by Raja Sharma
Never did I realize how it happened!
All that counted: 'One' means go many ways.
Compulsion, uselessness means lot to me,
I will pass away like a scholar high,
Ere long new class will spell 'I', 'We', and 'He'.
Truth never taught, nor teacher brave to tell,
SHOW with or without wisdom is to end,
Some more life Alexander did yell!
Chapter 23: Fibrils
A zealous ant working to build a hill
Delights me no less than
An old man setting his own house on hill
Shows the measured life-span.
A child striving to climb a box and hold
Enthralls me no less than
A young winner atop a podium with gold
Brings smiles to the whole clan.
A bee collecting honey in a hive
Touches me no less than
A father, working for palaces five,
Who passes to past man.
A tiny wisp of a seed being a tree
Means lot more to me than
A beautiful nymph dancing proud and free
Fades out with tan gone wan.
Me, my mind, meanings mine for all to mine:
World with wild weanlings vainly thinks to shine.
Chapter 24: By the People
A modern Macbeth somberly attired,
Surrounding macaques all cleverly share.
Macaws in all parliaments hardly tired
Of painting macabre now everywhere.
Lady Macbeths smile and fly in glory,
Unheedful of the whines of distant roads.
The approaching drums of time feel sorry
To remind the stories of painful loads.
Tenure ends and protagonist is changed,
with fresh promises in new bottles of death.
Own is all and others chessmen in range
To be hired and fired in classified breath.
Now I wait for Duncan's Resurrection
To mend damaged bliss with Godly action.
Chapter 25: I Take Chance
Divide people, mar the race, see dark dance;
Don't ask me to join, for I mere human
Dressed like you, away from you, I take chance.
They gave name, I spoke tongue they said was mine,
This tribe this form that God all came to me,
Then if I borrowed renounce, why they whine?
Leave me alone on my own all I care!
Lost in life, living dead to whole your world!
Let me make place in rhyme for all to share.
Peers will peer from poesy that I write here
Pounce refute reject while you've time now
Pray, don't bring this along when there we near!
Chapter 26: They will Say
It's a son; it’s a daughter, they will say
Give all Glory to God, sing and be gay.
Potters begin shaping unformed new clay
Love, anger, joy, changing moods of the day.
The gardeners will see fortune's display
Offspring leaving home one dark dreary day.
The syringe of delight waits for the prey
This modern life will bring its own decay.
Young harsh words they'll wish child'll unsay
Pierced hearts will never real hurt betray.
Dancing dear daffodils'll seem like hay
They'll claim these are not the flowers of May.
The old grim reaper will hold final sway!
We sent a beautiful child, out to play!!
We had a darling child, the tears will say!
The future's not fair, we can only pray.
Chapter 27: Perchance
Hold me tightly, perchance this be last tryst
Haply in life never again be kissed.
Fate ordained these fleeting moments to us
Discern me closely to heart's content thus.
Perhaps this very night by you be missed
Haply in life never again be kissed.
Come closer, for I'll never come again
Embrace me so that eyes could shower rain
lest our love's this divine drizzle be missed
Haply in life never again be kissed.
Hold me tightly, perchance this be last tryst
Haply in life never again be kissed.
Chapter 28: An Added Player
This life I live was once the sperm,
This mind in a foreign book.
Thoughtless sperm found a mate,
Being one they looked for a gate.
Did parents know me when close to mate?
This form I have was once unknown,
This voice in ether heard alone.
Mama gave first word to speak,
Now she listens, only I speak.
Did she know when about to teach?
This Mr. So and so was once the sound,
Sound they make and Lo! I found.
Sound ‘n’ I have things to share,
Words are only that I care.
Did you wait for this added player?
Play your role and say Goodbye!
Don’t think much, “Who am I?”
Chapter 29: Pain Gain Shame Game
Pain, pain, lasting pain,
Go find some satanic abode!
Would that you never crossed this path!
Gain, gain, lasting gain,
Release peace from horrific hold!
Would that love changed your devil's wrath!
Shame, shame, lasting shame,
Find salvation never be born!
