Abecedarian Poem; Spring at My Gate
Anemones
Blueberries
Chrysanthemums
Dahlias
Enjoying their day in the sun.
Flamboyantly swaying,
Going into raptures, craving to sing.
Happy at the arrival of spring.
I watch, bewitched.
Jubilation is injected into my gait.
Kay- kay -kay goes a
Lapwing.
Merry is the mood of every bird.
Naughty is the breeze.
Overhanging clouds- white, and
Pink, racing across the sky.
Quirky and fun-loving.
Rambunctious too.
Spunkily soaring.
Touching each other, impishly.
Unitedly creating a bright, new world.
Vibrating- pulsating.
Winsome.
Xanthisma blossoming with
Yellow blooms, aglow with the sunflower’s
Zest. Spring is at the gate, spring in my gait.
A THOUSAND TRUMPETS
The sky is mixing and remixing the clouds
like a maître d’ mixing salad with exaggerated
gestures of a snobbish gourmet.
A sliver of gold, a dollop of grey, and silver linings galore.
Misshapen shadows flit, lit with some lurking ardor.
The waves slither and creep,
skitter and slide
Roar and ripple and glide.
My imagination goes berserk
I see a tiny boat with a woman, so petrified
with a man at the oars pulling with all his might.
The swirling river tosses the boat;
it rears its head,
plunging its nose down. I gasp.
A thousand trumpets rasp away
in one voice of malicious gaiety.
I jerk myself free of this vision; relieved.
to find the water sparkling like sulphur
burning with a shower of blue sparks.
The river is no longer a naughty child,
it merely flirts with the boulders
watching the sun silently slip
behind the mountains’ shoulders.
A balmy breeze caresses me lovingly
beating in a synchronized rhythm.
Lo and behold!
The river is flooded with moonlight,
looking almost white as though diluted with milk,
delightfully pure and pristine.
A child, once again,
I snuggle in my mother’s arms.
No fears. No apprehensions.
A soothing balm calms me.
Charms me, pulling me away from harm.
Promises Kept and Unkept
Myriad-hued promises do a maladroit jig;
deluded into the belief
that they are part of a spectacular gig
that will fetch them big dividends.
There is pell-mell shelling.
The vacuity of words shells the commoners' ears,
luring them towards a non-existent paradise.
Loquacity is in full flow -slow becomes fast - faster.
Faster flow high-sounding words,
as rosy-hued reassurances, disguised.
Warning bells are drowned in the cacophony
of full-throated commitments, never to be realized.
Raucous drums beat stridently.
only to fall quiescent for years.
Five, to be precise.
Ears are bruised by
Goebblesian rantings.
Politicians puffing power-packed promises,
Glean bits and scraps from here and there
making a weird concoction, stitching the pieces deftly.
Abracadabra!
A brand new patchwork quilt of fabrication is born!
Another election has just gone.
Did the commoner win?
Or were common dreams again relegated to the dustbin?
We will soon know.
Meanwhile, we are waiting- breath bated.
Not Just Scraps of Thoughts
What is a poem, exactly?
Scraps of thoughts, whirling in the brain,
like bits of paper in a flurry of wind, slain.
It is a heartfelt prayer of gratitude
of one who has just been miraculously saved,
salvaged from his high-pitched whines
while in the throes of death.
A wilted rose magically revived.
The itching in the fingertips,
the forgotten notes on parched lips
exploding; an explosion aft, an explosion forward.
Yes, the petrified heartbeat of a coward.
It is also the sunray waltzing on a bald pate.
It is the valiant twinkle in the blind man’s eye,
the feeble light from a fragile lantern, burning bright.
It is the chuckle and chortle of an emaciated child,
beguiled by the flood of golden sunshine overhead,
who knows not the meaning of dearth
yet.
Don’t you see an intensely mournful verse
caught in the whimpers
of a mangy mongrel,
lying next to a bedraggled man near an overflowing gutter,
who does nothing but mutter
incoherent words?
It is the anguish of Pablo Neruda, bleeding on paper,
“com and see the blood in the streets.”
It is what remains when the bombs went off
when kids were savaged, ravaged by shrapnel.
When people with names,
were reduced to nameless statistics.
It was then that a high–spirited poem became a dirge.
A threnody.
It is the mist swimming in your eyes
as you listen to a young, terminally ill friend of yours,
clutching your hand, in a death-like grip,
and in a voice, tremulous and heart-melting,
asking you,” I am not going to die, am I ? “
A sad, sad poem lies therein.
The Fire of Life
The moon made grotesque faces
smirking at me through the window.
Was it trying to hint at something?
Something strange coming my way?
Banshees shrieked at the tops of their voices.
Their agonized screams calloused my eardrums.
Was Death going around in circles?
Round and round and round?
Jumping through circles of fire?
Was life slipping out of me?
Or merely taking me for a ride?
Well, wasn’t life a rickety ride anyway?
Going up and down, caught in turbulence.
Jumping, stumping folks with its weird antics.
I could see tongues of fire everywhere.
‘Fire on the mountain run-run- run.”
Who was humming this childhood chant?
I was stunned.
What did I see?
What did I hear?
Thunder tearing the surroundings asunder
More thunder!
Three silhouettes appearing and chanting:
“We weird sisters,
hand in hand,
swift travellers over the sea
And land,
Dance around and around like so. Three times
to yours
And three times to mine,
And three times again
To add up to nine
Enough! The charm is ready.” *
Would I now be thrown into a bubbling cauldron,
to suffer a fiery annihilation?
'Fire on the mountain run-run- run.”
Ah, the night was over.
It had played strange tricks,
scaring me with its nocturnal histrionics.
Was I still alive, despite the sisters’ charm?
Yes, I was! I was! I was!
The thunder had stopped.
There was a ball of fire in the East.
The three sisters had crept back into the pages of Macbeth,
taking the fiery cauldron with them.
But there was a fire in my belly.
And an inner flame that no evil charm could douse.
I WAS ON FIRE! I WAS ON FIRE!
The fire was in me!
*Macbeth Act 1, Scene 3
Dr Santosh Bakaya
Her other books are:
Where are the Lilacs? [Poems, AuthorsPress 2016]
Flights from my Terrace [Essays , AuthorsPress , 2017 ]
Under the Apple Boughs [Poems , AuthorsPress , 2017]
A Skyful of Balloons [ Novella, AuthorsPress , 2018 ]
Bring out the tall tales [short stories with Avijit Sarkar, AuthorsPress, 2019 ]
Only in Darkness can you see the Stars [biography of Martin Luther King Jr, Vitasta 2019]
Songs of Belligerence [ Poems, AuthorsPress, 2020 ]
Oh Hark! [Long poem, AuthorsPress, 2020]
Runcible Spoons and Pea green Boats [Poems, AuthorsPress [2021]
What is the Meter of the Dictionary? [Poems, AuthorsPress [Poems, 2022]
The Fog, A liquid Ditty Floats [Poems, AuthorsPress, 2023]
The Catnama [With Dr. Sunil Sharma, AuthorsPress, 2023]
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