SING OUR SOULS FOR YOU....

 

  CONTENTS

1.      TO LORD JAGANNATH, THE OMNIPRESENT

2.      A HYMN TO LORD SHIVA

3.      A HYMN TO MAA SARASWATI

4.      A LETTER TO LORD GANESHA

5.      LET'S TAKE AN OATH ON THE HOLY BUDDHA PURNIMA DAY!

6.      LET’S CELEBRATE DIWALI LIKE THIS!

7.      MY CHRISTMAS WISH

8.      8.      AHMED'S ARDENT APPEAL TO MUHAMMAD

9.  9      GOD! HOW LONG WILL YOU BE A SILENT SPECTATOR?

10.  RELIGIOUSLY SPEAKING.....

11.  A HUMBLE PRAYER TO THE RIVER GANGA

1212.  O GOD! WE SEEK YOUR GRACE AND BLESSINGS FOR VISHNU.

13.  HOLI IN MY CHILDHOOD

14.  TEARFUL TRIBUTES TO JAYEE RAJGURU

15.  A TRIBUTE TO UTKAL GAURAB MADHUSUDAN DAS

16.  A TRIBUTE TO UTKALMANI GOPABANDHU DASH

17.  A TRIBUTE TO SWAMI VIVEKANAND

18.  A TRIBUTE TO SUBHAS CHANDRA BOSE

19.  TO SARDAR PATEL, THE IRON MAN OF INDIA

20.  WHAT DOES THE LIFE OF LAL BAHADUR SHASTRI TEACH US?

21.  TO MAHATMA GANDHIJI, THE FATHER OF THE NATION

22.  IN MEMORY OF DHYAN CHAND

23.  REMEMBERING DR. B.R AMBEDKAR

24.  A TRIBUTE TO PT. BHIMSEN JOSHI

25.  A SALUTE TO BHARAT RATNA DR. A. P. J ABDUL KALAM

26.  A TEARFUL AND FLORAL TRIBUTE TO BHARAT RATNA ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE!

27.  MAA BHARATI SINGS FOR SUSHMA SWARAJ.

28.  NAMO REDEFINED

29.  A 74TH BIRTHDAY WISH TO SJ. NAVEEN PATNAIK

30.  TO HELEN KELLER

31.  TO PELE - THE FOOTBALL KING

32.  A TRIBUTE TO SACHIN TENDULKAR

33.  A BOUQUET OF GRATITUDE TO MY INVISIBLE AND ALTRUISTIC FRIEND 

34.  TO ‘DHAN’ - MY DECEASED BABY DAUGHTER

35.  A COMMON TALE OF A SOLDIER’S LIFE

36.  BE AT LEAST A HUMAN BEING.

37.  A HAPLESS DAUGHTER’S LETTER FROM HER MOTHER’S WOMB

38.  PLANTS’ PLAINTS

39.  HOW MUCH YOU AGREE?

 40.  AN ODE TO PLASTIC

4141.  AN INDEPENDENCE DAY RESOLUTION

4242.  AN ECHO OF EVERY INDIAN HEART

4343.  HARK! THIS IS WHAT KASHMIR SPEAKS OF NOW.

4444.  DON’T ASK.

45.  TODAY

46.  TO THE MODERN OZYMANDIAS

47.  NIRBHAYA ASKS, "WHY DO YOU FORGET?"

48.  A DROP OF PARENTS’ TEAR

49.  PARENTS’ LOVE

50.  TO THE LECHEROUS RAPISTS

51.  LET’S DETHRONE THE MONARCHS OF CRUELTY

52.  HOW REAL IS THE MODERN MAN'S LOVE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT?

53.  TELL 2020 TO TELL.

54.  NEW YEAR

55.  A 17TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY GIFT TO MY BETTER-HALF

56.  TO MY DESDEMONA

57.  A SONNET THAT ALL VALENTINES WOULD LOVE TO HUM

58.  AN ODE TO MY LOVELY PYARI GUDIYA

59.  TO MY EID KA CHAND

60.  AN ODE TO MY LIFE'S MONALISA

61.  YOU ARE ONE OF THE COSTLIEST CASKETS OF ALL THE FEMININE VIRTUES.

62.  THE LANGUAGE OF MY HEART

63.  A POET

64.  YES, WHO ELSE CAN BE SUCH AN ADORABLE LIAR? 

6565.  TO MY FATHER ON HIS 43rd DEATH ANNIVERSARY

ABOUT THE POET:-

 

Dr. Shankar D Mishra, the youngest among the three sons and a daughter of Dibyasingh Mishra, and Saria Mishra, was born on 5th June 1973, At/Post TadasRamahansPur, Via- ChandanPur, Dist. - Puri, Odisha, India. He was bereaved of his father when he was hardly two years old. As a result, he was compelled to pass through the bitterest phase of poverty, insecurity and uncertainty in life, however he was timely taken care of by his two elder brothers, his sister and widow mother whose invaluable contributions made him a Sr. Lecturer in English in KalingaBharati Sanskrit College, Jajpur, Odisha, India in the long run. The contributions of Mr, Lokanath Mishra, his cousin, and Mr. Lingaraj Dash, the then H.O.D of English, SurajmalShaha College, Puri can never be forgotten. Since marriage in 2003, his better half has been a pivotal cog in his life's mansion.

 

The poet admits that teaching has vastly inspired him to be an author of two published grammar books “Tips To Be Top’ And “Rishabha’s Tips Series In English Grammar”for the high school and college students, as well as a bilingual poet. His first poetry anthology 'A Cynosure of English Poems' was published by the Poets Foundation, Kolkata. Its Foreword was penned by Dr. D. C Chambial, a distinguished editor of a literary magazine ‘The Poet-Crit’, Himachal Pradesh, India. Dr. Mishra has been published in a score of leading Literary Journals of India like Poet-Crit, Himachal Pradesh, Rock Pebbles, Odisha, SamvednaKarnataka, Bizz Buzz, Karnataka, The Poetic Bliss, Andhra Pradesh, Poetry World, Tamil Nadu, ContemporaryVibes, Chandigarh, Poetry Today, West Bengal, Replica, Odisha, Triveni, Andhra Pradesh,. His poem "How Much You Agree?" published in "Samvedna", Mangalore, Karnataka, India, was adjudged the second best among the Indian poems by Chetna Literary Group, headed by Dr. Skanda Prasad and the poet was awarded in Mangalore, in 2007. The same poem inspired Dr. Adolf P Svedchikov, a Russian American Scientist to translate that into Russian language in 2011. The poet received an email from the former Hon'ble President of India, Late Dr. A. P. J Abdul Kalam, who was touched by two of his poems, “A Salute To Dr. A. P. J Abdul Kalam” and “To Dhan, My Deceased Baby Daughter”, published in Poetry Today, a monthly Literary Magazine, published from Tamil Nadu, India. His poems have often been adjudged Best, and Outstanding by some Facebook Literary Groups like “Aesthetic And Heritage”, “Chironton”,“Antoheen”, “Institucion Cultural Colombiana CASA POETICA Magia y Plumas”, “NossaEssencia”, “Peace and Love Inkers Society”, “GENESIS WORLD WRITERS COMMUNITY (GWW)”, ‘RevistaPoetica Y Artes”, “Spiritual Poetry For The Soul” etc. His poem ‘Thank You, Corona’ published in a literary magazine ‘Poetry Today’, received the best Indian poem’s award on behalf of Poets Foundation, West Bengal, 2021. Ten other anthologies of the poet, including English and Odia, are under publications. He has translated three translation books from Odia to English written by Late Baikunthanath Acharya. He has been posting his poems on his blog: sdmpoetry.blogspot.com for more than five years. His blog has been viewed more than 1, 20,000 times across the globe. All the poems in this anthology have been taken from the blog. He has recently opened a website: http://sdmenglishtuitions.comto provide online guidance to the ICSE and CBSE students across the country.

 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is his most loved poet. According to Dr. Mishra: ‘Poetry is the wordy, suckled offspring of a sacred, solemn communion of matured  experiences with emotions, conceived in the subtle niche of an observant, thoughtful, imaginative and sensitive human mind.’

 

 

 

SINGOUR SOULS FOR YOU.

 (THE 2ND ANTHOLOGY OF POEMS)

 

TO LORD JAGANNATH, THE OMNIPRESENT

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the light ascending vapours

In the life rendering waters

In the dancing waves of the seas

In the mellow melodies of the bees!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the bright blinks of the stars

In the mocking mystery of the Mars

In the serene face of the Moon

In the healing beauty of the boon!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the green vernal woods

In the life sustaining foods

In the dulcet chirrups of the birds

In the imminent birth of the buds!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the sweet aroma of the flowers

In the soothing magic of the showers

In the crimson dawn of the day

In the immaculate children’s say!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the shy glance of the brides

In the triumphant players’ strides

In the innocent smiles of the babes

In the patriots’ immortal graves!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the sugary taste of the cherries

In the auto-charging human brain batteries

In the honest perspirations of the toilers

In the public service of the just rulers!

 

O Lord!

Thou art in the earnest prayers of the reasonable

In the decent demeanours of the humble

In the sublime missions of the noble

Behind each and every creation inscrutable!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A HYMN TO LORD SHIVA

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the light feathers' flutter

In the free birds’ harmonious twitter

In the Neem leaves curative though bitter

In the falling rain drops’ musical patter!

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the tiny emerald grass blades

In the deep, tranquil vales and glades

Inthe cooling and soothing shades

In the most intelligent human heads!

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the all-pervading wind’s breath

In the devotees' unflinching spiritual faith

Behind every living organ’s death and birth

Behind all activities upon this unique Earth!

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the ever prevailing truth and virtuous duty

In the fair, unmixed, purifying and perpetual Beauty

In the self-realized and confessed remorse

Inside and outside the never-ending Universe

 

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the merciful silver beads of showers

In the benevolent benefactors' forgiving powers

In the pleasing tunes of the mellifluous choirs,

In all the marvels and across the astoundingairy layers!