Would that no one had love betrayed!
Game, game, lasting game,
Leave my true love in a pious form!
Would that love was eternally played!
Chapter 30: Abaddon
This world to me is only undesired
Transient smile, a heard sound merely wordage.
The unheard melodies divine, untired
Flow from Master to this ignorant page.
Father to me is a failed Daedalus
Striving to accomplish aberration.
Icarus vanishing into blue rush
Mocking at follies of human creation.
Labyrinth of worldly struggles and strifes
Leaves me with a deep mournful sigh of grief.
Now family, kingdom, or nation thrives
With a cabal's assent in journey brief.
Judas, Brutus, Iago in harmony
Playing symphony higher than Babel.
Abaddon I live in, sad and gloomy
Pretending a smile, sharing the table.
Chapter 31: Life Divine
A step of yours, a step of mine,
Two souls one being make life divine.
Your coy smile kindled first pure hope,
This dark priest's only love in prime.
Shedding reason's fictitious cloak,
Plunging in your eyes wasn't a crime.
They saw your visage in my eyes,
Altering clime raised love sublime.
They heard you in my lover's sighs,
With your name's sound my eyes did shine.
I curse the time that made you turn,
Winds of change brought a change of mind.
Unseen rival caused hurt and burn,
Thought love betrayed but I was blind.
I prayed and begged but all in vain,
I couldn't sing lovers' song of mine.
Bade adieu, never came again,
But I am waiting for bell's chime.
A step of yours, a step of mine,
Two souls can still make life divine.
Chapter 32: Own Kind
"Tiny ant that left the hill digressed,
With antly pride it distanced from the rest.
The swallow swallowed it in direct hit.
Hawk-eyed hawk harked the chirping of delight,
Curved claws picked it cleanly for longer flight."
Thus Godly angels shared stories of earth,
Various tales of creatures they told with mirth.
Lord God and Gabriel heard and simply smiled,
With one creature's ghastly deeds their hearts cried.
"Yours are parts of nature's perfect cycle, dears,
One is still there, and he brings only tears.
Tachyon he tries to find to reach divine,
Machetes and guns his means of human crime.
He is the one who I repent to find,
He is the only one who kills his kind."
Chapter 33: Daily Armageddon
Pandora's play in pious world
Gives rise to doubts in modern mind.
Grecian tales of glory I heard
Now to believe them is hard grind.
Shepherd's wave caused a great turmoil
BC to AD did time change.
Resurrection would mend all spoiled?
Generations passed, world deranged.
Pagan's armoire fictitious pearls
Palanquin carrying bride yonder.
Eastern wail on these shores unfurls
Unnumbered deads see I wonder.
The Scriptural end of life here
Was a grand saga I was told.
What worse can now come? I don't fear
Daily Armageddon all behold!
Chapter 34: Catch the Bird of Truth
He trudged along, deaf to the worldly strifes
When at bottom, lure too much to decline
Every step leaden, some regrets and sighs
Yet, Mill's wanderer impelled him to climb.
Treasure-Trove of Muse imagined when young
Bard, Milton, Yeats, and others kindled fire
Lyric divine in glory never sung
He knew yonder golden globe was dark mire.
Sounds, words, phrases, beads of his fine garland
Decked with all the beauties his prime poesy
Many a bald head called it castle of sand
His glass filled, back bent, his cheeks not rosy.
Time will take its toll and he will acquiesce
Strewn lines haply Keats' pal will pick one day
Will epitaph show how his struggle cease?
Will Frost stop by now with elegy grey?
Chapter 35: I am always all Ways
Then land was green: they sang aloud
No chaos seen: he saw no crowd.
Happy Adam and Eve in prime of time
He heard no keen: they felt no proud.
They called him all: he was the time
He saw them fall; he saw their line.
He witnessed the death of Abel through Cain
They called it call: he saw decline.
He saw it clear; he saw it plain
They all were near; they all felt shame.
Many false Aron now disguised as priest
He did not fear; he did not gain.
Age passed by him: he saw each beast
No mood no whim: no West no East.
