Sanjeev Sethi- Three Poems

The recently released, This Summer and That Summer, (Bloomsbury) is Sanjeev Sethi’s third book of poems. His work also includes well-received volumes, Nine Summers Later and Suddenly For Someone. He has, at various phases of his career, written for newspapers, magazines, and journals. He has produced radio and television programs.

 

His poems have found a home in The London Magazine, The Fortnightly Review, Allegro Poetry Magazine,  Solstice Literary Magazine, Off the Coast Literary Journal, Synesthesia Literary Journal, Oddball Magazine, Hamilton Stone Review, Literary Orphans, Crack the Spine Literary Magazine, Otoliths and elsewhere. Poems are forthcoming in Sentinel Literary Quarterly, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Bitchin’ Kitsch. He lives in Mumbai, India. 

METHODOLOGIES

 

We usually take turns leading us to happiness

though the esses of mountain make me edgy.

Actuality means little, what matters is how

we bake it in our brains.

 

She has mounted a set in the studio of her head.

A camera too is embedded in her cranium.

She is the leading lady. There is no hero.

Aloneness undulates her reel.

 

Another floor is the setting of her desires

and devices via media sessions. She waxes

on absences. She is convinced the worthiness

of words will weave the completion of her circle.

 

 

 

ACCOMODATION

 

Some homes have no ceilings.

Some no casements, no belongings.

Some homes have nobody.

These are not homes. They are houses.

 

I’ve  lived enough to know what it

is to live with me. I like my smell.

Points of departure, yes, but fewer

than folks have with others.

 

I enjoy space, the décor is minimalist.

My place has curtains, rugs and ruminations.

There is color-keyed flooring and focus,

electricity too: what is missed-- current.

 

 

 

LOYALTY

(1)

 

Tonight I bought God

in tune with my aesthetics.

Woody texture. Warm features.

While placing it on the mantel

I wondered --

Will He approve of me?

 

(2)

 

You are the perfect auditor.

It is us who fail to understand

your arithmetic. Is there anyone

who can teach me God’s calculus?

 

(3)

 

When you are riled up

of remitting to the impious

remember: that too will reach

your karmic rink.

 

(4)

 

Should yachties cruising through life’s canal

bypass those God chooses to publicly castigate?

Or should it be their calling to nourish them?

 

(5)

 

We inherit our God.

A few grow up

to find their own.