Monday, May 13, 2024

Life Beyond a Storm

It was a terrible hailstorm,
The ice clods thudded with mad frenzy,
The rich rued car's broken glass,
The poor hadn't enough glass to lose,
But they had enough to be
beaten to trash in the open,
Their crop was trashed,
So they could feel each strike
as a stony hit,
Some farmers even thought of
calling it quits from the game of life,
Too much money to be paid
to settle the lease hold
and the entire crop in trashy fold,
Many birds also perished,
Nests, wings and eggs broken,
Trees bashed and stripped naked.

But there was a rainbow 
after all this was over,
The children played with ice marbles,
And there were enough birds alive
to carry the exciting chirps of life ahead,
The rainbow, surviving birds and playing children,--
The vibrant soldiers of life,
Carrying the message:
Life is above such momentary interjections;
The song, the excitement, the colors
take just a little break
during such momentary lapses,
They take the centerstage again
once the storm is over.

The storms don't define life,
they just affirm the strength and resilience 
of life against all momentary interjections.   

Love's truth

 When you are floating in love,
O my dearest dove,
You get another illusion to live
that you are here to give
a chance to someone to live,
But that's a polished, pious mask
to accomplish a humane task:
To cover the need to take
something moral from the fake,--
The pool of desires, needs and fears,
A smile offered to hide one's own pain and tears.

We are very-very needy
when we are ready
and run to fall in love's embrace
with full apparent grace,
The ugliness of our needy self remains hidden,
Run as we love-bidden,
We cover our pain with smile,
Paint selflessness on the needy guile,
We are looking for a hiding hole
after getting bored with journey sole,
To sneak in
to run away from the ever-chasing sin,
To run away
from the miserable self's sway.

We are a very poor dove
when we go seeking love, 
But we suppose ourselves to be rich,
So much for that illusionary itch,
In youth a body we need
for desire's feed;
In the middle age
caught in the cage,
we are looking to boost our faith
in greying, weakening vitality's swathe,
We feel cheated, deleted
and defeated
by the youth's passing clouds,
Struggle we to come out
of the grey shrouds,
We look for the confirmation
of our weakened vigor's strength
from some other soul;
In the age old,
our power and strength on hold,
Just a story already told,
Haunted by fears,
Tormented by pitiable tears,
We are seeking cushions
against falls giving broken bones,
To beat the loneliness ghosts
and avoid destiny's roast.

Love is a very sweet bargain
in lieu of all the sweet sounding 
treasures of fabled emotions,
The strength of love 
lies in confirming the needs and fears
as pure, pristine emotions
of just give, give and give,
While in reality,
we are merely there 
to take, take and take.


 

Friday, May 10, 2024

Gone

A little clump of trees
on the margins of a village,
A last refuge for 
some birds, squirrels, lizards and reptiles,
A mere dot of a forest,
A mere drop of green in the natural ocean
carrying a tiny essence of
the raw face of nature,--
Playful chirps, survival game,
hunting, mating, nestmaking,
dying, births--everything.
The sparrows raised 
the songs of dawn and dusk,
The little haws and coucal hunting till late,
The squirrel stole eggs,
The angry tailorbird threw abuses,
The cat too leapt for chance grabs,
The snake slithered around,
The peacock kept a stern watch,
The robins, rockchats, sparrows, flycatchers,--
the denizens of this tiny glimpse of a forest,
Lovemakings,
Births, 
Deaths,
A composite life 
throbbing with varied, chirpy excitement.
Then the humans again felt the need
for more land,
Arrived the clawy hand,
The mighty earthmover raged the place
with its metallic, predatory brace,
Gone was the little dot of natural grace,
The birds flew away,
The squirrels scurried around,
A snake with a futile crawl
and the panicked human brawl.
It's all clear now,
Ready for our developmental touch,
Silent mornings without bird songs,
The dusk too settles stealthily
without the goodbying chorus of sparrows,
It's all clear,
Finely levelled,
The wood taken,--
A fine plot 
with economic prospect and financial shot.
A cemented, plastered building will come up,
A stony castle of the human will,
To stand rock firm
against the time,
But I miss the sparrows
and their morning and dusk songs,
I miss that tiny stage 
bearing the raw game of nature
and life
among we humans. 
 
 

The futility of worldly love

I thought I loved you more,
But you too were sure
of your love as more pure,
The testing time but played smart cards,
and beat illusions by several yards,
With its neutral chime
wrote it its own rhyme,
Bared, naked, trimmed we stand,
No longer holding each other's hand,
Each other's faults we now weigh,
having eaten and spent the golden ray.


The inflated paradise
and the infatuated sighs
now cut down to paltry size.


The card castle on the heap of lies
sobbing with painful cries
and burning sighs,--
Sweet to sour,
Heavens to teary parting hour,
We humans first make
then break,
First make love
then eagle turns the former dove
and make war
for some negative excitement more;--
Just a long series of
little births and deaths,
Tiny beginnings and endings,
All these links form the final chain
between 
the first birth and the last death.  

The exiled darkness

The developmental lark
with its growth songs and financial hark
waging a fight against the dark,
Billions of bulbs in fight
against the night
to cast away shadows out of sight,
Now every nook corner has light.
We just want to have a day
with 24-hour ray
with our manipulative say,
But dark is the womb,
Flashes in which all this boom,
zoom
and the materialistic bloom,
Prevail it will
against all this human-centric hoot shrill,
It--the dark--transforms with a trill,
Wow what an amazing skill!
Dives it into the human heart
playing too smart,
The exiled darkness of night
keeps its fight
and throws a tart
ensnaring dart,
It stabs the human heart
with its shadowy, selfish art.
So into humans sneaks the gloom,
as they fornicate in full light and bloom,
Outside light, light and more light,
While inside us the ghosts dark fight,
Outside we turn rich,
Inside we carry a beggary itch,
Outside we seem to brightly smile,
Inside we frown with a dark guile.

Tuesday, April 30, 2024

The dying leaf

A dry leaf rustles
as a youthful gust of breeze hustles,
Says the leaf
full of wisdom untainted with grief:

"Dear don't feel proud
of this young, stormy shroud,
You feel that you move the world,
Thy stormy vanity funnily curled,
Drunk with age and passion whirled,
Jesting with someone like me
blown away and crumpled.
I too was once luscious green,
An exuberant teen
with new-age glean,
A prince lost in his sheen,
Realities buried under the screen,
and pride prancing with haughty preen,--
Someone like me
nowhere to be seen.
Thought I was the entire forest
and me the dearest.
Meanwhile, chuckled time
at my childish chime,
Blew it away the flowery spring ray,
And here I lay,
having spent--or wasted?--my day,
The pride and boast tossed away,
All dusted, crumbling on the way,
With whom you now play,
But listen mate,
Everyone has a date
with the inevitable fate,
So as you celebrate
with youthful gusto great,
Walk chest out, spine straight,
Look at me crumpled
and trampled,
Remember you should always
as you sashay through the maze
that a mighty storm you are not
which will burn forever hot,
You too will trip
and slip,
And helplessly lie
to die,
And look at the sky
with a remorseful sigh
for having run
with fruitless fun,
Too vain and lost
without looking at the host,--
The ever-welcoming 'Now'
always fruitlessly waiting with a kind bow. 

Saturday, April 27, 2024

The juice of life

Dry branches just fretfully shake and bow
to the wind's playful shove,
Leafy green branches gyrate and sway
even to the pulls of stormy winds.
The juice of life.
It's playful,
mischievous,
swaying.