He stands at a point of inconstancy
Some shine some dim: cruel he cares least!
Chapter 36: Shadows of Love
Dreams are on the wings that mock us,
And love a whisper among leaves;
Bliss of Shepard's love beyond us,
Truth is now like dry barley sheaves.
Hope like waning breaths leaving us,
Clutching at every spar we cry;
Echo our sighs come back to us,
Sad souls, damp spirits, and dry eye.
This poem is dedicated to the great master W.B.Yeats whose poems have always inspired me to unfathomable limits.
Chapter 37: Wandering
Deep in the valley of flowers
Once I saw her smile;
Waves of hair, lotus of eyes
A vision to beguile.
Ensuing dreamy long nights
With unsound sleeps in the dark;
Morning lines on paper
With scribbling hand, a deep mark.
Decades of my lonely wandering
In the valley of flowers;
Revealed new buds of poesy
And I gazed them for hours.
Hair streaked with gray, mind still
Lost in deep valley of chase;
Few sad breads still remaining
Ere they call me past phase.
Chapter 38: Africa
A mere shadow of a body to eyes
Hunger and fatigue the visible attire
The world gleefully burning in hellish fire
Will Divine descend to the mournful cries?
Sad eyes look for a grain in the parched land
Ravenous landscape wants more brine of eyes
Heavenly water before it falls dries
Mouth the grave of words, a waving dark hand.
Will the lot of dark continent ever alter?
Will Luther's voice call White God from heaven?
When they will not be gnawed by deadly raven
When skeletal child will never falter.
Chapter 39: Every Desdemona
The joy they had had its reason for all
An angel, a baby, was breathing there
A moment so divine they felt that fall
The scene encouraging parental care.
The mother first to kiss the girl's forehead
An ocean so calm with currents of gold
The father's smile bending over the bed
Arms extending for safe fatherly hold.
The years went past before they could surmise
The young girl was now dancing all around
Passing springs had made her pretty and wise
The parental delight now knew no bound.
The dim-lit room had only sighs and sobs
Ma and pa weeping in their love's embrace
What gardener feels when a stranger robs
And a pious bud follows an unknown face!
Sense of loss in dark ravine of sorrow
No more calls come from their lovely angel
Will smiling face appear on the morrow?
Sad mother picks up her fallen bangle.
Broken heart, shattered dreams now only friends
Remorse, guilt don't suffer steps to go home
Stranger, the vampire, sucked her beyond mends
Blake's experience led to innocence gone.
Every Desdemona in life is free
Many a Milton repeats this story old
I take this life with both sorrow and glee
Every event for poet is precious gold.
Chapter 40: Not in this World
Angelic wings, bear these tidings yonder
Last breath clings to lips to see her visage
Pray, don't let my this wish turn into dust
Lest time kill only desire, I wonder.
What words will tell the agony of love?
How hurt was the bodily form of mine?
Divinity and death showed some mercy
Left that life below and raised me above.
She attired in her white bridal glory
Stealthily & gently kissed my sad shroud once
Since that fortunate blessed day in heaven
The fairies kept me as groom for story.
O! My deep abode dictate your soiled path
Beware of soiling my bridal shroud now,
For only today I have changed my clothes
Only today taken the holy bath.
Life did never render this peace divine
I'll wait patiently till eternity
I can see the light of those bles
sed moments
When she'll amble into embrace of mine.
Chapter 41: Lost with Epochs: Good for Poesy
Infinite like the universe around
Thoughts arising now unbound and myriad.
Why then this mad mind persisted in one
Who caused me to this deep slumber, sans sound?
Dark life personified like Plath's "Daddy"
Lawrence gloomy with stream of consciousness
Windhover's splendor transient for Hopkins
I know, for played golf being my own caddie.
Your silken tresses fit for Bard's poesy
Pious love vanished with lost ancient ballads
Chastity sunk in Elizabethan plays
Remorseless, modern, she doesn't get rosy.
Chapter 42: My Lines
My love wanders away
From all that is man-made.
Mobbed by faces on my way
No piper under the shade.
