April 7th, 2023

For you, only

When we took our shoes the first time

At the temple gates

It was the beginning of water bending

And droplets in my hands

You felt my pain on phone call nights

But then all we did was moonshine under the light

We were not allowed entry within the walls

But we're allowed to stay until final call

You've made me better for what it's worth

And kept my wheels spinning beyond this earth

And shot me up and down the park street lights

If you've watched the bottom of my shoes

You know I got 40 licks and I've had the blues

The bottom right corner of my soles

On my right anklet extreme

Tell the story of uphill climbs

And a brittle statement that led to footstep screams

A passerby drove right on thru

And I would have been a dead bunny if not for you

I'll feed the children of Krishna, too

I'll home your animals like how I honor in my shoes

An uphill climb with a fleeting look

Of hopelessness and knowing an eternal muse

You art there for me in celestial orbit when I think of you

You are in my ears when I have nothing to do

You are in my heart from morning to start

You were at my family's mourning ritual

Of Karballah and Kusumpur and Kanpur, too

Of Noida, Murshidabad, and Dilli too

But kali peeli you bring me home

You sent me back in a plastic dome

For 500 rupees I paid the price

Of losing your respect into a motorcycle night

I would have walked the whole way back the first we met

If I'd known my lesson would be so long learned our second test

I walked back knowing not what I had lost

For in the sands of time you were not yet mine

But never-ending, mind, remind me, remember me

I'll be seeing you in familiar times

I'll be seeing you at the moonraker ride

The bumper cars, the bowling lines

The carousels of Saturday club

The stuffy halls of Cal Club bells

The bell hopping servants who inhabit my eyes

The sockets of my hips that tell no lies

The sockets of my eyes that accept your peers

To know you are peerless and I am deeply your dear.

With love, Manas Winfield

For The one and only

The Heroine(s) I've Known

 

We met halfway past sundown

At the suicide saloon

I did not let you see the craters of my moon

Coffee warmed us up and all we did was swoon

The second time we met and the sky was our whole room

Your mother made us tea and we sipped away our hopes

She said you’ll marry this one

And she’d had you on the ropes

Then your Papa sent the crows

From the Eastside to the West

…And My momma always taught me you gotta choose the best

My father art thou in heaven?

Only German Hegel knew

You can read a million pages

But you’ll never misconstrue

If you’ve only heard the greatest hits

Of History and its tunes

Then all the Led Zeppelin you’d ever heard

Never learned you ‘bout the Blues

Because current events cut deeper

Than crimson ever could

and the red-tongued goddess maidens

Won’t ensnare fires in the woods

For a water-bender most quenching

Is what’s needed to keep the peace

But don’t be misled my dears

The typhoons are of the East

I’ve seen the paths straight out of hear

In the crescents of your ears

I knew my god was in the flesh when it did not sweat in fear

I knew that peace was love supreme

When I let it whip me bare

I knew I’d drowned my craters there

When I crouched my hatred down stares

I knew I’d wait another year to show the moon to shine

We don’t need to be reborn again

To know who’s born …. under a

bad…

sign

 

I wouldn’t cry because you left me

For that is whom you choose

But to question my reality, wept me in the blues

I do not cry because you left me

Nor felt the agony of heart impaled

To see the mass graves adorned in blue suede shoes

would crater me to see you fail

For freedom goes of its own Accord

And To Yoda’s onto Hondas

But the day you drove straight up that hill

The Warrior Peace Arized down Yonder

The day you grab that wheel and don’t turn back

I’ll be your journalist

Until that day shall come

I’ll carry your shoes upon my chest

You needn’t bear the weight of chiles

To be the most respected of the pack

Browner than Blue and Bluer than black

The wheatfields in Egyptian mires

Are whole-grained pleats in ricey tyres

And the world won’t keep turn another day

Till the farmers make theirs back

Coffee Cup To-Go

Coffee cup to-go
As simple as
A recyclable paper cylinder
Crowned in a plastic helmet
With one spout of an opening
as if to represent sea mammals
up late studying
Now tepid and more than half-empty
Easy to pick up
With hardly a risk of spilling
for any land-dwelling primate
By the gown of its paper frock
That not too long ago
insulated once-steamy
Coffee, by now serving only to
Advertise in bold font
a well-known author
Appearing in our small town
Who knows where
I don’t care-
I came here for the coffee
to wake up from despair

A Cappuccino of Madness

Holding a cappuccino
By the ear of its cup
Several fingers carrying the
warmth to come
Of a supposed elixir
One finger curled around the handle
Ready to rifle myself out-of-bounds
If not spill a hot liquid-
Unstable.
With my index pointer trembling
Not wanting to be outcast yet again
Sitting at this coffee shop
Cozy and sociable
Invisibly sick
Not knowing if what I want
Is to have a grip on this reality
Or any other, for that matter
To sip by sip, be okay with it
Or to pour dreams into
A cappuccino
To accept destinies of chance
In the cream swirls
Of a not-thinking barista
To give my future
To signs, randomness, the universe,
Trails of imagined deliverance,
In the warmth of a cappuccino,
Seducing me
And yet failing me, always
As, with each sip,
Each gulp
My self gets washed away
As I take on the form of an empty cup
Once again

