such night

Unnoticed Lives in sweat
curled up and falling
on the push carts
under the moonlight
like cucumbers in daytime
on the same push carts,

me and my love saw them
after the dead poet departed us
at the crossroad
leaving the taste of dead fish
in our tongue

and the gate of home
refused us
but i opened it
with a plastic rope
while she like a kid
was riding the scooter
looking at the side glass
for the nose she pierced
and we rode down
together on the highway to love

and the ladies were singing to the goddess
and so we sang together the beauty
and love of such night

economic blockade

A football was crushed by a highway truck
Economic Blockade!
A mosquito collides with the windshield wiper
Economic Blockade!
A bullock cart bang on an old Banyan tree
Economic Blockade!

O Manipur!
don't think of going back to school,
as you lack good education,
because the schools are closed
O Manipur!
if you have stones in your gall bladder
don't go for surgery
there is no oxygen
and ICU too have been closed

The crest is for him, the trough is for them
but they don't know they are in the same wave
Economic Blockade!
The church greets them, and The tulsi leaves greet him
"Good Morning"
Economic Blockade!

O Manipur!
dont think you can go off to see your lover
dont think you can ride the bike down the road
to get away from this 'You or Me'
because the petrol price hikes to 150rs per litre

Don't think you can cook bamboo shoots
to remind them they have something common
because one LPG cylinder costs 1500rs

O Manipur!
dont think you can get away
Your name is not in Schindler's List
dont think you can get away
riding that brand new Hero bicycle
There are Bicycle Theives too
and don't think you can read the story
of your stolen bicycle in newspaper
because there are no papers left to print your news paper.

India has cut you off
Feel the freedom that you wanted, demanded.
Economic Blockade!

I can't name it

Dying in the streets
and leaking out lives through blood
under the boots
or in the great fucking clatters of firing bullets
is part of being a Manipuri

I never learn this in my text books
I never see this in movies
I witnessed them with my own my eyes
crawling under the barricades at Sanjenthong
while the AK rifles were singing their songs
spraying death in air I breathed

Now you feel it on the very highway
which you think is your kingdom
where the history of head huntings had been written
But the truth is now you and me are brothers
Now you are embraced by the Police bullets
Now i see you block the road
not only by digging the road
or chopping down the faithful trees
but using the faneks of your ladies
Where do you learn it from?

Now the rumour spreads
like tumour in the sick brain
but the humour is
it is just another Indian summer story

we are left alone
to be the beasts of the highway
to make you hunt my head
to make me chop your head

And the wind of history sings;
Rwanda is coming your way
Bosnia and Herzegovina, they say

But the truth, You and I must face
that this land is not made out of clay
but only blood
And if you want to break it
there will be blood in the Hills and Valley
and I don't want it
and your Jesus don't want it too

death is the only winner

You had June 18th 2001
with the blood of eighteen splattered
in the streets of Imphal

now they have May 6th 2010
with Mao Gate erupting,
with flags
with blood
with children parading the highway

but
who wins the hills?
who wins the valley?
who wins your soul?
Death only death

Death to the fences of barb wires between Naga and Meitei
Death to the cunning balls that roll between ethnicities

the highway is for god

whatever u hear now
is the story of God
whether you like it or not
if god wants to come
he has to come
but he will not walk upon the land
So they burn the buses to create flames
as flames are friends of gods

The Highway is for his
As you know so he block it from sky
by making a glance

The runaway kid has come back
being god;
so the houses are burning incense sticks
so they open the gate
closing the other

the folk singer is singing
"Oh Chingkhom Philave
Her bosoms like mangoes"
It is the return of a hero
but you never had a hero
Let them celebrate the hero's return
Let them drink down now what they couldn't digest
as past seemed to favor you

The highway is for his, the god,
so the one who prays can block
you are a turtle in dry well
you are as brittle as cheap bangles
learn to get broken once
the fragments will eventually dance
left n right up n down

Every god wants you to fight
Every god wants to grow his clan
Every God wants a flag too
Every God wants to slap you
Every god wants to erase the history
that gave him no space

the radio is playing Leonard Cohen;
"Jesus was a sailor when he walked upon water"
But no one knew he was sailor
but The god is playing his game
and on history you blame

wasting around

who will see the light in me
when they are blinded by their own little selves
the night is roaring and waking me up
but they slumber for the dreams i call waste
Call me a man in thirties
but Im young to waste around in my style
Im gonna walk the road Wild
beware if we meet again I may shoot at you

