Ashtray

Google Image

 

Our lips acted like

bolted gates

that would never

let the words

‘stop puffing like an engine, Baba’,

out.

My father’s luxury floated

in smoke rings.

Moradabadi* brass ashtray

would fill up.

He would chain smoke

the opponents of Indian cricket team

into pavilion.

Yet he would never sin

with any glowing tip

when Gavaskar, Tendulkar or Sourav

was batting.

The ashtray still remains.

 

*Moradabad is an Indian city famous for brass handicraft industry

Posted for Susan’s Midweek Motif ~ Smoking Tobacco @ Poets United

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Gift

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I open the wrap

of dawn’s matins slowly

breathing a soft prayer

to the unseen sender

every day.

I open with my trembling hands

the darkest envelop

to find stars inside.

I thank the unknown sender softly

every night.

 

 

 

 

Posted for dVerse Poetics ~ Wrap it in Ribbons Please! Hosted by Lilian

Food

 

source

When you feel that unpleasant emptiness

In your stomach

Take a food item

Need not be your favorite one

Watch it closely

Aren’t you amazed?

Don’t you feel the pull

Towards

Its physique

Color

Aroma

And ultimately

Towards its taste?

They do melt on the tongue

Oozing happiness

The taste buds, teeth, cells

Are nothing short of miracles

Are they not?

To some

Food is a marvel

Their eyes glued to the twinkling breadcrumbs

Strewn upon the sky

So distant and unreachable

They frantically search for those

In trash cans, dust, dreams……

To some

Food is a nightmare

For they want to shrink

Beyond recognition

A size-0 ethereal fashionista

They desire to morph into

Subsisting on crash diet

Some

Are food-stuff themselves

Cannon-fodders

They are born as ingredients

To be cooked by the Statesmen of their lands

And served on battlefields

Of foreign shores

 

This poem is an old one, written last year for a prompt now Posting for Poetry Pantry