Thus Poem by PRATHAP KAMATH

The alarm is set to go at 5 in the dawn.
When it bangs like a monster
shivering with rage the first thought
in the oppressed sleep is about the sun
who is hiding like a kleptomaniac behind the curtains.
I wish I had eatenimup with my dinner;
I wish he had gone down the drains
during the morning meditations in the loo.

The tooth brush is an uneven broom,
reminds me of Hitler’s mustache
my grandfather too had shared as fashion
of the 30s when he was in his 30s. Well,
that is colonial hangover, I think as
I jump into a half bucket of water (supply
is cut due to a broken pipe unfound)
to say my grandad aped Fuhrer.
In the bus to office I will grope
for an Indian model, at least an Asian one,
with a mustache that parted like Red Sea
or a worn out toothbrush.

Life is beautiful. Life is as rocking as you can rock it.
I want to write poetry and I will
on the walls of the wind that beats my face
as I stand jammed amidst scores
of stinking wet underarms clinging
to the iron bar of the city bus craving to reach.
To reach.
A fast dying long day awaits each one of us
whose bodies pass on vibes
of indefinite frequencies in the dancing bus of reality.

Each second melts like ice.
Each second clots like blood.
When the fire in the stomach is stoked
by the noon breeze the earth waltzes in dream.
Eyes encounter a vast desert of repetitions.

At night when setting the timepiece to alarm
the only thought that runs like a deer
is of a Indian who wore his mustache like Hitler
and visited my ancestor in his loo musings.