism,

of religion and of creed,

we have walked hand in hand, upright and never cowering,

refusing to feed the beast of sectarianism,

of communalism.

We have refused to feed the weeds of hate,

we have ripped out the roots of fear that keep human beings apart,

we may be only two, our love hardly piercing the putrid flesh of discrimination,

or the smiling facade of accepted segregation.

We know our union is strong,

standing firm, however harsh the storms that batter us,

we have cast off the shackles that bind,

for true love like this, is truly far too rare to find.

Our path ahead may be beset with the bile of holier-than-thou judgment,

with the jabs of barbed words callously spoken,

yet our bond, our tethered connection is firm,

we shall not let hate shatter us, our love shall remain unbroken.

We tighten every strand, to keep our love buffered from the choppy oceans of racist fungal minds, who spew misogyny, blinded by their twisted notions,

while we grow ever closer, sharing the years of our love’s emotions.

So we walk tall, hand in hand, always standing firm,

finding solace in the overwhelming humaneness of the vast majority of our shared human race,

taking heart of the tide that must change,

as bigotry gets swept away,

allowing us all to share a common,

dignified,

free,

prejudice and racist-free world,

as we inch by inch, keep on the fight, to raise the flag of hope,

so we may all bask in its comforting shade,

as it is, at long last,

unfurled …

The Beauty in You

the beauty in you …

My eyes have travelled across oceans, beyond valleys and peaks, across the vast savannah and swirling in murmuring streams,

my eyes have travelled far and wide in many kaleidoscopic dreams,

my eyes have travelled here and there, and through places in between, yet your beauty remains a constant, skipping off the most radiant sunbeams.

I have felt the touch, the wild deluge of the monsoons, drenching me in its cleansing rain,

I have felt the touch, of moonlight cocooning me, a soothing veneer, that has kept me sane,

I have felt the touch, of your body, your lips, your being a healing presence, your unspoken words a melodic refrain.

You come to me in moments alone, when this world seems empty, a chalice brimming with tears,

you come to me in moments dark, your delicate whispers banishing away all my dreadful fears,

you come to me in moments of splintered thoughts, your wondrous self offering shade from the scorching sun that sears.

The beauty in you lends a lifeline to me, dispelling my mute vacuum, raising me from life’s empty hole,

the beauty in you douses the flames of my self-immolating fire, breathing life into me to once more be whole,

the beauty in you is a sublime truth, a truth of love and of belonging, a truth that has firmly taken root, in my once barren soul.

lost echoes of our love

art by banksy

lost echoes of our love …

In the garbage heap of torn dreams,

long doused embers now cold and dead,

lie festering wounds, choked by dread.

Lost echoes,

whip up raw wounds, tearing at the scabs excruciatingly slow,

flayed by dimmed memories of long ago,

twisted, mangled emotions in our garden where flowers no longer grow.

Lost echoes,

creeping along life’s blade,

skewered sunlight condemned to the bleakness of the shade,

leaving a cowering form, torn apart, and afraid.

Lost echoes,

brewed in a chalice of once sprinkled kisses,

simmering on the furnace of burnt out wishes,

separated by deep crevasses, slipping into today’s yawning fissures.

Lost echoes,

now mere incomprehensible trashed thought,

charred, stuttering, a love reduced to absolute nought,

in life’s bazaar, where love is not love, but a commodity to be haggled over and bought.

Lost echoes,

dimming, dragged down bleak alleyways of curdled hate,

blinded by destiny, all hope lost to the tick-tocking clock of fate,

knowing now that it is all much too late.

Lost echoes,

unfeeling, just numb streaming tears,

burdened by the hopeless detritus, of far away splintered fears,

our shells, this life we carry, into the crowd as engulfing flames sears,

while we stumble,

while we fall through the cracks, as agony chuckles and leers,

at the hopelessness of all these days and months of the passing years …

art by banksy

just talking life

just talking life  …

walking through the thicket, nettles stinging our hearts,

ever on the lookout for pathways of promise, yet forever treading the beaten track.

the hands of fickle time, jabbing these bodies, our shells to continue on ahead,

passing myriad alleyways of beckoning promise, a different course to chart alone,

though thorns dig deep, we persist, blindly trudging this dreary old way,

study hard, work harder, get married, have kids, buy a house, pay off the mortgage, babysit the grandchildren, develop illnesses, totter unsteadily on walkers, lay bound to our beds,

the well-travelled alleyways so many stumble through – over and over, and over again,

staying on the narrows, not going against the grain, banishing the murmurs, that whisper in our ears, to take a chance, to veer off the road, to stray down a more twisting thicket,

into an unknown realm, of dangers that may litter this course, of the light of hope that may shine in the dark,

oblivious of dragons that may lie in wait, hugging the shawls of comfort zones, soon to tattered by time and fate, to be left in the open, to brace the elements,

the same howling winds of that other well-trodden way, stung by similar twists and tragedies, tripping and falling, finding love perhaps, another one who has chosen to swim the streams alone,

we may lose our footing, sliding down slippery slopes,

but with a raging fire of hope, burning deep inside, knowing this has been our unique journey, far from the well-worn shoes of that other life,

stepping ever onwards one tiny inch at a time,

beholding beauty not even known,

tasting the sweet nectar of something new,

swimming the seas of uncharted waters,

thrashed by deafening winds,

tossed around by slashing waves,

till in the distance, we spot land,

and as the tides wash us ashore, we drift into fatigued sleep,

awakening to the soft chirping of the birds,

surrounded by swaying palm trees,

the hues of nature so vivid, the feelings in our soul so true,

as we feel talcum sands beneath our feet,

hearing the familiar music of life,

the sounds of the living surrounding us,

as we find this new abode teeming with life,

a world of peace we have at last found,

as we disappear into the sunset of a new day,

with the countless others,

who also chose this other way …