 

O Lord!

You dwell in the omni-present, minutest atoms

In the five oceans’ mysterious, marvellousbottoms

In the tender petals of the fragrant nectar-blossoms

In the amazing effects of chanting ‘Aums and Bolbams'!

 

 

A HYMN TO MAA SARASWATI

 

O Maa!

Irrefutably, You are the eternal source of art, music and speech

To be bestowed upon the gifts of language, I do humbly beseech!

Without Your generous grace, none can perfection reach

Unless You munificently bless none can dream to preach!

 

O Maa!

May the universe, to the sweet tune of Your Veena, ever dance

May Your Light of Knowledge dispel the global gloom of ignorance

MayYour bounty breed Love and Peace in abundance

May Yourcelestial glanceremove poverty,cruelty and indolence!

 

O Maa!

May Your benediction of enlightenment illuminate the bleak world

May Yourkindness alleviate all woes; and health and wealth herald

May You encourage all to cultivate the crops of refined culture

May all plant the saplings of bliss to end sorrows, and savour rapture!

 

O Maa!

May the stems of my wishes bear the Elysian Success-Fruits,

May all benurtured and nourished by You, the Root of all the roots!

 

 

A LETTER TO LORD GANESHA

 

O Dear Lord Ganesha! Do You really want -

To be made up of POP, anti-natural stuffs, and chemicals

To be painted with dazzling,insoluble and hazardous hues

To be set up and worshipped on the vain, ostentatious Pandals

To stand like a skyscraper, or sit like a sprawling banyan tree huge?

 

O Dear Lord Ganesha! Do You really want -

The public roads being overcrowded, impassable and chaotic,

AsYou are fondly fetched to the Sanctuaries, and bidden tearful farewells;

To be evaluated for prizes by Your children devout and angelic,

Andpreach “In bacchanalian binges and deafening drums devotion dwells?”

 

O Dear Lord Ganesha!

The Remover of all omens and evils

The Tranqilizer of all the ugly devils

The Bestower of good luck, happiness and salvation

The Showerer of wisdom and enlightenment -

Will You chalk out a prompt and infallible solution

So that there can be a relieving end

To the degrading, disgusting and destructive trend

Leading to sighs of relief for the tyrannized surroundings that lament!

 

O Dear Lord Ganesha!

Hope, You will raptly read my letter to act upon it at the earliest

Lest such mad and sad fads and celebrations should turndeadliest!

 

LET'S TAKE AN OATH ON THE HOLY BUDDHA PURNIMA DAY.

 

Let's receive a redeeming Ray of light

From the luminous Light of Asia!

Let's extract a heavenly delight

From His sweet Enlightenment Ambrosia!

 

Let’s practise His principle of universal fraternity

Let's love and respect the whole humanity

Let's douse the flames of rage with the cooling water of compassion,

Let's defeat by peaceful arms the devils of violence and devastation!

 

Let's become the helping props for the needy and the crippled

Let's be the useful supports for the destitute creepers disabled

Let's sprinkle the rare Nectar of Love in the disintegrating society

Let's ward off hatred, malevolence, exploitation, fear and brutality!

 

Let's take this solemn oath on the holy Buddha Purnima Day

Let's seriously remould our subtle minds of raw, delicate clay!

Before it rains cats and dogs, let's now sensibly make hay

Let’s, for the global harmony and happiness,solemnly pray!

 

 

LET’S CELEBRATE DIWALI LIKE THIS.

 

Let’s retreat to the eco-friendly diyas, sweets and charming rangoli

During the customary annual festival of Light called Diwali!

Let’s spread the illuminating radiance of hope among one and all

Let’s rejoice over Truth’s triumph, and revel over Evil’s fall!

 

Let’s commemorate the return, from exile, of Ram, Laxman and Sita

Let’s assimilate and practise the prime purport of the Bhagavad Gita!

Let’s make Diwali more memorable by diffusing the harmful crackers

Let’s not be Nature’smad, blind wreckers, but be her loving caretakers!

 

Let’s not make a mockery of such a holy and pious occasion

By bursting thunderous crackers, and spewing lethal poison!

Let’s not smother the breath of the already diseased Mother Nature

Let’s relieve Her of Her ever-worsening pain due to our crazy rapture!

 

Let’s be sensitive to Her irreparably pollution-propelled wounds

Before being easily preyed by our own proliferated pollution hounds

Before being smitten by our pampered, frenzied and pernicious sounds

Before digging our own graves on the ever-expanding cremation grounds!

 

Diyas – Small cup-shaped oil lamps made of baked clay

 

 

MY CHRISTMAS WISH

 

O God!

Let me first be a student meek, obedient and humble

Let my thoughts, like the water of the Ganges, be clean, pure and noble

Let never my actions, like the obnoxious germs, be ugly and abominable

So that in life’s miry pond, I may bloom, like a Lotus bright and adorable!

 

O God!

 Let me first be a teacher well versed, disciplined and modest

Let me own a virtuous character - a must for all, to pass the ultimate Test

Let me, till my last breath, tirelessly, persistently, and honestly toil and sweat

So that I may mercifully be blessedwith eternal peace, contentment and rest!

 

O God!

Let me first be a man sincerest, strictest and staunchest

Let me never deviate from my just pursuit, and right quest

Let me never shirk my duty and blame You for my own sculpted fate

Lest I should miss, at length, to get a ticket to enter Your heaven's gate!

 

 

AHMED'S ARDENT APPEAL TO MUHAMMAD

O Lord! Let me never slumber on the mattress of misappropriated money

Let me never build a mansion on the foundations of the ill-gotten plunders

Let me never live, as the sucking bees, on the innocent’s invaluable blood-honey

Let me never stand on the sham summit of plenitude pursuing steps of blunders!

 

O Lord! Let me never dangle the looted laurels and the bribed badges of triumphs

Let me never win the Olympic Golds in Race crushing the soft, guiltless chest of lawns

Let me never be a Goneril or a Regan to hoodwink a many credulous King Lears

Let me never bathe beneath the shower of cheers by pumping the helpless, sour tears!

 

O Lord! Let me ever assure none to fetch the largest whales from the top of the skies

Let me ever promise none to pluck from the bottom of the deepest oceans the Sun

Let me ever tempt none with the irresistibly coveted creams of lovely, rampant lies

Let me never take the pious souls for granted to be bereaved, at length, of Salvation!

 

 

O GOD! HOW LONG WILL YOU BE A SILENT SPECTATOR?

 

O God!

 How long will You be a silent spectator, and say nothing;

When the cruel Corona Virus, like the savage jungle Kings

Keeps prowling and pouncing on the helpless human beings

To mince, munch and devour them with its invisible and lethal sting?

 

O God!

How long will You watch it quietly and callously, unconcerned,

When the carnivorous Corona Virus, like a heinous ruler of the hell's

Keeps ringing least audibly the hapless human beings' imminent knells

And, as the vultures, drags them either to be entombed or to be burned?

 

O God!

Still, I am firmYou will never relish men being killed any longer,

Or else, not a soul shall survive to singYour greatness and splendour.

 

 

 RELIGIOUSLY SPEAKING.....

 

No religion, all over the world, has ever been established:

To propagate heinous hatred and vicious violence

To preach callous cruelty, or unwarranted intolerance!

No religion should ever be, for the unjust and the unethical, a safe shield;

All religionsought to promote to morality and humanity to attain deliverance

They should push all to practisecandour and veracity to surpass the mortal fence!

 

No religion, across the globe, has ever been conceived of in vain

To be misused to bait the gudgeons and sturgeons of sordid self-interests;

So, no religion should ever be a secure and impregnable haven

For the hypocrites hateful and the brokers blasphemous

All religions ought to enlighten to be noble and pious

And they should ever be pursued so as to be blessed with eternal rests!

 

No religion, on Earth, has ever been set up as ostentation or an excuse

To flaunt, to fleece or to exploit the credulous masses

So as to reap to savourthe cheap personal profits profuse!

No religion should ever be rubbed on the distorted dresses

So as to clean the filth of sins, with the self-suited soaps of scriptures,

Rather all religionsare to be followed for Salvations after our departures!

 

Thus, let none of us sacrifice our respective religions

So as to materialize our meanest motives,

Let none of us play foul politics in the name of religions

So as not to suffer endlessly like the mundane Captives!

 

A HUMBLE PRAYER TO THE RIVER GANGA

 

O the holiest Mother Ganga!

Please be kind to a sinner like me

To cleanse, risen in me for years, the accumulated rigid grime

To scale the plaque-like sediments deposited in me since long

To rinse, collected in me the hill-high dirts, shameless and strong!

 

O the most sacred Mother Ganga!

Please take pity on a monster like me

To wash away the amassed filth of mine

To purify my ‘self’ to breathe pure air, and shine

To sanctify my ‘being’ to glitter at length, and gleam!

 

O the most pious Mother Ganga!

Please be bounteous to a wretched like me

Do snap the roots of my evil tree beside your august brink

Do floor the fulsome trunk grown abominably fat in me

Do flow me away drifting until I mingle with the Sea, and sink!

 

O the most generous Mother Ganga!

May my earnest prayers be humanely heard!

May I be delivered by Your blessings munificent and broad!

 

 

O GOD! WE SEEK YOUR GRACE AND BLESSINGS FOR VISHNU.

 

O God!

May You be kind enough to shower with overflowing generosity

Your grace on Vishnu, on this auspicious day of his Sacred Thread Ceremony

So that he leads a life of simplicity, humility, integrity, sanity and serenity

And the sky of his life remains forever clear, cloudless, bright and sunny! 

 

O God!

May You be pleased enough to pour with abundantmagnanimity

Your blessings on Vishnu, on this auspicious day of his Sacred Thread Ceremony

So that he loves truth, transparency, peace, duty, diligence and impartiality

And he saves virtue wealth for the rainy days instead of gold, insurance or money!

 

O God!

