An ode to the mundane

It has been over a year since I actually penned anything new.

It has been over a year since I tied the knot, too.

No, no, no, I don’t mean to say that my marriage has anything to do with my creative block.

That is, just, you know, an FYI.

I summon all my muses I used to exploit before.

Heartbreak, loneliness, rejection, existential crisis, 

So on and so forth.

None of them comes to my rescue now.

Only our housekeeping aunt cares to answer my call somehow.

“Didi aj kaam pe nehi ayenge, beemar hai”.

Escapes, then and there.

All my poetic endeavours.

Straight out of the window, 

Anticipating the add-on chores.

You see, the apartment we have rented here in Bangalore is over twenty years old.

A plethora of its daily tantrums, we get to behold.

A tap leaks, a fan squeaks and something, somewhere, breaks apart the next day.

This is just the least to say.

The fridge stinks, the laundry overflows and the furniture gathers dust.

My poor brain left with no other choice, has to attend to those first.

Next comes my list of goals,

And time never seems to be under my control.

Work goals, learning goals, culinary goals, fitness goals, financial goals, sustaining my family-relationships goals,

And my sanity finds itself in a rabbit hole.

I wish I could hold my nerves,

And lose myself in contemplation,

And come up with something profound and out-of-the-world,

Which only but a few could have unfurled.

Instead, I seek my poem,

Amidst the chaos and mundane.

Devoid of finesse, devoid of coherence. 

Perfectly capable of not making any sense to you.

Yet I guard it, through and through.