The Neverending Reality

 

Growing

Uprooted from a humble, shallow home

transplanted in resplendent greens

the earth is still made up of dirt

underneath the scenes,

underneath the greens

though it won’t at first be seen,

the seed holds all the promise

of every single thing,

of all a plant could ever be,

and the air and sunshine and flowers

a plant might never see,

but you’ve been growing upwards

and branching out as well,

tending to your garden

a product least upscale,

that you find your solace

in watering what is silent,

and waiting for tomorrow

to apply your fertilizing talent-

shows the humility in your hands,

the patience in your greenest thumbs,

and the blossoming radiance

that breaks through what is numb,

and sprouts out of a bud long dormant

in kaleidoscopic ways,

but only for the ones who’ll wait

through all the rainy days

princely states

Who knows the rose

who never had a globe?

To keep out the bugs

that made the stems shrug

what is a dove

to an indoor plant?

who gardens its self

on the corner of a shelf

in a cool dim shadow

malnourished and alone

who waters the leaves

to answer its pleas?

The golden-haired boy

arrives on the scene

wearing his cape

and endlessly naive

thinking that he will know

just what to do

to revive this rose,

make it blush from blue

but he asks so many questions

and jumps from here to there

traveling the universe

while the rose is on Earth

learning came easy

to the little princely one,

of all things most exciting

even what was in writing

the further he explored,

the more gold dust he collected,

whimsical wizardry extravagantly sublime:

ideas, friends, and beautiful rhymes

but none of these things

were proof to his heart,

for he had foregone the hard toil

of replenishing the soil,

and the rose had near wilted

under the weight of existence

and no amount of persistence

will raise a rose from a distance

 

hope

 

Hope sounds more exotic in Russian

but you prefer the Western ways

the sunshine and warmth of temperate days

and you see freedom in our flags

You don’t exactly stay hidden

but you know to be careful

for your ultimate mission

isn’t just for you or me

Yes, you swing between languages

and hang with those of many lands

One day may we be global citizens

for now, a netizen of silicon sands

You drench yourself in an online sea

Rather caught up in the internet

than the snares of henchman

out there rounding up the Freshmen

The characters of villains

Are rehearsing their roles

The audience is captive

Not seeing what they came for

it’s real horror-show

as the critics of this theater

are now critiquing heaven

and the light shines bright

on the void of any hero

Hope- a noun and a verb?

Are you enough?

Without a second and a third?

Your heart is many good places

Your thinking will yet develop

As you are what is boundless

A reaching out into the expanse

of all that we need

and haven’t had the chance

to manifest with hope alone

or alone, with hope

As we cast this net into an ocean deep

tighten and stretch the rope

we catch the ones we need to keep

for us to move as one

and pull the ragged dusty rug

out from under the ones who trample over

all beauty, truth, freedom, justice, and love

Constant distractions

Constant distractions

over here, over there

feel like hale pelting

on the top of my car

as I look straight ahead

following the road.

Constant distractions

blinking through my mind

as I try to keep those eyes open

focused on my mission

my purpose, my vision.

Patience eases the effects

of any pitter-pattering

and when I see even each distraction

reflected in the water of my mind

the hale becomes like gentle rain drops

connecting the skies to the sea

Assessment

Where do I go from here?

What have I seen? Who have I met?

What have I learned to take to the next?

What would it mean to be at my best?

Master the self,

subdue my ego (and that of the rest)

humble myself in my work,

my actions, my speech

and my thoughts, above all else.

banish any ambitions for empire,

sit back and listen,

and look within,

let go of any criticism

of the ones I love,

for who am I to judge?

accept the flaws in others and my own,

for truly, knowledge and wisdom don’t sit atop a throne.

expand the reaches of my heart,

dissolve the barriers of different parts,

focus on the vastness of mind

and not the rash desires of this ‘Manas.’

content in everything big or small,

love the crude, the beautiful, the hateful in all,

lying as the fulcrum, steady and tall

balancing the world of wonders,

never beating down,

never going under

Turning point

Reluctant writers

stepping out of the shadows,

out of the cool, damp, mellow home

where we hide our sorrows,

our tortured thoughts

chained to the furnace of regret,

on house arrest for our sins,

and the sins of others,

circling around

in our own captivity

But the light comes through the windows,

through the holes in the roof,

maybe I wasn’t meant to be so aloof.

the doorknob doesn’t seem so scary,

I turn it, walk out, and see,

the light rains down and thunders,

the feeling reverberates in me.

I soak up all around me,

the people and the trees,

growing side by side

with the force of destiny,

the unknown is adventure

with friends along the way,

exhilarated freedom

with every breath I play