The Wind from Dreamland

 

O wind, come you from far,

From that land beyond dreams,

which the eyes never saw, nor ears heard,

and the sleep missed even in dreams;

Bless thou! You enable my senses

to feel, hear, see and dream.

 

I dream with eyes open,

Of the land distant,

Thy touch makes me

imagine all that must be

now happening there,

Circle as you around me.

 

Those small hills rounded,

With pastures, scattered trees,

Clouds playing with the sun,

And the laughing blue also,

The distant howl of a wolf,

and the bleating lambs straighten their ears.

 

I accompany that tiller

walking barefoot, on the way

to his small farm and

touch the tools he shoulders,

And wish him the best of potatoes,

O air, I can feel his worries also.

 

I look at that house far away,

On that flat ledge by the hillside,

Chimney smokes, doors closed,

Family gathered around a table,

And listen to their chit-chat,

O wind, I can see their balmy routine.

 

My heart feels their feelings,

They worry about the father

gone to the nearest town;

One of them going to the window

and stare into the misty distances

of the winding, hilly path.

 

I walk on the grass unbeaten,

which softly pricks with virginal blades,

Nobody must have walked here

except some lone animal,

Or, some forlorn love-drenched soul,

I rest on the green carpet now and close my eyes.

 

Sit now under a luxuriant tree’s canopy,

Few must have rested here,

A bird chirps above in the green,

Heart beats with its melody,

And the notes go spreading

and surrendering to the majestic solitude.

 

There flows a brook,

Its gentle murmur on the pebbled bed,

The eyes see a fluid canvas:

Sand, pebbles and fishes,

I now dip my legs in the water,

I feel rain somewhere up.

 

O wind, I can live all that scene,

Distances have melted,

You mixed that hilly essence

as you swept over the charming panorama,

That is the world only for me,

As nobody else hears, sees or dreams it.

God! Who or What are You?

 

God, reside thou where?

In a simpleton’s easy, empty mind,

or an intellectual’s heavy, shiny brain?

Fill you an innocent, almost empty child,

or burst from the laden, wise old?

 

Sun’s warm rays are you

that bathes us with life?

Or the dark, blind night,

imitate when we death and forgetfulness?

God, which facet of appearance you are?

 

The winner’s pride are thou?

Or sulk through the defeated?

The water around a lotus

or the parched land below thorns?

God, which extreme you are?

 

Ever blooming, fade not,

or rejuvenate now and then?

Punishment to the guilty

or mother’s soft hand to the wronged,

God, what art thou?

 

Strong’s heavy impact are you,

or the weak’s escape?

Whether the animals in the jungle,

or most social are you?

God, which thing art you?

 

Humane more than humanity,

or a taboo you are to avoid?

Whose master are you?

Of those devouts in temples and shrines,

or just a common good being?

Mossy Fluidity

 

In the mossy fluidity of a solitary pool
in a lonely vale,

An open, welcoming canvas,--

Mossy green, pale yellow, rusted brown and mottled gray,

As a tired traveller I stand and
see my shadows while the mountain breeze hail,
My spread self mixed with the mossy waters,
And I marvel at the small canvas holding the image,
While the brook tries to rewrite the colours.

The Little, Mossy Stepping Stone

 

I am a round, moss-clad stone

laid as a fording step on this small, shallow riverbed,

I am glistening white on my face,

And moss-skirted around my base,

Sways my stony heart to the gentle tugs

of the shallow, rippling waters,

I, along with my brethren,

Line up to define a path,

across this little pebbled valley,

Humans, you may have a stony heart,

under the soft muscles in your breast,
But mine is definitely

a soft, mellifluous, mossy green one,
And I wear it on my sleeve,
While you step over my clean white face,
And scamper away,
I just pray,
Safe you reach,
Without any further breach.

Small Farmer

 

The shifting shades under the sun,

The poor farmer’s fate fluctuates with the same,

God watches detached from far,

Test’s His creation’s performance

through endless nature’s play.

 

A misfit in the modern world,

He desperately tries; turns unfit,

Greater is the loss,

for a misfit can have a hope of salvation,

The unfit loses his rights to dreams all.

 

Still, the dew shines daughterly,

The morning breeze sooths motherly,

The rising sunrays enhance the small self,

The brave shadow treads bravely afore,

Implores him to be happy and live just for a day.

 

The birds pass joyfully chirping;

Large becomes the small world,

Walks as he in his little world,

The insects line up to honour,

Confident becomes the poor man.

 

Fading sounds from the village,

Again remind him of his real worth,

As home is there,

Storehouse of all deprivations and anxiety;

Much to be extracted from the plot small.