May You be compassionate enough to bestow with sumptuous benevolence

Your favours on Vishnu, on this auspicious day of his Sacred Thread Ceremony

So that he chooses in life nothing other thanAbou Ben Adhem's noble company

And he loves humanity, lives for the mankind and feels immortality's essence!

 

O God!

These are the lavish boons we seek from You for Vishnu with total submission

And hope with obeisance that You will take them into Your kind Consideration!

 

N. B. This is a humble prayer from Papa and Mama for Vishnu, the poet’s son, on the auspicious occasion of his Sacred Thread Ceremony held on 3rd February, 2022.

 

 

HOLI IN MY CHILDHOOD

 

Ah! About three odd decades ago

Holi did use to come

With a gushing gusto

Flushing curiosity and swelling enthusiasm!

 

During those bluff, innocuous childhood days of innocence

It would start after the customary, auspicious DolaParva (Festival)

Of Devi (Goddess) Radha and Lord Krishna

On the Full-Moon day of the early March.

 

Deities with devotional fervour

And rhythmic, melodious and resonant musical pomp

Would be escorted from the temple on a decorated chariot

On to the village DolaMandap (Pandal)

Where they would be placed on a wooden swing:

Adorned with new gorgeous costumes

Sprinkled with varied hued Avir (Gulal)

Endowed with the glittering flower garlands

Flashy ornaments and bunches of green mangoes:

----- A unique prevalentOdia usage;

Mangoes are restricted to be relished,

Until they are offered to the Deities on this sacred day.

 

With sincere Pooja as per the Vedic rituals.

Like other children of my age,

I would be raptly waiting for the next delaying dawn

To complete the morning chores in a jiffy

And get braced up to enjoy a celestial bliss of Holi.

 

Ah! My acute poverty would fail

To suppress the ever surging and infinite joy inside,

What if there was neither money nor colours

Nor soap to cleanse the spots at the agonizing end?

 

Oh! The intense yearning for being coloured or sprinkled

Would drag us to smear one another

With the black and silky oiled-soot from the kitchen

Or, the black greasy substance

From the over-used axle oil of the wooden carts

Rowed on the dusty village street

Or, the burnt engine oil of the water pumps;

Like a stiff-necked tramp,

Unmindful of the imminent beckoning

Of the painful, embarrassing and humiliating bath

On the crowded, boisterous and hilarious village pond steps

Where others would flush and wash with varied scented soaps

In a victorious hue and cry of glee, excitement and fulfillment!

 

Alas! I, like a kook, would rub lamp kerosene and the pond bed sand

Against the cuddly, shy skin in a huff

Too scared to return my wretched, forlorn home

To confront the grief-stricken, furious and anxious widowed-mother

With a nervous, apprehensive and quasi-monkey face

And a scrubbed, freckled and mortified contour!

Still there was a rare, special and memorable charm in observing Holi!

 

But, alas! With the passage of the kaleidoscopic time,

Many changes have rushed in:

Thank God! The grinding poverty has fled away.

Kitchen soot, cart-axle grease

And burnt engine oil have been replaced

By the expensive, cancerous chemical colours;

Devotional fervourby a frantic, savage frolic and fashion

Curiosity byanxiety

A sound health by an allergic cold

Blue ribbons, kudos and recognitions

Have taken the place of the blushing affront

Fear is almost estranged,

And childhood innocence has grown into wanton cares and complexities!

 

Really, today everything is there in Holi

Except for that bygoneplatonic celebration and pure, endlessexultation!

 

*Kook – a person who is mad, foolish, or eccentric and amoral.

 

 

TEARFUL TRIBUTES TO JAYEE RAJGURU

 

O the blessed and the booned son of Biraharekrushnapur, Puri -

One of the renowned intellectuals of Utkalin18th century

An eminent scholar, like your Grandfather, in Sanskrit

A man of rare patriotism, sacrifice, loyalty and discreet

A well-versed exponent of the Vedas, Puranas and Scriptures

One of the ablest, cleverest and most talented administrators

One of the adept chief ministers, and dauntless soldiers

One of the wisest and most astute guides and counselors,

You richly adorned the courts of the King Divyasingha Deb –II

And his son, Mukund Deb –II; what could have been achieved by few!

 

Neither surrendering before nor succumbing to the British subjugation

Raising rebellious voices against their steep and unreasonable taxation

Inspiring the masses to fight for honour and the liberty of the kingdom

You were the first among India’s Freedom fighters to hug Martyrdom!

 

Who else could have embraced the cruelest British way of execution?

O the immortal Soul! With tearful tributes, salutes you ever the owed Nation!

 

 

 

A TRIBUTE TO UTKAL GAURAB MADHUSUDAN DAS

 

Oh! What a rare fluke and buoyant pride

To pen down on the glowingglory of Mother Utkal -

‘The grand old man’, well-known far and wide

For his gorgeous, inimitable wit of a sharp receptacle!

 

O our proud Mother’s first graduate scion

The first distinguished and enviable barrister of the holy Land!

You were the cynosure amongst many a million

You were born to enlighten, embellish and enrich Utkal’s sand!

 

O the common folks’ MadhuBabu, loving and endearing

You’ll remain ever adorable for your political career sterling!

You did render your best at your unique Inner Voice’s behest

To uplift the socio-economic and political status of the State.

 

O the shining stalwart of Odia-English-Bengali literature

A trilinguist, you gave the Odiasa clarion call to wake and nurture

A staunch patriotism, perseverance and the costliest self-esteem.

Yes, you were, all through your life, a leaping and rippling stream!

 

Above all, O our Mother Utkal’s unforgettable son!

You were a guiding, dazzling Star; a bright, luminous Sun

A social reformer, transformer and visionary par excellence,

Our Mother would have lost much of Herlustre in your absence!

 

 

 

A TRIBUTE TO UTKALMANI GOPABANDHU DASH

 

O the great son of Suando!

You are undeniably Odisha’s ever shining Sun

That rose to radiate many darkened parts unknown

That strove hard to eradicate many evil systems like superstition

That nurtured myriad plants like patriotism, social reforms and education.

 

O the glittering gem of Utkal!

You immortalized yourself by your untiring selfless service

Your genuine concern about the deprived and needy was commendable

Helping the flood affected and marooned masses was for you a divine bliss

Without your endeavours, we would lack today the identity of Odia people!

 

O the ever venerable father of freedom fight in Odisha!

You courted imprisonment for the country’s independence

You enriched Odia literature by your patriotic ink and deep sense

You founded ‘SatybadiVanavidyalaya’ to instill in pupils enlightenment

You set up ‘The Samaj’, today’sOdia Daily, and proved yourself a rare Saint!

 

O the sublime soul! Even the Nobel Prize isn’t enough for your epic eminence.

Will youaccept our humble gratitude - a token of our love, adulation and obeisance?

 

 

A TRIBUTE TO SWAMI VIVEKANAND

 

Oh! What a gigantic and refulgent persona thou wert

That ever trod on this clayey earth

And remained ever unparallelled and unsurpassed!

Thou wert amongst the scintillating constellations

The most radiant Jyotiska.

Thou wert the Jupiter amongst the chains of the nine planets

The most luminous Full-Moon amongst the satellites.

Thou wert amongst the numerous viviparous animals

The most immaculate and unalloyed genius.

Thou wert amongst the clusters of shiny stars

The most intense, ardent and enlightening mid-day Sun!

 

O the great adorable soul of Mother India!

We salute thee with utmost gratitude and submission

And vow solemnly to make your ideals our life’s mission.

 

 

 

A TRIBUTE TO SUBHAS CHANDRA BOSE

 

Yes, words falter to recount your incredible heroic tale!

To gift the Nation a heaven, you could sanctify even the hell!

O the uncrowned and unpaid Sovereign of India's Freedom Saga,

O the Millennium Man of India, O the dark, bleak Gorge!

 

O the inimitable and dedicated Designer of India’s victory flute,

O the cruelest and the costliest Victim of the dastardly brute!

Who can pay you a fit and tantamount tribute

Only except for a humble, grateful and submissive salute?

 

Your momentous birth was India’s mirth.

Alas! Your holy and devoted blood is now in an acute dearth.

Your brave and brilliant brain was a bottomless wisdom ocean.

Your unprecedented fortitude and matchless patriotism – who can explain?

 

When will rise another bold and benign Bose in the eager, Eastern sky

Who can heal the gaping scars, and bless his bereaved lovers and pacify?

 

 

TO SARDAR PATEL, THE IRON MAN OF INDIA

You were a rarest patriot minus any personal gain or political ambition:
A quiet follower of Gandhiji’s biased behest and dubious decision

A relinquisher of India's first P M’s Chair to Nehru without hesitation

An exemplary devotee of Lord Ram's noble and detached tradition
A fulfiller of an adamant and power hungry colleague’s mucky aspiration.

 

As the 1st Home Minister, you unified with India's territory 550 plus Princely States
By your astuteness, political calibre and acumen, diplomatic dexterity and boldness
Soon after the British government transferred powers to us, after a long dominance
Bringing an end to a pathetic story of more than a thousand years of foreign reigns.

But, had you not deemed nation’s interests far above yours unlike most others,
You could not have sanctified your birth and immortalized yourself in history

Nor could you have earned the love of millions of Indian sisters and brothers
Nor would you have been fondly and adorably called ‘The Iron Man of the country’
Nor would your bitterest political critics have finally saluted you, and shown remorse.

Thus, unless we, the whole of indebted Indians, sing in a chorus:

‘India got truly integrated due to your mesmerizing mettle and endeavours.’

We must be termed shameless, selfish and ingrate by our inner Conscience

And, we shall surely incur Mother India’s hatred, indignation and curse.

 

 

 

WHAT DOES THE LIFE OF LAL BAHADUR SHASTRI TEACH US?

 

The towering personality of a person

Is never measured by his wealth, clout and height,

For, the oil of character, not the stuff and bulk of a lamp

Matters most to get the darkness dispelling light!

