Eating mushrooms, to her is yet another art
she loves to perfect, in my ear she whispers
with such visible pleasure,"I want to be a connoisseur in this"
Her studio smelled herbs and wild flowers of inner forest,
brought me back to the cardamom and cinnamon garden
I played in my days of boyhood; spices build a  bridge for us.

More of a herbalist than a paint smelling artist, she seems,
mounted on the wall on irregular fashion were the mushrooms
she painted with a passion rare, and a precision mirroring life;
the paintings  brought her past in to the studio, only trained eyes
would discern the cryptic symbolism, a consummate artist she certainly is!

 The woman who smoked cigars in succession and untiringly danced,
she said was her favorite, along the lake front we took a long walk
comparing notes;  there were parallels that met, we found soon enough.
"You too knew her so well, I am aware", she said. A room filled with smoke
where we dance, make love, grow tired, fall down and sleep, wasn't it our life?
No one can miss the signature smell of her dense cigar smoke on my dress!"

I loved the smell of cloves she exhaled while eating mushrooms.
though detachment she pretended, eating mushrooms never was that!
I kept looking down at her eyes, a sailor about to sight the land,
any panting moment that rushes with a monsoon song for me and her.

The world around me slows to a crawl,
No one around me knows me at all.
I look over the crowd of familiar faces,
From various times and different places.
They laugh and they play, one and another,
All with secret pains, I’m just like the others.

Why dwell on the comfort
Of dusting off the adversity
That profane the corners
Of our compartments

When we can
Call upon courage
And write for those
Without the strength to crawl out
Of the hollow caves
They live in?

               You
                  And
                    I
Are blessed with the curse of
Seeing beyond the masquerades
Of others
That it becomes haunting not
To tap into their souls

And wander in the
Caves of their minds
To find the reason behind
The warped interior,

The vague, and sometimes
Vivid Answers to
           Why
They're sinking in
Self imposed darkness,
      
          
They feel they're slaves
To and in liberation,

        
They feel they can't be forgiven
For the sins they
Unintentionally created,

      
They feel so empty and hollow
And dead within that there's
Nothing, but dead spaces
Between heart beats,
  
        
They're engulfed in
Flames that they're turning
Everything they caress to ash

With every bit of
                 Taste,
                 Touch,
                 Smell
                
Lulling us into euphorias
Where fragments of
             Sound,
               Images,
                 Fragrances,
                  Thoughts,
Compound to a jungle of words
That we lose ourselves in,
Perhaps then,
We become a tad bit closer
To finding
Ourselves,
Perhaps.