Why This Hurry

(it seems our normally very brief winter will be briefer this year)

 

 

Gliding through the mist

Winter alighted

On my palm-

It held in its beak

A marigold promise

Of staying long-

Its plumage not as bright-

Eyes listless

feet, in fear-

In a feeble chrysanthemum note

It crooned into my ears

About the lost bees-

Then I don’t know why

It threw all its song into the fire

And left me to a pitiless sun so soon-

 

Posted for Susan’s Midweek Motif ~ Climate Change @ Poets United

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The Poet Has Gone

SOURCE

It’s comfortably cold here-

Winter birds have all come-

The pond is full

With water, tree-shadows and fish-

The blue sky seems dreamy,

So are the night stars-

Things of beauty,

Scattered everywhere

Like a Mary Oliver page-

Yet there’s an uncanny calm-

Where’s the ecstasy gone

With the “luminous fruits”,

“emerald eddies”, “lean owls”

“egrets”, “daisies” and all……

When I close my eyes

I see ‘red’

What’s burning, methinks-

A fire in a forest in a faraway land

Or a heart?

An ear of mine catches a note-

Is it a dirge in the woods?

May be-

A poet is gone-

Words in inverted commas are from Mary Oliver’s Poems

 

Posted for Poetry Pantry #436 @ Poets United

Balance

There’s a winter cocooned

In my summer heart-

So it is more seeming

Than true

More red than blue-

While living in a home

Of monochrome-

Abhorring the first month of the year

My laughter and smiles

Layer the tear-

 

Posted for my prompt ~ Life: Paradox And / Or Balance @ Poets United Midweek Motif

This poem is a fig tree, a bowl of sweet and enlightenment

Google Image

 

This poem is a large fig tree,

a witness to the struggles

of a seeker, smoldering within-

whose body, like the last autumn leaf

brown, emaciated, was about to drop off-

the tree could do nothing save being a shelter,

a prayer for this man ablaze in renunciation-

This poem is a Bodhi tree

 

 

This poem is an earthen bowl of payasam*

in the hands of a village maid

who sang a song of the ‘middle-path’

and offered the seeker the delicacy

which the ascetic accepted-

sun and moon rose and set

no manna ever came his way again-

this poem is Sujata’s bowl of sweet-

 

 

This poem is a story of enlightenment

of a prince in his thirties

who wished to conquer desire, disease and death-

he had his ‘rafter broken’,

his ‘ridge pole destroyed’-

his ‘mind came to the end of craving’-

he became Peace himself and a Buddha-

this poem is Man’s enlightenment

 

 

this poem is a sacred tree that saw a seeker transcend

this poem is a bowl of heavenly sweet that led a seeker

this poem is enlightenment a seeker leaves home for

 

 

*milk-rice pudding

The poem is written in Boomerang Metaphor (invented by Hannah Gosselin)

 

Posted for Poetry Pantry #435 @ Poets United

A New Beginning

SOURCE

 

In time

When darkness spills darkness

And one lives in a broken nest of alphabets

Where mother bird is a swear word-

All I can do is

Learn to stop saying yes

When I don’t mean it-

All the while

Wearing a homely smile-

The new button-

 

 

Posted for Susan’s Midweek Motif ~ Starting Over @ Poets United

Peace On Earth

 

I

Nights are longer

Peace keeps coming out

Of the hymns

 

II

Bluethroat* sings peace

In its winter home

Of our land

 

III

Curled up

In its mother’s lap

A child calls the moon

*Bluethroat is a migratory bird from thrush family

Posted for my prompt ~ Peace On Earth @ Poets United Midweek Motif

Surprise

SOURCE

 

Most of the time my thoughts,

largely black

in their forehead, crown and throat,

save the grey nape and breast,

caw vehemently

over carrions

of day to day life-

am I not surprised

when they are no more the crows

they are-

but asian paradise flycatchers-

with milky plumage all over-

with a glossy, navy blue crown-

majestic-

their throat holding a sweet note-

speckling my glowing inner sky

with their angelic flight-

 

Posted for Susan’s Midweek Motif ~ Surprise @ Poets United

Let Them Pass Away

 

dying diseased words

gasp-

the scaly, slippery beings-

how they are

bereft of that golden sheen-

bred in cramped quarters

of cliché ,

exaggeration,

untruth,

they can no longer take in

the stress

of being hyper active-

how hard it is

for one

to let go of their pet words-

 

 

Posted for Poetry Pantry 431@ Poets United

My Morning Poem

Ramakrishna

 

I breathe

Your words

So breezy and cool-

I perform my ablutions

With your

Words each dawn-

How myriad suns

Emerge from your words

To enter all my dark corners-

You are the alpha

And omega

Of my existence-

 

You are my morning poem

 

 

Posted for my prompt ~ Morning Poem @ Poets United Midweek Motif

A Prayer for myself

Praying Hands by Albrecht Dürer

 

How can this mind of mine

so full of worldly delights

taste divine bliss

of thy name?

Neither had I left everything

nor had I followed thou-

how can I taste divine bliss

of thy name?

Let this mind be a lotus leaf

shaking off the last droplet of worldliness

and taste the divine bliss

of thy name.

May this mind of mine

only seek holy company, solitude and thou-

just to taste the divine bliss

of thy name.

O my mind

be restless and be intoxicated

with the divine bliss

of His name.

 

Posted for Susan’s Midweek Motif ~ Prayer @ Poets United