A Poem

gimme a liter of kerosene

Give me a Litre of Kerosene
I will burn down this university
for all the things it taught me
for all the years i have spent
like a beggar walking from table to table

c me beautiful

See me beautiful
Im no longer a fool
Im no more a fat girl
See me beautiful in ur dream
if you wanna see me fast
sleep soon
Im already in my sleep
and my toes are digging the sand
of your love river
my throat is thirsty of your love spring water
my eyes want to be blinded
by your unwashed dirty long hair
tell me the story of Seoul
tell me how it aches when your love left you
tell me how you deny the morning
when you find no one next to you
tell me I m the only beautiful soul
promise me you will see me beautiful
in my wet hair in my wet clothes
in my pink slippers in my lips with songs of you

See me beautiful hey Nupa
I m your nupi
lets meet on the bed of yellow daffodils
lets wet this land with tears of laughter
hold my hand hey nupa
stop thinking of Naropa university

Please publish my poetry

Please publish my poetry
they are about trees and bees
How can my poetry be of my home?
My home is now a tomb stone

Please Please
They are about Indian Classical Dance and music
They are not even about Harijans or Hijarahs
They are not at all about India throwing Hussain out of the country
They are as soothing and emotional as the national anthem
They are about Tagore murmuring love in April's evenings

Please publish my poetry
They are about flowering mango trees
They are about the boots dancing tango
There is nothing about me and my home

Please publish my poetry
they are readable at Leaning Tower of Pisa
while you eat a slice of Pizza
They are as universal as sexual instinct

Dear editor please consider my poetry
How on earth will i write of blood?
my brothers and sisters have bled it all
there is nothing left for such minimal poets like me

Dear editor
my Poetry don't haunt
my Poetry don't scare
my Poetry don't kill

above these
Mine is about lovers and dopers
who defy the truth of living among firing bullets.
such courage where on earth will you find?

Story of a Slice of Uhmorock

Necha cut a slice of Uhmorock
listening to the Sicilian
boasting of his Italian roots
As he talks he put the thin slice of uhmorock
in his spoonful of rice
after a moment he drinks a glass of water

and said "what was that?
It whispered in my ears,"Dont fuck with me""

one day in March

One day in march
I marched these streets
tearing every page of my notepad
splattering my poetry
like blood in battlefield
but none looked at me
my words were foreign
my steps were foreign sound

One day in march
i marched these streets
slinging my old blue
Signature Guitar
i sang my song of Seaons
but none heard me
my words died in the sound of their motorcycles
my strings were too old
to make an audible sound

One day in march
I roped my own neck
and jumped down from a lamp post
unlike shri tomba
then the city was frozen
beneath my toes
No chaos No noise
they all looked up
at my feet

O loktak when will u stop being a myth

O Loktak
When will you stop being a myth?
every myth around you has become real;
Lord Thanjing committed suicide
seeing Thoibee bleeding by the roadside
of Kwakta as the armies patrols
zipping their camouflage

O Loktak
The poetry i studied too was a myth;
It is not the gentle breeze of Kwakta
that push back thoibee's hair
it was their hands
I have seen it in the play "Draupadi" too

O Loktak
when will stop being a myth?
but the thorns of your heikak made me bleed
but the lives of the fishermen and women
in your fumdi are as hard as anything.
should i see it as stories of your mythology?

O Loktak
Now another myth
of dissolving Rs 224 crores
in your name into their dirty pockets.
what connections do you have with Russia?
Have you ever read Mayakovsky
denying Thangjam Ibopishak's poetry about you?
Do you want to be a Black Sea
when you are already so red with blood
and sour with sweat?
Why Russian?
Do you also love foreign sound?
Do you need to be cleaned or
are their blood stain from the Operation Summer Storm?
but i believe the sharks you have been housing
have to be killed first and share their flesh
among the deprived ones
O Loktak
How can i save you from being a whore house?

watch ur head

Watch your head
there are heavy thoughts in the sky
thoughts to suicide, thoughts to revolution
thoughts to steal, thoughts to kill

"Your eyes are in your face
how will you watch your head
will the government watch it for you
for the ballot papers you have stamped on"

and she never came back

and she never came back
and they say i am fucking going mad
as i lick the tea bag
but they don't know
i can talk to cigarette buds
and i can rebuke humane
looking at the chopped woods
I can mop these clean floor again
i can wait whole night for a three line poem
i can fuck my hand like i am in french whorehouse
i can cook the korean pumpkins in my own style
I can heal my own pain whenever i want
i can lie to my love any time

