by Rucha Gadgil, 1st MPT

Skies to skies, Dawn to dusk
 Mountains and valleys, time does rust
 Soul to soul, tears to smile
 Fate and destiny indeed travel miles
 Regrets to regrets, love to hate
 A decision made we seldom repent
 Hand to hand, mind to heart
 Eyes searching, often travel far
 Crimson to crimson, ravines to road
 What is reaped has to be sowed
 Change to change, laughs to frown
 The carousels always turn around
 Memories to memories, shadows to sunshine
 There’s always a greater love for which we pine
 Wanderer to wanderer, wonder to wonder
 A lost soul always stumbles upon someone to ponder
 Twinkle to twinkle, wrong to right
 The souls unite, shining stunningly bright

by Safoora Parkar, Final BPTh

वोह आसमान से फरिश्ता बनकर ज़मीन पर आया 
  खुदा ने येह नायाब तौफा हमे अदा फरमाया 
जिन्दगी की किताब में सियही बनकर वोह पन्हा तर्शाया 
जब कदम दग्मगये तोह वोह थप्कियों ने साथ निभाया 
गिर के सीखना उन्ही ने सिखाया
डाट फटकार से आज वोह तारा चमकाया 

मनके अंधेरो को रोशनी की राह मिली
टुटे अर्मनो मे उम्मीद की लौ जागी
ये कुछ ऐसी इनकी छवि

उनकी कदमों मे सारा जहाँ 
समांदर के किनारे वोह खुला आसमान 
माता पिता तू नही कुछ वक़्त का सही पर तेरा नाता हमसे वोही
शुक्रगुजार है हम आप सबके 
आज हमे इस काबिल बनाया 

by Maria Dalal, 3rd BPTh

Under the quiet stars
when heady winds dance 
and sounds just rustle and chime,
It is easy to wax poetic 
To condemn formal thought 
To brush off the tangible 
in favour of looking for answers 
among the stars 
To questions you haven't formed 
It is easy to joke about being  inconsequential
Throw in phrases of grander schemes 
meandering sentences grappling to resemble debate 
And to pass off Carlin as your own 
But you can do it in harsh daylight 
Where the sun streaming through the window hurts the head 
When there is nothing hiding the hustle of the world 
When every passing tap is a footstep heading to a goal 
When all is bright 
and no shadows hide your eyes
You can look into mine and speak. 

I hope-
That every word that leaves your mouth is mirth 
Every wave of your wild hands 
Every roll of your eyes
is a shrewd calculation
And, hidden, lies a motive to say what you say with such ardent conviction 
Because if there isn't 
and you've fallen for your words 
What do we do then? 

by Aastha Shah, Intern

They took their time to evolve, growing on every step, grasping from the others around them. They gathered what they could from the significant bits of their fellows, and each became a unique portrait of unmatchable shine, complete with every colour there was. They each grabbed shades in variable quantities – tossed in the heat of anger, bathed in the cool of tears, dried and stirred in the mirth of laughter; they cast impressions on the surface of the colours and let them settle. At the end of it, they all stood out, sculptures that had contents which completed each other, colours that overlapped, textures that contrasted with each other to beauty, and shapes that spelled joy. They were never intended to be perfect, only destined to shine; for, they had unimitable permutations of 40 colours, all converged into one.

by Nikita Balachandran, Final BPTh

 
We could have been a raging fire,
All we had to do was nurse that tiny flame,
And maybe bear the heat on our raw skin once the mittens caught fire,
For a second, maybe much more according to our repentant claim.
 
If ego could be felt, it sure has to be cold as ice,
But what did more damage than those icy jets was our aversion to light.
Maybe the dark is comforting because nobody’s exposed and vulnerable,
Because what person has quantified your weaknesses and still provided the wood for you to ignite.
 