 

The frosty and dampening winds of poverty and adversity

Cannot hinder a person from scaling the Everest of success,

For, even the turbulence of the flooded Ganges

Bows before a man of aplomb, fortitude and self-confidence!

 

The supreme Head of a country should smilingly skip food and privileges

So that he can feed millions of starving stomachs of his needy countrymen,

For, only on the firm, toiling and loyal wheels of his soldiers as well as the farmers

The golden-growth percentage of a country incredibly turns out to be ten out of ten!

 

Motherland, ahead of Mother and family, comes first for a patriotic Prime Minister

Like LBS, whosedubious, mysterious demiseat Tashkent, is shocking and sinister!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TO MAHATMA GANDHI, THE FATHER OF THE NATION

 

Thy name flashes before every mind two facets uniquely fantastic:

An old man, enlightened and bald headed

A wrinkled, pensive and farsighted forehead

A typical round shaped, bespectacled and beautiful nose

A half-clad chest with a Khadi napkin skillfully homemade

A hand-spun dhoti, covered from the loin up to the knee, always glows

A far-fetched hand with a firm and unwavering walking stick

And a pair of safe and indigenous wooden slippers with an ever steady tread!

 

A man of sublime simplicity

A symbol of vivacious veracity

A lover of transcendental integrity

A practitioner of unalloyed purity!

 

A bold and uncommon speaker of his own weaknesses

A harmless Knight armed with the safest weapon of non-violence

A praiseworthy warrior armoured with the shield of forbearance

A staunch devotee of passive resistance!

 

A rare replica of sweating perseverance

A hungry man’s sweet sustenance

A nobility of the mind’s instance

A soft flower of peace-love fragrance!

 

A universal figure adored by the friends and the foes

A coveted plant of thorn-less rose

A hardworking cultivator, who freedom seeds sows

A bright torchbearer, who only just, righteous path shows!

 

A real founder of Ram’s impartial and dream realm

A true detester of the chair, crown and stardom

A noble believer in VasudhaibaKutumbakam

Yes, an unprecedented idol of Martyrdom!

 

 

IN MEMORY OF DHYAN CHAND

 

Oh! You rose like a meteor in the sky of Indian hockey

Your pivotal presence in the field made India proud and lucky

You stunned Hitler, and Bradman by your magical hands' mavericks

Your dribbling and goaling feats fetched India Gold medals thrice in Olympics!

 

No other ‘Chand’ so luminous had emerged before, nor will appear again

No mundane laurel can equal your sportsmanship spirit, patriotism and pain!

But, sending you, a wizard with 1000 plus national and international goals under his name

To a general ward in AIIMS for Liver Cancer, was surely an embarrassing National Shame!

 

A rarest of the rare World Ratna in Hockey, could not be conferred upon Bharat Ratna

A sorcerer in Hockey wasn't allowed to a stadium to watch a match for lack of recognition!

The son of a Scion of Mother India was, for the Moscow Olympics, forlornly forgotten!

Yes, you had justly foretold, "The world, not India, will shed tears over my cremation!"

 

Thus, let not your contributions be buried under the ingrate tomb of oblivion,

Let your name be sincerely engraved in every Indian heart, home and stone!

 

 

REMEMBERING DR. B.R AMBEDKAR

Rising steadily like a blooming and lustrous lotus
Passing through the rigorous tests and ordeals of litmus
Shining like the blistering noon Sun, the Diwakar
Emerged an effulgent star, called Dr. B.R Ambedkar!

Once a prey, in school, to the bitter caste discrimination
He incredibly became the architect of India’s Constitution!
Hailing from the humblest background, known as a strict disciplinarian
An astute parliamentarian, he was posthumously awarded Bharat Ratna!

The founder of a new universal religion called ‘Humanism’
He was bold enough to merrily and joyously embrace ‘Buddhism’!
An ardent worshipper of hard-work, and a devotee of honest labour
Ambedkar ultimately proved his mettle as an inimitable ‘Trend Setter’!

May a ray of his enviable and embellishing enlightenment light our path
May our life keep improving on this ever falling and deteriorating Earth!
Let us dog his steps of not laying any emphasis on trivial mundane mirth
Let us lead a pure and virtuous life so that we can book a heavenly berth!

 

 

A TRIBUTE TO PT. BHIMSEN JOSHI

A doyen of Hindustani Music Classical
An unbeatable emblem for his mellow Khayal,
A Guruji worshipper
A Kirana-Gharana practitioner
A home fleer
An infallible struggler
A Tansenian scholar
A divinity showerer
An angelic ariste rarer
An enviable inspirer
A devout follower of Raghavendra Swami
A humble, unassuming pursuer of spiritualism
A hypnotizer
A mesmerizer
A sorcerer
A fascinator
A reverberater
An enchanter
An enthraller
An enrapturer
A triller
A thriller
A pacifier
A ruler
A perfectionist
A humanist
An inimitable, invincible Sur-Samrat
A possessor of a heart great and virat
An irreplaceable Maestro immortal
A snarer by his unique recital
An optimist
A transcendentalist
A monumental music icon
A legendary master – India’s great scion
A subduer of the crippling adversity
A creator of his aural university
A riser from the humblest to the celestial
A founder of SawaiGandharva Musical Festival
A ‘Mile Sur MeraTumhara’ renderer
A bigamist and a fast, reckless car driver
A groovy disciple of the venerable Swami Gandharva
A synonym for ebullience, knack, eminence, humility and love
A saintly Classical singer
To the mundane earth the ecstasy bringer
Closed his eyes, ceased his breath and sewed up his lips forever
Dropping a thick pal of gloom, grief and irreparable loss everywhere!

Yes, we do mourn and pray for thy renascence
So as to retain thy legacy and revive thy same aura and ambience!

 

 

A SALUTE TO BHARAT RATNA DR. A. P. J ABDUL KALAM

 

O the most revered and gentlest Dr. Kalam!

Do kindly accept our sincerest Pranam.

For, thou art for us, the angelic 'Abou Ben Adhem'

A sweet, mellow fruit in proud India’s success-dignity stem!

 

Thou didst prove "One can scale to an enviable zenith of eminence

Not merely because of one's Milton's imperial, or favourable ambience,

But by virtue of one’s persistent, perspiring and honest perseverance,

Unfaltering pace, unswerving toil, passive resistanceand pious sufferance!”

 

‘The Missile Man of India’, thou art proudly called.

Born with a unique flair to turn cheap brass into glorious gold;

Who is known as the young ignited India’s ‘the avuncular Uncle’

Who has adorned the Highest Office of the country on his own mettle!

 

A true and infallible visionary of a Modern and developed India,

Whom salute gratefully the country's commoners as well asintelligentsia!

Thou art blessed with unmatched wit, humility, sincerity, integrity and austerity,

O the Missile Man of India! Sheis proud of thy patriotism, silent serviceand charity!

 

N.B. On 16^th March, 2011, the hon’ble President had sent an e-mail of acknowledgement and thanks to the poet after going through the above poem published in ‘Poetry Today’ a Chennai based monthly literary magazine. This gesture of late Dr. Kalamshows his matchless humility and greatness.

 

 

 

A TEARFUL AND FLORAL TRIBUTE TO BHARAT RATNA ATAL BIHARI VAJPAYEE

 

O Atalji!You were, undoubtedly, a Moon of fluorescence

You were, undeniably, an unblinking star of effulgence

You were, unquestionably, a Sun of eminence

And, you were, indisputably, a statesman of essence!

 

O Atalji! You were, incredibly, a Himalaya of patience

You were, irrefutably, a world leader of credence

You were, assuredly, a visionary with uniquelenses

And, you were, most notably, a man of remarkable sense!

 

O Atalji! You were, certainly, a patriot par excellence

You were, surely, a Yogi with rare continence

You were, truly, a model of inimitable munificence

And, you duly deserved to rise above the mundane, mortal fence!

 

Thus, we pray to God to bless the world with Atals countless,

And shower on your immortal soul eternal peace, rest and solace!

 

 

MAA BHARATI SINGS FOR SUSHMA SWARAJ.

Dear Sushma, I'll feel, forever, proud of you, my darling daughter
For, the world has seen in you an astute, assiduous and austere lawyer
You have ever been the youngest and worthiest Indian Chief Minister
And my million Indian children's most lovable and sincerest sister!

You restlessly reigned over India's political domains for more than four decades
Your unprecedented command over rhetorics stunned so many human facades!
You were the rarest of the rare, to be loved and respected so much by your rivals
You ever came out with flying colours in life's most stringent trials and upheavals!

Yes, never could the eroding and staining agents have any effects on you
The distinguished and distinct aura, you had etched, is possible only by a few!
In the illustrious annals of India's Politics, you'll ever be adorable, inimitable and new
You were ever unique, and will ever shineas fresh as a drop of pure autumnal dew!

Yes, you have proved to be a true daughter, sister, wife, mother and stateswoman,
So, dear Sushma, I am profoundly proud of you, and the same, will forever, remain!

 

 

NAMO REDEFINED

Never knows he in life whether the ‘Nos’ do really ever exist

Never known to any if he ever compromises with the Nation’s interests

Never known till date to befriend treason, treachery, revenge or rests

Never knows he how to desist until ‘impossible feats’ are plucked in his fist!

 

A plant of honesty and duty bears fruits sweet and tasty

A foolproof stitch much before time is his life’s vision prime

A unique bond with philanthropy is his life’s richest trophy

A public servant of rare altruism is his paragon of patriotism!

 

Meditates he ever to defeat rage, to rule over the mind and be impartially kind

Mitigates he without fail the woes of masses, and strives to push problems far behind

Musters he fortitude to fight against all evils; toils ever to make India number. one

Mourns he for each minutest mistake; motivates all to excel and wills himself to atone!

 

Outshines he the stiffest tests, is awake for novel quests, and exerts ever the best

Outclasses he his national and international counterparts, and easily leads the rest

Outwits he the wittiest, beats the buffets, and proves himself for every occasion fittest

Outmanoeuvres he the opponents sans arms, so is unanimously called a P.M and a Saint!