 

Big-hearted he becomes,

Till he reaches the last night’s dream,

But alas! Too big for his little parcel of land,

Passes the sweat-drenched day,

only to repeat its old version with the next ray.

Little Angels

 

Little angels, swim in the pond

till the lazy days of late winters,

Flew the elder ducks to reach the hills,

For the nature’s law to survive,

Ducklings but too small to fly to the hilly lakes.

 

Earlier, started the monsoonal song above,

The pond got fed to be a tiny lake,

Secluded and safe turned the adjoining land,

For, no foot treads there

through the chilly winter whole.

 

And the ducks far in the hills

smell the heaven waiting motherly,

They feel the aroma of peace extreme in the plains,

Despite being so close to the agents of noise,

Arrived they with birdie songs and quacking notes.

 

Little ones, you were then just hopes,

Eyed the parents the village pond to breed,

Many dreams thronged the waters,

Swam throngs of tiny ducklings among the elders,

Quack-quack started the great birdie game.

 

Passed the winters; the early born grew,

Many more were the big ducks now,

But alas, the serenity lost,

The silence was conquered,

The spring brought the conquering foot.

 

Now, your elders sip peace in the hills,

You here; being the last to be born,

Unable to take the flight long,

Pray I, grow thou strong alone!

And conquer the hills with a brave song.

Nothing Isn’t My Village

 

Testy, desultory or heavenly,

Bright as theism or atheistic blind,

Devoid of twenty-first harum-scarum,

But not a dormouse of the nineteenth,

Nothing is my village, yet all.

 

Perfect are a few weeks of spring here

even without the famed flowering flora,

The acacia prickles smile

among the lush green branches,

Nature’s soldiers last; the green army retreating fast.

 

Not nature’s compassion soft,

Nor concrete’s girdle hard,

Soil’s warmth scent or burn,

Villagers enjoy the extremes both,

While, the oxen envy the master’s stamina.

 

Law abiding, if they ignore,

Awareness shows only the opposite,

Rises humanity with the sun,

Skilled and unskilled

live here lifefully most.

 

The summers pass, remain as they

cool to the facilitated islands,

Easily strolls the cold, stay as they warm

to the icy deprivations,

Such are the people here.

 

Aspire they only a harvest good,

Loss-gain being the sequence,

Teasing nature throws them

on the hard but motherly soil,

Live where they as simple villagers.

The Human Coronet

 

So strange are we humans,

Rule a swooning world by faking consciousness,

Take us to be the Kings but slaves we are

to the self-perpetuating mind’s yarn,

And always bowed down by the whirling emotions.

 

A tyrant is this human trait,

But compensates with coronation;

The humans rule with a heavy diadem,

Happy we are to be supreme in the food chain,

But fodder we are to our own selves.

 

Make we fun of the beasts

for being bald without the coronet;

The crown finds them too low,

So taken they are as light-headed and funny;

And we high with a loaded head.

 

Lashed is the master by the desires unstoppable,

Cries, wails, neighs, but cannot deny

as a revolting ‘no’ needs the head’s shake,

which the King’s craving avoids,

for any browbeat will turn the head bare.

 

Dressed we are with the shiny fabric

of chronic self-importance,

So much is piled up by the ‘thinker’

that it turns a creaky, complaining wagon,

Throw we then our load at others with hate.

Zeroed Self for the Crane Couple

 

The winter is ageing,

The small heaven sulks here,

Wheat’s seedlings strong now,

Dew feeds grass healthy,

Meekly await they, only you,

Yes, away you are! But where?

 

Winter always seemed natural,

Started with your arrival—

Legs long, wings big and beaks strong,

Made you look a bossy bird,

Echoed the horizon with your resounding cree…k,

Nothing is same without you.

 

What is this poor night

without those clarion calls?

Sailed which across the dark,

Now, the same night with

countless twinkling lamps above,

Alas! Missing is its pride.

 

So dull is the cold rain,

Drops waste without wetting your fur,

Ah, what luck of those

mingled which in your shabby coat!

Now die they in earth,

Tears are they for a chance missed.

 

Moon cared not about its diminishing size,

As you turned the crescent brighter,

Your gentle movements under

the chilly night played with solitude,

You alone were there to share its sorrow,

Empty now, and suffers alone.

 

Then, the sun played with earth;

Your shadow proved its essence,

Now, looks it timidly below,

Lost is its identity without you;

Nobody big like you is here

to play with the shining rays.

 

Red adorned you around the head,

The sky lost its colours in yours bluish gray,

The humans may envy size and

the stormy wind around the wings,

Even other delicate feathers looked strong,

Now, just poor birds are they.

 

Those long flights brought

the fragrance of land distance,

United was my country,

due to your migrations across it,

We felt unity in diversity,

Landed you down as you here.

