Outpost for Amy

Outpost for Amy

Those Tibetan prayer flags hung like colour laundry

Talk to spirits

and spread the blessings of Buddha

On the breeze

And down the wind swept cleavage of rocks and stones

Longing for the green far below-

Those stone mounds of the Tibetans

Are not graves, just markers for the spirits to follow-

Soaked in prayers

Like the flags

There is nothing to keep

They whisper-

Only memories and respect

And maybe-

Understanding.

II

Can we tell when we are straying

Far away from our moorings?

Can we feel the flutter of impending doom?

It's a hair on the back of the neck rising warning

A not another step command

No more pulling-

Or the bag will tear-

Everyone else hears it but not the doomed

It's not in the plan

But when the Amy Winehouse moment of no return

Comes

It comes at the end of time building for seven years.

The past tense came upon Amy like thugs in the dark

Threw its rough heavy blanket of oblivion over her head.

Then its all eulogies and pictures

The heartbreaking songs-

Too few but promising too much

Playing good to her broken doll body

Anima sucked out-

It's

The dead girl, the dead girl, no more defiance

And more flowers and thoughts about the dead girl.

A threshold is crossed

From where

There is

No coming back

From

Where

If you're awake Amy

You know it's

Irreparable.

You stop breathing, you turn cold

And then you're gone

One more step

And you lose yourself

One more

And you lose consciousness

And you leave the room without taking your feet.

The chapter closes

The book is done

Just where you leave it-

On its back or spine-

If there is more

Afterwards-

We don't

Know about it-

Even though we suspect

That you well might.

28th July 2011

Gautam Mukherjee

Copyright Gautam Mukherjee 2011. All rights reserved.

There is proof that Hess is no longer Hess

There is proof that Hess is no longer Hess

Water refracting light

Sea shimmering

River flowing in chords of reptile strength

Hissing with foam

Exclaiming with spray

Opaque with silt

and

Cold as ashes-

You can flow away

Or dissolve

And let's face it

You do.

They just dug up Hitler's pal

Rudolph Hess's bones,

Cremated them-

And scattered the ashes at sea.

See

What I mean?

They could be Hindus or Romans

But the German authorities just didn't want a Neo-Nazi shrine

One Third Reich is enough for the psyche

But it's hard to convince the young

Angry with too many Turks-

But any Hindu could have told the German born again Hitler Youth

Even their own departed

Herman Hesse or Max Mueller

Shrines are in your heart-

Not in 93 year old suicidal bones

Or in Hess's tomb.

But when it comes to dead flesh

The Aryan idea is to purify the matter with fire

And Germans, ignoring some of their wilder tribal origins

Like to be seen as Aryans

Blue of eye

Blond of hair

And what a lot of ethnic cleansing this caused.

So

Even though they don't push their theories

Of the Master Race anymore

Its amusing to think that we Indians

Think we're Aryans too.

And Aryans love their fire

Fire for Havans

Fire to witness marriage

Fire to be consumed in at death.

Christians probably got the burial idea from the Muslims

And Jews

All religions of the book-

And born as neighbours.

And determined to not do as the Romans and Greeks did

With their pagan funeral pyres.

But the proof is in the eternal life of the spirit

That everyone seems to agree on

Even Rudolf Hess's spirit.

So

Burn or bury as you might.

But the story remains

Of a man imprisoned after the War

For decades in a

Allied prison

Where he was the only inmate

Till he killed himself at

93

And here are

Neo-Nazis wanting to invoke

His spirit by

Gathering at his tomb.

Let's think of

Boats-

Frail vagina shaped craft

Gentle crucibles

For beginnings and ends

And messages to the afterlife.

Let's realise-

That Hess is no longer Hess

Anymore than Mueller is Mueller

Or the gentle Hesse is Hesse.

22nd July 2011

Gautam Mukherjee

Copyright Gautam Mukherjee 2011. All rights reserved.

As for reality

As for reality

It's a cyclorama-

images seguing into each other

moving ever onward

Totally without bias

Probably without much purpose either

Just what you see

And what you feel

Or is the cycle getting larger

A revolving thing, a carousel, that will revisit

the point where you left your keys

On the ledge, amidst a very different piece of music

After a very long time-

It's uncertain whether you'll still be around

By then

And your keys may be rusted through

So enjoy the view-

The lights

The sights

Shining bright

For you.

2nd July 2011

Gautam Mukherjee

Copyright Gautam Mukherjee -2011