Call me Drunk
Call me faggot
Call me Loser
Call me lover

but the night is mine
the bed is yours
so i unfold the night sky
and give away the stars
to the burried soldier
Mother earth is pregnant
with dead men and women
and she never came back
and they say i am fucking going mad
as i want to kiss all the cracked sad lips
of all girls in the world
but they don't know
i am the first flower that blooms
in Zinko tree in March
they dont know
I am beginning to convince them
with my kisses that they refused
on their way to their pointless point
where poets painters singers
revolutionaries, bureaucrats meet
greeting each other like they are the best kind
and i am never there
and they are beginning to fear
and she never came back

happy cheiraoba

Happy Cheiraoba"
The Government greets us
The extortionists also greet us
but the body is there
chest, half opened
to stuff their lies
"Happy Cheiraoba"
they pray to their ancestors
for they were fools
"Happy Cheiraoba"
But the cries are lingering in air
and the father is still waiting

wat am i to do now?

i spilled cooking oil on my jacket
and my other woollen clothes have been soaked
what should i wear now?
the road is calling me out
the whole city is expecting snow
what am i to do now?
my finger tips are deprived of music
my life is a sad song of a tired man
what am i to do no

A Windy Day in March

plastic bags are dancing
but not in my songs for sure
but may be in Ani Difranco's
Untouchable Face's fuck you.
the wind snatches away
the smoke from my mouth
and i don't regret it for sure
the chirping birds are flirting
so the trees are watching
I got a crush on the clouds
so it pisses on me
and the sun shines bright
so are their lips and hips.
like physician's prescription
i write one poem a day
but today the wind has written
my share and i become
a line that stops with a comma
i become the one dancing
with the plastic bags
so i light a long fag
and wear black hat
and jump over "Use me"
crashing their camera

elope wid spring

Me and the Spring
sit together at the bench
of Cheongnyani bus stand
as i wait for the bus to home
while Spring waits for the rain to go away
Spring says to me
"can you please get some leaves
or paint the tree bit greener?
It will make my job easier or faster"
"No, I am sorry, i don't know how to paint"
"can you please stop the rain?"
"No i cant, if i could i would have walked
away long ago"

"My bus has arrived
Will you come with me to my home?"
"Do you think the trees will mind?"
"No i don't think so"

And the Spring and i sit in the bus singing
"Seoul, how are your trees gonna flower again
I'm stealing away your flowers
I am eloping with your spring
I am wearing all your flowers in my hair"

"O home my home
spread the fields wide
Wash the trees please
here comes your spring

Hello Seoul

Hi Seoul!
I have come to you
after standing fifteen days in queue
at Passport Office, at Visa counter
after i almost felt in love with the lady in Visa counter
after i said "I love Korea"
after Cathay Pacific left me stranded at the airport

Hello Seoul!
I have come to you to gather your love
and take home and fill the pockets of my country men

Where is the love you showed to me in your movies?
Your Classic was excellent
Your Full House was always sweet
even when my home was starving
Your actors suffer from Alzheimer
Me too nothing I remember
about my past all i know is about my lover.

look at me i am as sweet as your girls
my undergarments are torn
now they look like your expensive thongs
my shoes are colorful too,
they match your roads of yellow oranges
my hair is long, and i don't feel that cold.
the cold of death
i have felt every summer in my hometown
the teenage boys and girls in my town
they are as beautiful as yours

I sleep in Korean time
but wake up at Indian time
with Imphal chewing my brain.
Give me something new Seoul,
I too, have been the soul of my town
like you call yourself the soul of Asia
I represent the poetry of the hopeless
I represent the poets of my generation
who are selfish and proud
who are gluttonous and patriotic.
what are you gonna do with me, Seoul
I am right here writing poetry in your soil
inflicting the dirt of my land in your air.

Hello Seoul!
Snow upon me cool me down
i am a burning charchoal in poor man's fireplace
yet i get cold in the rain of imphal
Dye me white
i will leave red for the poets
and to the tomatoes in the market

Hello Seoul
Let me carry you on my back
when you are drunk with soju
I wont let you fall here and there
like your girls in the subways on the bridge
in the bars in the streets.

My land the poets have carried away
and sold it off to a thing called Literature..
since then my back has been emptied
O Come on Seoul
it is 4 am..you are drunk enough to be on my back
Come on
a lullaby i will hum for you
i will sing to the moon as i walk along
i will dance as i walk along
Come on
Let me kiss your lips till you know i don't cheat
Let us share the Utongchak
i haven't shared anything with anyone
i was once a bull on parade
I am one of the names that the bullets
promise to kiss in lips
Hi Seoul !
Say “Sarange”
“Ei yam ware”