 

Thy long strides measured the land,

Its vastness was proved by you,

Alas, lies it worthless now!

Unfortunate mother, without baby

to measure its maternal depth,

Away are you! Survive or not?

 

Little was your world,

despite all those bigs about you,

Bird’s vapour eyes you were not,

As, lesser was that scary alertness,

And still more, and more, as

I approached you with my humanness.

 

At a certain night

you tugged at my heart through the ears,

Heart’s imagery it was or else,

Maybe just a deep sigh of the past,

I don’t know:

At the zero hour

zeroed my imagination and reality.

The Weeping ‘Dead Place’

 

Solitary is the place,

Left out almost as a grave,

Comes nobody to live here,

As if a cemetery it is,

Beyond the nature-human tussle of life.

 

Pulled it never the time’s leg,

So passed it swiftly most;

Nothing blossomed here,

Which could drag along,

And force the time to stay and pause.

 

Shrubs, arid semi,

Rocky foothills small,

Faded grass, poor earth’s robe,

Sulks which in clumps,

at places here and there.

 

Chokes the wind to sing

the prayer for the dead,

Sunrays fall in impassivity,

And wail burningly,

Above is the sky forlorn and discharmed.

 

Thorny branch sheds tears

motherly for the birds,

But come they not in

the poor mother’s clumsy lap;

Play they in gaudy shades elsewhere.

 

Calls it the humans;

feebly crying to catch someone’s attention,

But, unbothered is everyone;

Man as well as nature,

All avoid this place.

That Great Flight

 

Merrily gushed the air,

Happily gyrated the tree compassionate,

Shook the nest; the nestlings became aware

of both good and bad comingled in nature.

 

Far away were the parents,

Laboriously engaged in ripe corn,

The farmer’s little son watched

the birds old, yet littlest to him!

 

Flew he them away unwillingly,

Due to father’s past rebukes,

Subdued which his innocence to give up

fancy and realize the ways of the old.

 

Flew then the group,

to that dense wood far,

Attracted which always

the little boy’s dreamy self.

 

Flew he also, one day,

On foot to catch his fancy,

Lagged behind but the poor,

for we humans trudge the earth only.

 

Realized the bird couple,

the plight innocent of the child,

Melt heart theirs for the child,

The same were in the nest.

 

Flew they slow and halted on the way,

To allow the man’s child to catch up,

Joined bird-human to fly,

Delighted which the mother earth.

 

The boy found himself in a dream;

Stood under the tree,

The birdie kids flapped their wings,

And parentally sang the bird couple.

Tolerance Divine

 

Bears society the onslaught,

Abound ‘isms’ around,

Suppress they the kind, loving natural self,

Dead sea are they,

Drowned is man in,

Modernity aids the evils old,

Making them almost immortal.

 

Shrinks the world today

with a deadly spasm,

Its small size

not a sign of humanity broad,

But a stone like

exploding dead apathy,

Useless is the human real

for the ultramodern heart,

Centuries tread away,

Tangled is man more;

Inhuman and intolerant manifold.

 

Yes! The only hope being

the tolerance divine;

The thing humane most,

Able to do good to all.

 

The chances to survive lie

not so in modernity,

As in being a human real,

Intolerant who is not

like a hardy machine soulless.

Rain, or Not?

 

Poor farmers provoked the monsoon,

For it’s their last savoir

despite the modernity all,

Farms, cattle, land lifeless feared the burning sand,

Looked meekly for the hope last.

 

Then came the respite thundering,

Healing them like mother’s kiss;

Hayricks, animals, mud-houses,

All made merry with jumpy Utopia,

But to a point only,

Because beyond that misery stares starkly.

 

Starts the spiritual plight again,

But for the opposite now,

Fee-fawing scarecrow turns the blessing,

As the little life of before,

Gets stalled by the gushing torrents,

Heresy turns all for the low-borns,

It’s a world swinging to the extremes,

Never allowing them the stable life of balmy

balance in the middle.

 

Viciously hammered all with the season—

Paddy appearing just grass over the water sheet,

The cattle gone ownerless,

And the farmers working tirelessly to

drain the great solvent away,

Now they pine for the dry earth;

Dreams of dry, buffeting, blinding sands,

Because water is the foe now.

 

Zoomed then the drama official,

In all its hypocritical sheen,

Came the dirty hand gloved nicely,

The chameleon offered the rites soft;

Joined mankind nature to plunder emotions.

 

But the poor people new,

The curse was no irresolvable puzzle,

Hide which can in the nature’s maze,

It was simply a man-made flood;

a common way of

saving a great city from getting flooded

by diverting the rich waters

to the poorer fates.