So the next time you see a spark
As fascinating and potentially consuming as venus’s reign,
And we try to protect it with our bare hands devoid of any protective charms,
Remember our hearts form the hearth here; and there’s only so much room for the ashes from burnt out flames. 

by Safoora Parkar, Final BPTh

वोह सजदे मे पलके झुकाये बैठे थे
आसू मे गम बहाये बैठे थे
दिल मे एहसास जगाये बैठे
वोह यादों की लकीरो संग सजाये बैठे थे

आज फिर क्यू रूह ने रूह से इबादत की
गुस्ताक दिल ने ये क्यू फिर बगावत की
वक़्त की भी क्या बेरुकी 
पर्दों को पंख की बेनसीबी ही सही
कुछ टुकड़ो की कहानी 
लफ्जो में बेज़ुबनी 

by Maria Dalal, 3rd BPTh

The grit. She hated it when it stuck to her toes and to the hem of her pants. It was not mud- they were tiny gravel particles bounced by the more powerful patter of drops on the road- that would so graciously gift her sandals with that unsightly coating. Sometimes, larger stones would slip under the soles of one’s feet, and scratch the tender shoe bites. It was impractical to stop every time this happened, so one had to suffer and let it takes its course.
This always sparked the debate of whether she would prefer to walk through waterlogged streets, even when the source of said water was not deliberated on. For at the end of the waddling, at least the feet were visually clean.

‘Scoot over.’

Her attention was brought to the oncoming car streaming its way through puddles.
Puddles were a filthy, filthy part of commuting. They were not exciting. Fools gaze into nothingness, reminiscing carefree childhoods with smiles on their faces. Fools then shake their heads, tut ‘gone are those days’ and list horrors of responsibility.
‘It has been a while, now. Ask him‘

Frowning, she looked over at the vendor and the sandwich he was handing over to an aged man.

“Bhaiya, jaldi karo na”
“Ji ji, aapka hi next hai”

The stall was not much. Just a couple of cardboard sheets taped to a table, under a huge rainbow coloured umbrella. A little kerosene stove coughed and stuttered at the char black toaster balanced over it. The tiny sandwich wouldn’t be enough, but it would be warm and spicy to drive off the bite of drenched clothes on the journey onward.

“Tchh Tchh. Madam.”

Her food was cut into six unequal pieces, unceremoniously transferred onto a paper plate with spoonfuls of red and green chutney, and passed through aforementioned customer. He smiled, but it wasn’t returned. A bad day was a bad day, and it deserved a proper sulk.
The bread corners hurt her gums and the potato filling burnt the tongue.
After a greeting unreturned and an account settled, she was on her way.

The beat of the rain on her flimsy umbrella was not music to her ears, it was a deafening noise. It had sounded like a perfect symphony last week when she pranced down this very street with a friend. It would sound like music next week, when she will smile at the stall vendor and ask him about his children.

Every drizzle did not calm her mind.
Every sunset did not inspire,
nor did they have to.
For as long as some did- she was alive and well.

by Nikita Balachandran, Final BPTh

The evening sunlight barely manages to stream through the old-fashioned windows, what with the heavy maroon curtain-drapes falling gracefully from above in perfect semi-circles, in way that suggests the sun must be on its way to the other side of the world. She knows. By the glint on the leaves of the Gulmohar tree which is reducing with each passing minute, the breath-taking green turning darker on the side of the foliage facing west as if surviving one more day has made it age.

She knows something else too. The sense of finally having a task at hand is unmistakable. Tearing her eyes from the window, she looks around. Patches of sunlight dance around the house. A few minutes pass in which her eyes adjust to the setting so familiar to her. But its still disorienting, making out her surroundings after hours of being lost in thought, her gaze fixed on the window.

She is nestled deep inside some sort of chair facing the window. The chair seems to rock when she shifts her weight. Its a rocking chair, she concludes. She feels around for her spectacles over a plastic stool to her left by instinct. Once they are on the crook of her nose, her confidence increases. Funny how a pair of lenses or more importantly their absence can make you feel like a handicap, she thinks. She flexes her hands waking them up as they lost all feeling a while back when they were uselessly propped up on the armrests of her rocking chair. Shifting her weight forward, her quavering fingers find the armrests and grip it tightly, she pushes her feet as far outside as she can so that her toes are touching the tiled floor. She glances at the clock on the wall to her left, 6.30 it reads.