N. B. -This poem is dedicated to dear Narendra Modi, the Hon'ble P. M of India.

 

A 74TH BIRTHDAY WISH TO SJ. NAVEEN PATNAIK

 

O the astute Chanakya in Odisha's contemporary politics!

You are embedded with laudable logics and impeccable statistics.

You have stunned even the sorcery kings

And shocked the clueless opponents by your victory stings

With your five consecutive coronation magics,

Proving again, Teresan feelings and Gandhian wills –

“To serve is to win people's hearts by honest and needful deals

Where hardly matter hollow and freaky language tricks!"

 

Unquestionably, your responsible, reasonable and relevant reticence

Has time and again subdued your hapless arch rivals

Hushed their husky, rancorous and raucous voices, and stupefied their sense!

You have preached silently and frequently showcasing your potentials -

 "Votes are won by service records, goodwill, pro-people schemes and actions,

Not merely by spreading ridiculous rumours, playing lame blame-games

And, giving false assurances and reverie-like proclamations

Which bring forth, at length, nothing but defeats, affronts and shames!"

 

Thus, may the young, talented and qualified Odia men and women

During your 21st century's golden Gupta reign,

Not be tempted, enticed and entangled by an aching brain drain!

On the contrary, may Odisha be turned a hub of lavish investments foreign

May your regime rewrite Odisha's rewarding and memorable history

Of sustainable surge in health, wealth, peace, progress and happiness

May your rule usher in odishaan admirable revival and Renaissance

Ofart, education, culture, farming, science,technology, industry and business,

May your able, stable and reliable incumbency heal by scrupulous chemistry

The wounds of poverty, corruptions, addictions and inequalities in the real sense!

 

 

 

 

TO HELEN KELLER

 

You did untimely succumb to blindness that seized your sight

But, could neither squeeze your vim, nor quiver your insight!

It bowedlike a vanquished soldier before your resolute fight

You came out with flying colours as an eclipsed sun sees day light!

 

Your long struggle did personify a rare paragon of aplomb and grit

You could dauntlessly overcome all stumbling blocks and valiantly meet!

How aptly you did symbolize an undeterred determination!

How dexterously you could defeat defeat and attain a blissful liberation!

 

You could even visualize more than the most having their eyes

Your heavenly vision and noble mission did fetch you the fit prize!

How astounding and astonishing was your die-hard battling attitude!

Yes, the whole world marvels at your fantabulous feats’ magnitude.

 

You truly taught all, “Eyes matter little for a man of foresight and vision,

For, eyes can view only the visible, while vision, what lies past the horizon!”

 

TO PELE - THE FOOTBALL KING

 

Who else could strike poverty as well as footballs harder?

Who else could run on the slippery and risky fields swifter?

Who else could defeat all the defenders, and vanquish the rest?

Who else could remain even till date incontestably the best?

 

You treated each match as a sacred and religious ceremony,

Each goal was a long cherished feast; heart’s sweet symphony!

Yes, unconquerable was your never satiable quest,

For, you ever dreamed high, and were resolute to put up your best!

 

Oh! The lucky miss-pronunciation of your favourite footballer ‘Bile’,

Fortunately fetched you, at last,the world famous new identity ‘Pele’!

In the history of Soccer, you etched, with ease, a legendary and golden name,

Your impeccable style and inimitable flair bought you the Soccer king’s diadem!

 

O the black Diamond!Theglobe gladly salutes you, one of the best of men,

O the undisputed monarch of Football!Unmatched was your knack and acumen.

May you live long, along with your mile-stones, O the Soccer’s Abou Ben Adhem,

May the Crown of your unbeatable feats keep shining and inspiring forever, Amen!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SACHIN TENDULKAR

 

When the fiery and flawless Sachin was on the confident and dauntless crease
Runs would ceaselessly rain as blows the sweet, swift and unstoppable breeze!
His immaculate and rocketing shots would million fans, across the globe, please
While, alas! The chocked heartbeats of the battered bowlers would utterly freeze!

Unarguably, matches would ever seem pretty well in India’s favour
TillSachin’s patient, valiant and unfailing bat did majestically deliver!
Towering sixes, lightning fours, along with cheeky singles and quick twos,
Would constantly trickle in, worsening the rivals' woes, if the balls were loose!

Donald, Mac Grath, Walsh, Chaminda Vass, WasimAkram or Brett Lee
Could so effortlessly and fiercely cut, flick, pull, hook, haul and manoeuvre he!
He often ceased the engine of the fastest and the fiercest Rawalpindi Express
And, forced Shane Warne for ghastly nightmares, who did once honestly confess!

At 16, in a 20-over exhibition match, he faced Pak stylish leg spinner Quadir
In which his fastest unofficial fifty lashed, thrashed and pushed the latter to nadir!
He too stunned so many brilliant batsmen with his unintelligible spinning balls
And, byscoring 34,357 runshecarved his golden name in the Fame of Halls!

He is the lone Centurion of the Herculean as well as the Himalayan centuries
Thus, the world salutes him for his rarest humility and novel cricketing stories!

 

 

 

 

A BOUQUET OF GRATITUDE TO MY INVISIBLE AND ALTRUISTIC FRIEND 

 

Oh! When the going in life gets tough

When the tides of turbulence grow rough

When the dreams are about to tumble and crash,

From a true friend 'myriad new hopes' do splash!

 

Oh! When it seems a distant possibility to triumph life's race

When life's swift wheels of progress agonizingly ebb their pace

When in the feasts of life mirthful celebrations have no place,

A perennial fountain-like friend does shower infinite grace and solace!

 

Oh! When the cruel fate mocks at life and scares its smiles to wreck

When the sadistic world does call you an 'untouchable' and ruthlessly forsake

When the salty water rush in; shakes the kneel steadily, and seems unsafe the deck,

An invisible and altruistic friend is sent by God to save you from a fatal lake!

 

Thus, one must bow before God, the Rakshak, with humility and a bouquet of gratitude

And make the most of the shot with more toil and sincerity to soar at an enviable altitude!

 

 

 

 

TO ‘DHAN’ - MY DECEASED BABY DAUGHTER

 

Ah! Under the debilitating debris of our marooned memories

You’ll ever remain, like the shiny dews of the morn, serene and fresh!

Time forced you so untimely and shockingly to leave the crease,

Yet, he cannot steal from us your ever pleasing, playful and tranquil trace!

 

Ah! Your living image wells up torrential tears in our groping eyes….

But, what’s our lapse andoffensethat we do so sorrowfully surmise,

Of being bereaved of you at so early an age?

At the dawn of your voyage, you left even before viewing the Sunrise!

 

Ah! Your spring-like nodding head

Your relishing and rolling of the joined fists

Your skating like movement on the wheeled device

Your innocent and shy glance; your delicious nibbling of biscuit and bread;

My tickling kisses on your smooth, supple, delirious and unalloyed cheeks,

Your sweet short sojourn and painful exit mince our hearts into many a slice!

 

N.B. This poem was composed over the sad and unexpected demise of the poet's baby daughter ‘Dhan’ on 15th November, 2010 at 11.45 pm due to pneumonia. She was born on 10th Feb. 2010.

 

 

 

A COMMON TALE OF A SOLDIER’S LIFE

 

Alas!We are to fearlessly and pitifully die young

So that you can calmly, for ages, breathe in;

We are to heavily atone in the battle field unsung

Albeit we haven’t certainly committed any SIN!

 

Alas! We are to willingly and quietly depart young

So that you can merrily serenade life’s sweet song;

We are to smilingly give up sleep, luxury and gaiety

So that you can enjoy, to the hilt, life’s varied Beauty!

 

Alas! We are to gladly and madly hug martyrdom young

So that you can move along unhindered, and grow strong;

We are to be posthumously garlanded and lavishly honoured

So that you won’t have to fear a little, or shed a drop of blood!

 

Alas! Across the globe, it’s a common tale of a soldier’s life:

“He is born to bleed to death, while his country wins the strife!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BE AT LEAST A HUMAN BEING.

All the milk you churn
Yields not the same cream;
The world is not so
What it does seem.

All the flowers that bloom
Yield not the same honey;
Deeds maketh immortal
A few hours but money.

All the coconuts you squeeze
Yield not the same oil;
Swarms sorrow sin
But, emanates contentment toil.

All the water that drops
Succeeds not to be drinkable;
Be never an obscene page
If you can’t be an epic adorable.

All the smiles that dance
Retain not always a sweet sense;
If you are too dull to exude glory
Don’t ever commitany offense.

All the rivers that flow
Enjoy not the Ganga’s honour;
Don’t fall into a bottomless gorge
If you are really too crippled to soar.

All those who lead and guide
Can’t be an exemplary epithet;
If you can’t mould one’s career
Then, avoid marring one’s fate.

All that emits smoke
Can’t be healthy, hygienic odour;
If you can’t be as impartial as Yudhisthir
Pray notfor Duryodhan like a shrewd pleader.

All those who worship and pray
Yearn not for liberation;
Remember! God cannot confined
In a litigious and unholy mansion.

All those who have brains
Can’t lead the rest;
If you can’t be a healing balm
Be not then a pestering pest.

All the trees, like the banyan
To support, can’t retain hangers;
If you are too miserly to applaud
Never condemn your benefactors.

All the woods that you rub
Can’t ooze out the sandal scent;
Please kick not at one’s hungry stomach
If you are unable to, a pittance, donate.

All that you pile days and nights
Will be carried by you alone;
If you can’t be a divine sage
Be not then a frightful demon.

All those who build cities
Can’t make civilized citizens;
If you can’t heal one’s wounds
Then, support not harmful acid rains.

All can’t be Patel, Subhash or Modi
Those who are in India born;
If you are too unfit to be a soft flower
Be not then a sharp, excruciating thorn.

All the plants you tend and raise
Can’t be so succulent as sugarcane;
If you falter to utter soothing words
From inflaming the masses, do refrain.

