Prufrock outside the listless party-hall

And he beside the marriage-hall

Hamlet-like indecisive:

Should he go in

And be the groom groomed

Or stay without

A lonely bird though...

A wave within him leapt up

He was within

He knew not how.

Trumpets blared

Conches spluttered

And he like a portrait was hung up.

Amidst the milling crowd of people, things and instruments

He shrank within:

An island of being hemmed in.

Amidst the catcalls of people, things and instruments

He went deaf

Never to hear the music of love,

Years of mental masturbation…

Years of spiritual privation…

But the bark of body his spirit had boarded

Remained untouched.

Matter sans spirit – a nullity

Spirit sans matter – sheer potentiality.

The two must commingle

For the River of Love-Bliss-Power

To course down the parched crust of earth

A prisoner of his ‘karma’

He looked out the tower of his self

Shimmering globules of celestial rain dropped

He outstretched his lips

To the slithering drops of enervating dew.

But alas! They slipped,

They slipped off his expectant lips.

Oh! Cruel cruel Destiny

Time’s bastard progeny

Begotten in moments of laxity

No man, no angel nor a demon

Could ever defy your inscrutable will

So, ply on your merciless steel-cold wheel

And test the mettle of this petrified self

For no plea, no appeal shall he make to you.