Mayflower

A gossamer-thin ocean hits low notes today.

Only the lower ones; the hapless sullen lover,

The nonchalant up above couldn’t care less. 

 

Wind bleats, boat creaks, pet dogs merry-hop

In the sea-wind. Voices rise and fall with the waves.

These shores, they say, have seen the Mayflower.

Countless others have sunk to the bottom,

A slow dissolution of collective merciful being.

People of the first light walked here; These waters 

Are the finest monuments. Revered flotsam of undaunted lives.

Lighthouses, moved and freshly painted, still carry the

Dim fragments of light; strewn from the blue hollow.

The biggest moon of the year's impending, we must head back 

Soon. Quietly, we exchange smiles like vows. 

Sense drowns deep in me or perhaps it’s the nip of the wind.

Like a fool I toss away my shoes and walk 

Barefoot on the beach, soft sand and silken touch and all. 

Anant Dhavale

( Edited significantly from the previous draft.)

Things

Hands warmth hugs kisses
being near being one

journeys long afar brows
the heaviness ajar 

time ripens fast slow
songs jade stale

discordance thought
memory deep trench years

flaps wings the gallop
the heart the stories the 

solitude in-between. 

- Anant Dhavale

( The conjunctions/ prepositions were blocking the flow 

so I got rid of them. This note too was unnecessary, 

but there is too much real estate on the page. )

Kanher

No recompense for the thousand shards of self
What about this smothering cloud
What of the travails of a long journey

Buzzards one and two, high they used to fly. I noticed them
Frequently on my long wind-bitter winter walks
A whimsy with its own color and smell

I did not see them along the decaying heights of New York
None. Drifters, yes, hordes of them, fellows 

Stranded on the artistic bends. Quiet
And turbulent souls on late-night homeward trains

No respite from living, from breathing the continuum
Veins are freed from the weather’s wrath; but storms?

Always always on the way back, a clockwork of the absurd —
The Kanher loses a shade of red each summer with me

This evening could almost kill me and yet.
 

--

Anant Dhavale

(Kanher : Nerium Oleander)

Mayflower

A gossamer thin ocean hits low notes today 

Only the lower ones, the hapless sullen lover

The nonchalant up - above couldn’t care less 

Wind bleats, boat creaks, pet dogs merry-hop in the sea-wind

These shores they say have seen the Mayflower

And yet, several hundred others sunk to the merciful bottom

Going down is hard albeit low effort

People of the first light walked here; waters are the finest monuments

To have seen it all. Flotsam of undaunted lives

Lighthouses, moved and freshly painted still can't shake off 

Dim fragments of light swept in from the depths of turbulent nights

The biggest moon of the year's impending, we must head back 

Soon. Quietly we exchange smiles like vows. 

Sense drowns deep in me or perhaps it’s the nip of the wind

Like a fool I toss away my shoes and walk 

Barefoot on the beach, soft sand and silken touch and all. 

.Anant

Notional Pie

a kiss

missed

is akin to 

the notional pie

you would want to

but couldn't

consume.

-Anant

Mir's Poems

back then

when we were 

obsessed with 

poems of Mir

a cloud of melancholy

would shroud 

us in

the sadness, inexplicable

yet beautiful in

some bygone way

and how we sat through the

hours

and how the hours 

lingered for us

with us

much like they did in

Mir's poems.

-Anant

quest

another quest

another day

a loner path

waives away

history drools

by awkward shrubs

huddled together, in

the desert's way

-Anant