Uncut Poetry

Sipping Tea in a Rumi Morning

I have so often sat down to write poetry, and all that I actually wanted to do was to sit quietly and do nothing. Sipping tea, getting into my routine, crossing a street, looking out of a window, untangling a small problem, pointing out something beautiful to a loved one.....as I sat on the edge of an evening, and watched a bird delirious in its abandonment and random flight, I knew -  even an unwritten moment could be a poem. And our life is full of poetry, if only we open ourselves to it.
 
This is Uncut Poetry's 50th episode.
 
I've been with you every week with a new poem. And it's been a journey of discovery as much for me as it has been, I hope, for you.
 
Thank you for trusting me, and returning to Uncut Poetry, week after week.....
 
I want to give you a gift, absolutely free, a beautifully designed chapbook of some my poetry. Just because you have been with me.
 
Do go to the link below for this - 
https://linktr.ee/UncutPoetry
 
There's so much still to discover.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of Journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

The Ageing of Love

Years go by in relationships, and sometimes we feel that this is the nook where we fit in perfectly, and then suddenly we are left bereft of  an anchor to latch onto or a bank to rest our boat against. Why is there never unalloyed comfort even in a relationship of many years? Maybe that is the way the universe ensures we don't take anything for granted. Maybe that is the way we get to know that love with a little tension attached to it ensures longevity rather than the lugubrious version of love which takes itself for granted, and then finds itself alone.
 
Lovers, the next episode will be my 50th in Uncut Poetry. 
 
I would like to thank you for being such an integral part of this journey. I am here because you are here. And I want to give a part of my heart as a gift.
 
Write to me at uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com. I have a chap book of poems which I would like to send to you.  For being with me, for being such a valuable part of my journey. Thank you.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

When We Were One With The Stars

"Heaven is above and I know where I am,
At the corner of the interstate,
I couldn't let you go,
I could not let go yet."
 
I have just collaborated with Alma Roxx in their new single "Interstate (when we were one with the stars)". My poem is embedded into this song.
 
Alma Roxx is the brainchild of Oregon based producer/songwriter Renny Currin. Often times a genre bending sound, Roxx delivers infectious melodies married with sensitive lyrics.
Ryan Minor states in his Bottle Conjuror music blog that Alma Roxx's sound is "as if Simon and Garfunkel, Animal Collective, Beck, Mac Demarco and Stephen Malkmus decided to do a collaboration with Thom Yorke acting as producer and beat maker."
 
Alma Roxx calls their sound as something which is in the intersection of psychedelic pop and sheer chill. It makes for a compelling listen. 
 
This song - and my poetry in it - deals with death, remembrance, waiting and reconciliations. The lyrics, the music and the poetry seamlessly and tenderly explore loss. 
 
As Gabby (@oddgeezerfineart) says - "this tune will hit you like a sack of bricks, pick you up, dust you off and drive you forward."
 
Catch the full song at the following links - 
 
https://almaroxx.bandcamp.com/track/interstate-when-we-were-one-with-the-stars-feat-sunil-bhandari
 
or
 
https://open.spotify.com/track/3rV5c5hlYBNxNqxcpM4cjv?si=viI8v3h9Qz2Z4aIXF8YK7Q
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
 
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available as Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com
 

A Love Poem to an Office

People who don't know me are surprised that I don't sleep with a blanket of moonlight and a pillow full of stars.
But I have a day-life and it's in an office.
And it's a place which has consumed a large part of my life - and, alas, is rarely acknowledged by me in my poetry. Even though it has given me a livelihood and a distinct place in the world.
So I decided to make amends. 
Today's poem is a love song to my office.
 
I am Sunil Bhandari.
I am a poet based in India. My book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. My second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com

Rediscovering the Flawed Beauty of Love

One of the abiding tragedies of love is the lack of breathing space between lovers. The freedom they experienced, and which brought them together to begin with, suddenly switches into ownership and expectations which can never ever match with what is ordinarily possible. People, more often than not, don't drift apart, they merely suck the oxygen from around the very person they fell in love with, because she was free.
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com
 

Let Them Bring Any Year

"She knows love, /
because love was an answer /
sheared of every question /
unburdened with doubt, /
unremarkable as fact."
 
As we come to the close of an extraordinary year, and wait for its end, we hope there would finally be a pause to the disruption of lives, families, places, things, routines.
But when has the drama of life ever ended?
 
And as someone I love dearly struggles, I turn again and again to poetry. In reading it, in writing it, to seek forbearance, to resolve reasons, to look back with fondness, to look forward for grace.....
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
Get in touch with me on uncutpoetrynow@gmail.com
 
 

My Little Zen Warrior

"Once, on Sundays, as I read the papers,
I saw a sunbeam make its way to her,
and her hair was suddenly aflame like a fuzzy halo,
as she lay on the carpet,
her face cupped in her palms,
lost in the world of wizards -
and the sun helplessly
putting the spotlight on her,
for the universe to gaze at her,
and no one else."
 
In Pema Chadron's  exquisite and heartfull book "When Things Fall Apart" she says -
"You are the sky. Everything else – it’s just the weather."
 
This poem is about how children are natural zen individuals and how the universe recognizes them for what they are.
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
Follow Sunil on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.
 
 

Kripa (a blessing from a daughter)

"I sit on the edge of the evening,
as I allow you to find your way:
the sea is low and I want you to know
what it is to tread the skies."
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
 
Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Indian Summers

Summer, of all seasons, is the one which brings us human beings into our most elemental  state - frank, often ugly, always true.
 
We indulge and never regret; we forgive and we mean it.
 
We know that what happens to us, is what we do onto others. And in that strange steaming symbiosis lies the powerlessness of our appetites - we are what the air makes us -  not good or bad - just stripped of everything, naked, true -  and for once not ashamed, and for once refusing to be shamed.
 
Summer is a body's sigh of being, as it realizes how everything is so fleeting. 
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
 
Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.

Seasons as Consultations to Life

I am amazed how we pass our lives through the magnificence of seasons, and how we change with them, as if they were our partners on a road to nowhere, somewhere.. .
 
Summer, winter, autumn, all come and go, as witnesses to our peculiarities, our small concerns, our happinesses which seem as tenous as sundrops , as also our sadnesses which seem to fill the universe...
 
But we just need to be open to their messages, to their careful power and their sensitive tellings - and we will see them as pointers to life, as instructions to find our way, as friends who will not speak but will tell us everything.....
 
We merely need to be aware, we merely need to be present.
 
Uncut Poetry is brought to you by Sunil Bhandari. 
 
Sunil Bhandari is a poet based out of India. His book of poetry 'Of Love and Other Abandonments' was an Amazon bestseller. His second book 'Of journeys & Other Ways to Get Lost' is just out. Both are available in Kindle on Amazon.
 
Sunil is on Instagram at @sunilgivesup.