There is another world, and it is in this one. ~ Paul Eluard

In a quite room, by candle light (a hurricane previous night Had knocked out power, water And hundred year old oaks) A mapmaker sits and shuffles His deck of cards: jokers, lovers, Enemies, friends, angels and demons.

The first card he picks, he places Face up on water, a flotilla A drifting continent. Tasmania This devil (she was also his first Muse and lover) gets.

The second, that smiling, stammering Judas, Full of casual betrayals, his master In this regard, finally gets his comeuppance And is sent to Antarctica, where time Is a long night or a long day. For food: dog meat, for drink: hard ice. And clenched on his feet, in a vise like grip, That heavy sledge of memory.

Then come others. Enemies get Amazon where tribes shoot painful poison Darts with blowguns into them. Those who Didn’t return his invitations get Scandinavia Where people usually die of depression and cirrhosis. And those who took advantage of his Friendship, even if they didn’t mean to, Get one of those countries in Africa, Slave labor in a diamond mines, So close to heaven, so many lashes, And so on.

This diabolic game will continue all night. And you curious onlooker, you better Play your own now. Beat it!

Last night’s intruder Has left his fingerprints In the silt.

Look here, these dark striations Of iron. Look here as I carefully Lift these prints

Onto this tattered newspaper Following my sniffing north Pointer.

Interpretation of Gulzar’s ‘Seeli Hawaa’

At a touch of the east wind My body drops its scales Of time. Snow piles at the front door Barricading out winter days.

Held to my chest, in my hands, is The life I have had with you then. Then there was only you, my darling, And now that you are not here, There is still only you.

I wonder by what names Is this city called, this city to which My heart has dragged me to? Without you, Days here burn like wood fire, without you here, Lamps never take their glaring eyes Off these desolate rooms.

How was it then we glibly went About deciding which exit for you, And which for me, on this highway Of dislocation? Miles ago I have Left behind days. Since years I have been ferrying nights.

At a touch of the cold wind My body has dropped its shells. Over the frozen river tonight, Darling, first quarter moon.