Sitting in the stark white hall
with fluorescent lighting, Sureshan saw
the scenes of his life flash by. School was a distant memory now. All Sureshan remembered was a petite, fair and demure
girl who always sat on the first bench. She laughed with a twinkle in her eyes and his heart missed a beat.
Last year when he had seen Ruchita in that
coffee shop near the school all the memories had come flooding back. They were
all here for the 8th reunion of their batch and Sureshan was
attending it for the first time. Ruchita was still the same petite and demure
girl. She had looked more sophisticated and stylish yet a little offbeat and
too thin. “Must be dieting “, he had thought, “all young women these days took
their fitness seriously, sometimes too seriously”. 
Life’s silent tears
Festering and unhealing
Causing eternal lacerations
Which fill eyes with dry salt
Love’s but a ghost
Eluding yet haunting
Chasing coloured-paper dreams
Which crumple sleeplessly
इस दिल के पान के पत्ते का
इक कोना चिर के कहाँ गिरा
मिटटी पानी या हवा हुआ
हमको लेकिन फिर न मिला
कटे फटे इस दिल कों अब
बस यूँही लेकर फिरते है
कुछ चाक पैबंद लगा के
अब आकार कों पूरा करते है
आकार जो पूरा हो भी गया
फिर जान कहा से फूकेंगे
कुछ ज़ख्म ये दिल का ऐसा है
खुद दर्द ही जिसका मरहम है
As the sun, a golden ball
Of cold fire hides behind
The cotton clouds, I sigh
Today too the moon,
Won't be seen In the sky
And today again I will
Be left longing For those
morsels of you that the
moondrops bring for me