All the seeds that you sow
Be not the wish granting KalpaVrikshas can;
If you can’t be Lord Ram’s devotee Hanuman
Be, at least, a decent, noble creature calledman.

 

 

A HAPLESS DAUGHTER’S LETTER FROM HER MOTHER’S WOMB

O my dear Papa and Mom!
Now, I am helpless and dumb
Unable to scream, shout, cry or speak,
So, I’m penning this letter in an invisible ink.

O my esteemed Papa!

 I am the fruit of your biological joy
I am not at all an insignificant ‘Use and throw toy’.
I am your own pure blood
Yes, you are my living Lord.
In me runs always your divine love flood
Aren’t its tickling felt and whispering heard?

O my respected Papa!

From the womb to the tomb
You are my ultimate fate and doom.
You are my sweet laughter
You are my sour tear
You are my pain killer
You are my wounds healer
You are my sorrow feeler

You are my soothing cooler

You are my trend setter

 For, you are my great begetter.

O my adorable Papa!

We are ever inseparable

Then, how can I, like a tomato, be crushed and abortable?
We are one and the very same
Then, how can I be your headache and your repressive shame?

O my revered Papa!

We are part and parcel
Like a train and its rail
Like sweetness and sugar
Like oxygen, hydrogen and water
Like days, nights and time
Like a poet and a rhyme
Like the Sun and its light
Like a victory and its delight
Like milk and its vitamin
Like shade and leaves green
Like coconut’s shell and its kernel
Like mineral and soil
Like virtue and heaven
Like the sea and the rain.

O my beloved Papa!

Had my Mom gone through my present state
Could you have been her husband at any rate?
Had your adorable Mom and her venerable Mom
Been cursed with my hapless and ghastly fate
Where could your precious life have found form?
How could you have seen the current momentous date?

Hence, O my reverent Papa!

Be kind to me and relent
Let me not be a prey to Misoprostal and Mifepristone

Let me not be an easy victim of suction aspiration

Let me not be forcefully ground by a doctor indecent
Don’t smother your Conscience being so impudent
Don’t be more venomous than a savage serpent

Don’t suppress your Inner Voice to later repent
Be judicious in obeying Nature’s Law as a noble Saint:
To acquit yourself of feticide
To restore a rare heavenly love
To give justice to an innocent girl child
Around whom the whole human life does revolve.

O my loving Papa!

Who is to be blamed for my fathomless malady?
The wise scientist for his/her fatal immortal discovery
The shrewd lewd doctor for his/her inordinate greed
The ill-fated fetus – your so called priceless breed
Or, you yourself – a stain on your very name
Or, you yourself – a synonym for a stigmatic shame
Or, you yourself – a self devastating and disrupting flame?
Good bye, dear Papa! Please write to me the real culprit’s name.

 

 

 

PLANTS’ PLAINTS

Oh! It is enough.
Ah! It is too much.
Ouch! It is beyond our forbearance.

Hark! O the irrational humans!
Have pity on us.
Don’t exploit us any more
Don’t stab us any more
Don’t chop usany more
Don’t cut us any more

Don’t mutilate us any more
Don’t cripple us any more
Don’t saw us any more
Don’t torture us any more
Don’t stifle us any more
Don’t petrify us any more
Don’t flummox us any more
Don’t bewilder us any more

Don’t stupefy us any more

Don’t fell us any more
Don’t uproot us any more

Don’t murder us any more

Don’t butcher us any more

Don’t slay us any more

Don’t botch us any more
Don’t kill us any more.

Hark! O the insensible humans!

All of you know well
We haven’t the animals’ feet to run, dodge and escape
We haven’t the birds’ wings to flit, fly and evade
We haven’t the fishes’ fins and scales to swim and us save;
Again, in our excruciating, paralyzing and dying throes
We can’t shriek, scream and squirm like you
Screech, whistle, romp or caper like a bird
Snarl, howl, growl, yell and wriggle like a beast
To convey our unheeded grievances and unheard distress
To grumble, groan, resent, remonstrate and demonstrate
To attract or snatch the Jury’s attention
To steal or win over sympathy
To politicize the matter
For our survival against our premature, brutal massacre.

Hark! O the insensate humans!

We are helpless and forlorn
Totally at the disposal of your mercy.
But, don’t you know?
We alone are the altruistic benefactors of yours
Your well-wishers, caretakers and selfless saviours.

Hark! O the callous humans!

We protect and help you in a million ways:
We are your vital lungs
We do fill your bellies
We do furnish you with clothings
We do provide you with shelters
We do care for your countless illnesses
We do run the most vital Cycles of Nature
We do ensure all requisites for your smooth survival.
Still, you never take note of our pain
For, we make not our agony vociferous as others
Yet, we feel the same pangs as they
We wail after being wounded, bereaved or slaughtered.

Hark! O the apathetic humans!

Lip sympathy and pen compassion are showered on us

Concerned volumes in varied forms are written on us
Awareness programmes are carried out across the globe
Van- Mahotsavs are observed ostensibly every year
Billions are splurged for our survival

By the so-called kindhearted governments and NGOs
But, alas, to no avail!
For, you are self-centric, sadistic and heartless past measure
Avarice has turned you altogether blind, deaf and dumb
Beckoning to your own ruin and the end of the planet as well…..!

Hark! O the unmoved humans!

It is our last endeavour
To convince you and persuade
To make you feel the gravity of your uncalled-for blunder
The intensity and monstrosity of its imminent consequences!

Hark! O the indigent, audacious and mad humans!
Now it is up to you;
Whether to plant, tend, nourish and conserve us
To think for our mutual welfare
Or, to perish yourselves along with all forever and forever……!

 

 

 

 

HOW MUCH YOU AGREE?

 

Blindness is a blessing

Where eyesight fails to perceive properly.

It’s better to be mute

Where tongue poisons hearts utterly.

 

A curse is the birth

That kills other’s mirth.

Ignoble is the life

That stabs souls like a knife.

 

A hell is the shade

That scorches limbs and head.

Futile is the fence

That filches crops men’s.

 

Vice is the power

That injustice does shower.

Garbage is the knowledge

That lacks virtue, nobility and glaze.

 

Useless is the cultivation

That yields rigorous ruination.

Despicable is the elevation

That blocks the path of salvation.

 

N.B. This National Award winning poem, published in “Samvedana” Mangalore, Karnatak, 2006, has been taken from the poet's first poetry Anthology 'A Cynosure Of English Poems' published by Poets Foundation, Kolkata.

 

 

AN ODE TO PLASTIC

O the sweet-sour son!
What will we call your dear Father, Leo Hendrik Baekeland
To whom you must ever be obliged, and adorn with the most grateful garland -
A beautiful boon of the Earth, or a baneful begetter of a deadliest slow poison?

You have been a cursed blessing for man since your birth in nineteen zero seven
For the king as well as for the beggar, with your generosity of a pseudo heaven;
That can never be defied or denied by any of your most loyal beneficiaries
Only except by those, stung by your unseen venom, suffer from inevitable miseries!

Oh! Your stifling and poisonous presence, after being used, under the soil and in the water bodies
Has shortened the life of ecology, killing the joys of all sorts of animals, with their babies!
Alas! Your unsound and unwelcome presence has rung an alarm of sure ruinations
For, you are being gulped, as the baited fishing hooks, by the wisest fools of the Civilizations!

Thus, it's high time a harmless and eco-friendly substitute was found before it is too late
Else, neither God nor you, can be blamed, for the end of lives, once opens the Fallution Gate!

 

 

 

AN INDEPENDENCE DAY RESOLUTION

O my dear countrymen!
 Let’s not celebrate It as a mere flamboyant and flatulent formality

Let’s not proclaim the hollow, parched and clichéd assurances

Of the so-called socio-economic justice, indiscrimination and equality

And pull the wool over the eyes of the credulous and hapless masses.

 

O my beloved countrymen!
Let’s not misconceive of the nuances of inner freedom

Only from the perspective of political sovereignty:

It ought to be meant ‘free from moral depravity’

Refraining ourselves from the Five Senses’ serfdom

Eradicating the evils of illiteracy, ignorance and vulgarity

Curing the unbearable plagues of hunger, thirst and poverty

Keeping the poisons of theft, intoxication and violation at bay

Not coming under the ugly, attractive and tasty falsehood’s sway

Not defiling the valued Virtues of honesty, loyalty and chastity

Not sowing the baneful seeds of envy, hatred, betrayal and cruelty

Not planting the saplings of malice, terrorism, treason and communalism

Not stifling humanism, nationalism, rationalism, spiritualism and eartheism!

 

Unless we are able to practise this sacred, solemn and essential Resolution,

What’s the sense of a shallow and pseudo ‘Independence Day Celebration?’

 

 

Flatulent - pompous

Pull the wool over the eyes of – deceive

 

AN ECHO OF EVERY INDIAN HEART

Lo! We, the Indians, never miss to spread peace
We never ever wish to chop love apiece
We never betray to cull trust into many a slice
We never intrude, infiltrate or inflame, for it is vice.

Lo! We believe in mutual agreement and brotherhood
We harness harmony; neither practise nor promote hegemony
We honour to maintain stability and respite in our neighbourhood
We enhance humanism, and avoid what augments mankind's agony!

Lo! We, the Indians, are the worthy sons of Buddha, Asia's Light
We hate violence vehemently; and loathe leprously to fight
We strongly detest homicide; and bitterly condemn bloodsheds
We denounce pseudo Crusades under the garbs of bombs and blades!

Thus, let not our patience be misconstrued as our fearful dumbness
Let not our tolerance be misconceived as our timidity or cowardice
Let not our generosity be misunderstood as our helpless numbness
Else, do brace up to face the music, and pay a heavy and aching price!

 

 

 

HARK! THIS IS WHAT KASHMIR SPEAKS OF NOW.

Hark! I am not a Cricket World Cup
That you can win over me by a mere coincidence!
I am rather a valiant daughter of mother India
I am most capable of my own safety and self defense!