 by Prachitee Joshi, 2nd BPTh

In search of wild we run into the meadows,
where we get lost and are followed by ruthless shadows.
We run deep into the darkness in search of the horizon,
with a sweet yet powerful orison.
But then they stop and all they do is hypnotise,
while we try to run away but our bodies are getting paralysed.
They start to haunt our souls and blur our eyes,
with their reckless behaviour and convincing lies.
Now the hunger has aroused but the fingers are broken,
And the angels are wounded but the demons are awoken.
We are trying to get up but our body’s weaken,
Couldn’t help ourselves because our minds are shaken.
Our mouths are sealed but our minds are screaming,
blurry vision of a chaotic mess where we don’t know what to believe in.
Our fears have taken our bodies in a deadly way for sure,
Where we are suffering from the pain which has no cure.
We try to conjure it but we are afraid of the wrong time,
While they’re destroying us and all we do is glime.
While poisoning our souls we set ourselves on fire,
burning down ourselves we are fueling their desires.
And finally we’re dead-tired, scared and are bleedin’,
While they walk around us and their presence is spine chillin’ 
We either give up, cry and surrender while they still haunt us like devours,
Or we rise up, fight back and end it like we are the endeavours.
So oh my beloved friend take a deep breath and do not surrender,
instead of hiding and suffering he the dead ender.
Because our fears are nothing but a game of our mind,
which is shaping us to be a pathetic coward or a brave kind.
And now that you’re awake, wounded and a bit bonker.
Let me tell you a secret we either survive or we conquer!
So the path is yours and act accordingly, you might end up bad but you shall win.
Because you are the power who can set you free! 

by Manasi Bhutani, 3rd BPTh

As each muscle fibre in his heart
craved for that last bit of oxygen
before it underwent necrosis 
just like that, virtually my soul died when he did
my grandfather

by Rucha Gadgil, 1st MPTh

Shining eyes, a bright smile
 Alone she stands staring at long miles
 Twinkling skies on her looking down
 She sparkles wearing a thorny crown
 Laughter unheard tears the norm
 She looks straight in the eye of the storm
 Unafraid she goes marching on
 Naysayers and her people alike
 With their words down her strike
 Still she walks to the beats of her own drum
 To sound out the voices she loudly hums
 Walking along the path unknown
 She walks , walks alone
 Knowing she’ll be mostly that
 She hopes one day someone will have her back
 Take her side, listen to her say
 Not take what she says in the wrong way
 Till then she vows a silent smile
 For she knows she has to walk along the hard aisles
 Broken, accused, alone she rides
 In the eye of the storm she directly strides
 Fresh hope alive in her eyes
 With a serene face she rides beneath the skies
 Knowing her day will come
 With laughter and love for her in the open
 Till then she’s ready to wait
 Beneath the stars vowing to changing her fate.

by Maria Dalal, 3rd BPTh

 
At the end of the day,
How do you picture your work? 
Do you see it reflected in widened eyes?
Engrossed, enraptured by the screen
The image shifting- as spectacles slip down their nose 
Or- do you see it in a stuffy room?
Between subdued conversations and rolling eyes
As the syntax is broken down for connections
And the phrase ‘frame of mind’ used far too many times? 
Or better yet, under an arched ceiling
Flooded with lights day and night
Perused and dog eared
A volume that is never dusty
But painted with oily smudges
Of too careless, but too comfortable a handling? 
Or- can you see the lines being trailed
By a pencil lead so stubbed and bruised
When suddenly, it presses down with force
Right, left, right it goes-
Tears the paper through and through 
Or- in the cozy tucking of cold feet 
Of being lost, and yet being found 
Who- in the quest of turning a page
Poke themself in the eye
frown, then laugh, to frown again 
At the end of the day,
As you get up from your desk
Legs cramped, fingers jammed
What do you dream about?

What you have been working at,
And plan on working for-
Is it prized?
Is it hailed? 
Reverently referenced?

Does it make somebody love?

Does it make somebody hate? 
How do you picture your fruit?
When washing from hands the soil?
Can you envision a garden-
after the first day of toil? 

by Dhara Pooj, 3rd BPTh

 The see-saw of her life was disrupted,
 Entire equilibrium had been shifted,
 Desire, fire, anguish everything was swept away,
 Her blue and sunny sky had now turned gray.
 Underneath the hood, she masked her emotions,
 To reveal herself she’d rather require magic potions.
 Her self-esteem was sinking into a bottomless pit,
 Why? She knew she was the answer to it.
 She realized the need to embrace herself,
 She was perfect and needed to reveal her true self.
 Her flaws and faults, mistakes were her definition,
 ’Cause these made her the brightest star of her life’s constellation.
 After realizing her breath was the answer to her way,
 She pledged to accept herself with each growing day.
 She established herself fearlessly once again,
 Trying not to put all these attempts into vain.
 Finally, she succeeded in unleashing all the demons from within,
 The demons that had once ripped her apart,
 The demons that had created a storm in her heart,
 Was her see-saw now at equilibrium?