Hark! Those who beg of my compassion and mercy
Can never enjoy the privilege to have their say, or to choose.
How can they dream of adorning my loving and caring lap
Who don't even deserve to be the filthy dust under my shoes?

Hark! I can, as a kind mother, even feed the refugees, if loyal and law abiding
I can also, likeMaa Kali, kick and eliminate the treacherous wasps that sting!
I can prove myself, in sheltering, as one of the most benevolent benefactors
I can too pulverize and end the deadliest, ghastliest and most barbaric traitors!

Thus, you should decide now whether you want a peaceful and happy life
Or, indulge in infiltrations and terrorism to die like moths in a fatal strife!

 

 

DON’T ASK.

 

Don’t ask the scintillating Moon

How much love It has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much light It borrows for you!

 

Don’t ask the refulgent Sun

How much love It has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much shine and warmth It pours on you!

 

Don’t ask a mass of firm stone

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How strong a peg it becomes to support you!

 

Don’t ask a little, petite lamp

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How long it burns to dispel darkness for you!

 

Don’t ask a benevolent book

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much wit it gifts to remove gloom from you!

 

Don’t ask life rendering water

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much it quenches thirst in you!

 

Don’t ask a spontaneous shower

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much greenery it breeds for you!

 

Don’t ask a versatile tree

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How many bounteous boons it offers you!

 

Don’t ask a tender blossom

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much nectar it carries for you!

 

Don’t ask an altruistic mate

How much love it has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How often he stakes himself to save you!

 

Don’t ask an illuminating teacher

How much love he has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How much he instills to make you one among the few!

 

Don’t ask your incomparable mother

How much love she has for you,

Have patience and watch:

How often she can die to immortalize you!

 

Don’t ask yourself you

How much love you have for you,

Have patience and watch:

What a fair path you tread to liberate you!

 

Don’t ask anyone and anything hence

How much loved you always are,

For, love lies not in expression

But, in realization, you will, at length, concur!

 

N.B. This poem has been taken from the poet's first poetry Anthology 'A Cynosure Of English Poems’ published by Poets Foundation, Kolkata.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TODAY

 

 

Today, veracity is grilled and tried

In the illegitimate courts of absurdity!

Ah! Honesty and rectitude are fried

On the red and irrational pan of falsity!

 

Today, virtue is vehemently kicked

Under the violent feet of vice!

While injustice is praised and peaked

In the domain of ill-gotten power and price!

 

Today, humility is a hapless chicken

In the offensive abattoir of oppression!

While smothered simplicity is sunken

In the stinky, germy gutter of exploitation!

 

Today, liberty is a shackled and suffocated slave

Inside the inhuman and unscrupulous enclave!

Though the higher does one endeavour to fly

At the lower bottom one's dreams shattered lie!

 

Today, peace is fiercely festered

In the prison of violence and brutality!

Conscience is piercingly pestered

With the whip of indecency and vulgarity!

 

Today, money is the means to measure and gauge

Muscles seize powers; flattery and influence snatch applause!

Humanity is a stifling captive in the doorless and cruel cage

The way of the day is to ignore and crush one's own solemn pledge!

 

Today, tongues are replaced bythe deadly arms

While eternity and harmony are by disruptive storms!

Beauty is scaled and measured in kilos and grams

Alas! Wounds are treated to heal with incurable harms!

 

Today, Flesh is worshipped at the cost of morality

In the bestial brothels of lust and sense gratification!

At the stake of rationality, continence and fidelity

Scorching all the shames are weighed vanity and fashion!

 

Today, proper nouns wear the boots

And common nouns put on the caps,

Plants flourish and prosper without roots

'Nothings' replenish the infinite and the invisible gaps!

 

Today, blossom on the coloured lips, countless sham smiles

Laws without executions do adorn the office files!

Undeserving hands do grab awards in dubious styles

Those, who can't even walk, win laurels in the Marathons of miles!

 

Today, solace-like perfumes, are jetted on the fair skin

A giant needle is substituted for a piece of tiny pin!

Gems are treasured in a dusty and destitute dust-bin

Dear detergents of delusions are used to rinse the rigid sin!

 

Today, the birthday of a son is, with pomp and pageantry, celebrated

Even much before the wedding of an engaged couple is due to be held!

A captain, with the honour of 'The player of the tournament', is felicitated

Much before the ensuing World Cup is about to be scheduled and played!

 

 

Today, one must be skilled enough to chatter, cheat and gab

Else, one will lag behind the rest; and will fall haplessly flat!

Vanity and ostentation are universally a fab

To be diplomatic and sycophantic is to be wise and smart!

 

Today, religion is an easy and accessible excuse

For the war mongers and the frantic fanatics!

They are born to inflame the atmosphere and abuse

Power and position for narrow profits by nasty politics!

 

Today, battles, broils and wars are won

By the weapons of deceit, falsehood and treachery!

Myriads of greedy henchmen are honoured

For their hypocritical, crafty and devilish chicanery!

 

Today, discipline is deadly dented with the axes of executions

On the plinth of autocracy and anarchy are built the civilized nations!

Patriotism is adjudged on the basis of sedition and treason

True martyrs are those who fight not, but put the country in a prison!

 

Today, nectar brims up to the human vessels' edges

But, the insides of the hearts abound with dross and dredges!

Societies stand on the strongest pretext peg

Substance is replaced by shadows, vapours and vagaries vague!

 

Today, the teachers and the taught have hardly any bearings

Upon their thoughts, actions, characters and demeanour!

The former parrot and the latter pick up only forluxurious livings

Both lead grand life styles sans any vital and respectable grandeur!

 

The scrumptious diet of today is mendacity

Deadly depravity is the paramount duty!

The only Truth that prevails everywhere is falsity

Hallucinations are a steady source of mirth and serenity!

 

Today, wild eyes cast dull, dreary and distorted visions

While gullible hearts are trapped by seasoned temptations!

Nights and days roam and prowl the lusty and vigorous horses

Alas! They reach the hateful hells due to the innocent victims' curses!

 

Today, those who backbite their bosses, and piss

At the same spot where they shelter, thriveand dine,

They rise like the morning Sun, and never their success trains miss

The toppers are so brilliant that they score in exams Ten out of Nine!

 

Today, those who shout "Mera Bharat Mahan"

Take to their heels, regrettably, to settle in the lands foreign

When they feel their profits are too petty for their narrow personal gain

They leave their mother and motherland, albeit deemed greater than heaven!

 

Today, terrorism, riots and communalism are fostered and perpetuated

Under the cloaks of patriotism, crusade and national liberty!

For books and schools, mobiles and social media are substituted

Fast food complements human nutrients; urea, pesticides soil's fertility!

 

In an enchanting chorus of chants, they all say

"Kam Nam Ki SatyaHai!"

Most of them are ensnared by the same irresistible prey

There are very few who are not in this mad, weird and wild fray!

 

The colour of today is bizarrely bleak and densely dark

In a nutshell, the way of living, is loose enough and slack!

Apples of discord and Sodom mark the barren parks

 Even the dead tender votes; but the watchdog neither bites nor barks!

 

Today, illusion depressingly spoils the significance of reality

Simplicity is sliced with the pretentious sword of complexity!

Infidelity and betrayal sermonize on the sweet taste of integrity

Greed and evanescence preach the value of charity and perpetuity!

 

Today, artificial, appealing and entrapping tears are tactfully shed

To buy deluxe flight tickets; attend night clubs; and earn rich bread!

To procure the certificates and jobs of one's own choicest grade

Powers and positions are misused; flesh is served and black money paid!

 

Today, writings are praised and writers extolled without being read

Green foods are exhorted as nutritious without being cooked and fed!

Rogues and scalawags are applauded as cultured and thoroughbred

The saintly paths are showered with flowers though few ever tread!

 

Thus, the multi-coloured face of ‘today’ is past description

Maintaining self-esteem and self-restraint is the best solution.

Not being swayed by the hollow vanity and shallow sensation

One can retain peace, maintain equilibrium and attain liberation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TO THE MODERN OZYMANDIAS

 

O the modern Ozymandias tyrant, oppressive and cruel!

Why do you, like an arrogant and haughty balloon, do swell?

Why do you seize the sceptres by all possible foul means?

Why do you take over like the stinking, unhygienic dustbins?

 

O the modern Ozymandias insane, repressive and despotic!

Why do you thrive at the cost of a sweet and laudable logic?

Why do you kindle to misuse your wasteful, sinewy muscles?

Why do you rain bloods and spread broils, brawls and tussles?

 

O the modern Ozymandias, blind, barbaric and savage!

Why do you nurture to torture the innocent with your rage?

Why do you lick public smiles with your all gulping tongues?

Why do you sing, on the poor, wretched graves, your victory songs?

 

O the modern Ozymandias corrupt, vitriolic and vice!

All your predecessors have paid, and you too shall pay the price.

Nothing remains around except one’s noble and virtuous deeds

For, injustice, at last, bleeds, while justice ever endures and leads!

 

N.B: The above poem is inspired by the poem “Ozymandias”.written by P. B Shelley

 

 

 

NIRBHAYA ASKS, "WHY DO YOU FORGET?"

 

Why do you forget, o the cancerous and heinous curses on earth

That we, the women, are not born merely to meet your bestial mirth

We are not the fleshy food for your savage and lecherous hunger

We are not the delectable drinks for your unquenchable carnal thirst any longer?

 

Why do you forget, o the slanderous and blasphemous burdens on earth

That we, the women, are, not at all, the dry dungs to feed your licentious hearth

We are not to be mistaken as the inert, pervious and easily pregnable mountains

To be blasted with your libidinous lust bombs at the cost of our blood rains?

 

Why do you forget, o the barbaric, barbarous and lewd brutes on Earth

That we, the women, are goddesses, without whom life seems lifeless, let alone birth?

Thus, unless your immoral, unscrupulous and unchaste atrocity ceases once for all

Our tears will crush your spurious haven; and your fell, catty demons' reign tumble!

 

N.B. This poem is dedicated to a 23-year-old female physiotherapy intern, gang raped in a private bus, and murdered in Delhi on 16^th December, in 2016.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A DROP OF PARENTS’ TEAR

 

A distressingdrop of parents’ tear

Embitters even an infinite ocean of nectar

Poisons a heaven of panacean blessings

And spoils sadly the ages of good feelings!

 

An aching tear drop of the living and obtrusive angels

Perturbs even the ever vigilant gods and goddesses

Puts peace into shameful shambles and messes

And convertsbliss into the most disdainful hells!

 

A piercing tear drop of your heart-throbs

All your life’s hard earnings in a trice robs;

Your bloomed path of real progress curbs

Jabs your morality, your serenity disturbs!

 

An excruciating tear drop of your parents’ pains

Invokes, to pour on you, pernicious acid rains;

Proves all your material mundane gains in vain

O the most ingrate, insensible and willful insane!

 

A strangling drop of your parents’ tear when falls

It becomes the most venomous, vicious curse;

It rumples and ruffles your life’s still and staid sea

It snatches your happiness, and ceases your glee!

 

You are in penury and paucity despite teeming wealth

You are paralyzed and crippled in spite of plum health

During your insipid life span you face a spiritual death

Once you are devoid of compassion and parental faith!

 

Neither can help you your delayed alerted repentance

Nor can save you your late conscientious atonement!

Farsightedness is to learn through others’ instance.

Keeping parents content is a genuine accomplishment!

 

It is never too late to rectify your distorted ways

Reflection and rectification turn a rogue into a sage

Sincere confession and self purification at length pays

Obligatory duty and service help you to surpass the miry maze!

 

Thus, do awake your slumbering and hibernating scruple

Ponder over again, ‘In parents is latent a divine temple.’

By their blessings you can please God, book an upward flight

Andend your worldly plight only by serving them right!

 

Hence, don’t divest yourself of their invaluable blessings

Which is the only key to ‘Salvation’, that time ceaselessly sings!

 ‘Eternal solace’ is then neither inaccessibly alien nor at all far

For your life becomes as immortal as the ever shining Pole Star!

 

 

 

PARENTS’ LOVE

 

Parents, like the rare gardeners, sow the human seeds

With so sweet dreams on their beds of life gardens!

Do warm them with love heat, and water with care rains

Until they do sprout and evolve into special breeds!

 

Parents, like the caring gardeners, tend kids-saplings

With tender compassion, affection and timely service

Unique devotion, dedication and invaluable sacrifice

Until making them as valuable as the diamond rings!

 

Yes, no pebbles unturned they do ever leave

Until their promising plants grow impressively to live

Even longer than the gigantic, enduring banyan trees,

All that they do merely drawing sopping hardship fees!

 

Alas! Little do they ever dream in their wildest nightmares

That they will be, one day, deprived of shades, let alone fruit cares!

They will be abandoned like abominable snake sloughs

Oh! They will be blown out like filthy mucus and coughs!

 

Ah! They are returned their vital water in the form of hot tears

They are reciprocated with biting sneers and piercing jeers!

They are no longer in the scheme of things like dry tree barks

Alas! They are found begging for Mercy in stations and parks!

 

My greatness! Still they curse not their own ingrate bloods

Still they devoutly pray for them, being whirled in pain floods,

Hence, their matchless Love is equal to that of god and goddess

Oh! Who, even from their graves, still love their kids, and bless!

 

 

N.B: This poem is inspired by the title song of a Hindi movie, Baghban.

 

 

TO THE LECHEROUS RAPISTS

 

Ugh! You have more ominous glares and more voluptuous eyes

Than those of the carnivorous, gluttonous and portentous eagles!

You are shrewder than the seagulls and slier than the foxes

To satisfy your carnal hunger you ever pray on our women races!

 

Faugh! You beat the barbarous bears and hippopotamuses hazardous

In greed and savageness of your terrorizing teeth and devouring tongues!

The Bonobos, Brown Antechinues andEmperor Penguins lag far behind

In the intense and bawdy race of your indulgence lewd, wanton and blind!

 

Fie on you! You blatantly strip off the robes of all decencies and shames

You are least pinched while staining your parents' and forefathers' good names!

You are least compungeredwhile charring the innocent ladies' chastity stems

By the fiery, promiscuous flames of your heinous, licentious and lustful games!

 

Mayyour terrible and contemptible tribe perish from earthat the earliest

Otherwise, our molested, violated and slaughtered soulscan never get rest!

 

Compungered - pricked hard

 

N.B. This poem is dedicated to a 26-year-old veterinary doctor, who was gang raped and murdered in Shamshabad, near Hyderabad, 2019. Source: Wikipedia

 

 

LET’S DETHRONE THE MONARCHS OF CRUELTY!

 

When the unbridled cruelty is copiously in use

Compassion takes to her scared and shaken shoes!

The heaps of irreparable ruins become so huge

That no one is then spared or left for repentant rues!

 

When blatant blindness deafeningly blares

Uncontrolled greed in the air glares

Foul deeds defiantly and without compunction flout

Alas! Looms large, like an eclipse, the knee-deep doubt!

 

When wanton blood incessantly bleeds

Withered and dead are the empathy seeds

No one ever sensibly thinks, feels and heeds

Rampant everywhere are the fell and fallen breeds!

 

When the torn and tattered Conscience is on sale

The Reason corpses are scattered rotten and stale

Heaven is locked in a morgue like a past tale

Alas! Descends to rule unrivalled a hideous hell!

 

Until is dethroned the oppressive and despotic ‘cruelty monarchs’:

The light of hope is put out by the thick and threatening dark

Only a mass-walk on the kind, humane and compassionate tracks

Can revive the lost paradise on earth, and bring bliss forever back!

 

 

 

HOW REAL IS THE MODERN MAN'S LOVE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT?

 

Our sham love and phony concerns for the environment is so much

That for a bed or a door, we either cut a eucalyptus, or a teak tree touch!

We substitute soil spoiling urea for compost, for fast, abundant yields,

And we fondly poison with the deadly pesticides our ever venerable fields!

 

So much our forged love and feigned affection for the environment is

That we wantonly hunt the animals and birds for food and for infinite pleasure!

To construct a solid concrete and tiled jungle we mercilessly fell countless tress

We wildly erase mountains by bombing and bulldozing as we shave with a razor!

 

We have so much pseudo love for and hollow affinity with the environment

That we can't spare fridge, flight and DJ a second, for comfort and entertainment!

To be the Super Powers, we exhaust mines; manufacture the ghastliest weapons

We ever purify the rivers, seas and oceans with the sewage and affluent in tons!

 

Whose love for the environment can then be more real than the modern humans?

Who else can match man's platonic romance with the environment even in an ounce!

 

 

 

TELL 2020 TO TELL.

 

Do tell 2020 to tell whether we can call her:

A pirate like Anny Bonny, or a Mary Read like plunderer

The Four Hitokiri of the Bakumatsu, the manslaughter

A silent thunder, a muteBuldozer, or a Tsunami's Mother

Who dictated man, even at noons of May,to helplessly shiver!

 

Do tell 2020 to tell whether we can call her:

Sir Ralph, a sea buccaneer and the Inchcape bell cutter

An unwanted, illegitimate offspring or a baneful begetter

An unlawful trespasser, or a disdainful intruder

A hateful poacher or a dagger that chopped man as a painful butcher!

 

Do tell 2020 to tell whether we can call her:

A time-tested tranquilizer

A heartless, caring surgeon, or a much awaited Vaccine bitter-better

A moral preacher, a grim, useful chastiser, or a rare austere character maker

A hidden, heavenly benison, an open curse, or a sadistic, but venerable teaser!

 

A stern, generous teacher, a tear-smile fetcher, or a long sought-after panacea

That was needed for the whole of Europe, Africa, Americas, Australia and Asia!

 

 

NEW YEAR

 

Yes, last year too, dropped in this New Year

Replenished with some new hopes and promises galore

Replete with some new excitements and enthusiasms -

Ah! All blooming eyes were adorned with a million new dreams!

 

Yes, I’ve beheld those joyous and jubilant souls celebrating the New Year

I’ve seen many of them bleeding the whole year in poverty, disease and fear

Still, striving hard to conceal the unnoticed wounds with caution and care

Under the hoods of sham and superficial smiles in this kaleidoscopic fair!

 

 

Oh! My unblinking and vigilant eyes did gaze during the last New Year

The atheists garlanding their stone carved gods with rapt pomp and fervour

Decorating the Chauvinism pandals with LEDs, DJ, diving into a wine river

I watched them gasping inside the hollow shells of shallow happiness

And, I too found myself lost on the soft and colossal bosoms of emptiness!

 

 

If you can, do take a new oath on this New Year's Day, and see

Do restrain your mistakes by the bridle of self-continence and see

Do check the unwanted trespassing of the heinous brutality, and see

Do hum a hymn of eternal love and see

Do forgive the pestering kinsmen and see -

You will see peace will prevail, and amelioration will reign over pejoration

And each new day will be a Happy New Year's grand and glorious celebration!

 

N. B. This is an English version of the original Odia poem “NuaBarsa” written by the poetess Shweta Rout, a Facebook friend.

 

 

A 17TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY GIFT TO MY BETTER-HALF

 

In my life's nuptial lottery, I had been heading for a captivating casket of gold

To embrace elatedly the platonic portrait of Portia a decade and seven years back!

But, the unnoticed leaden case was lying fated to bless Bassanio with a fluke untold

What its other two counterparts did unfathomably, immeasurably and incredibly lack!

 

Since then my bankruptcy hasbegun to be banished to an irretraceable land

For, you've been enriching my hollow neck with your hallowed and priceless garland!

Your chastity can never be challenged even by the chastest virgin in the world

Your loyalty, sacrifice, altruism and inner beauty can only few virtuous hearts hold!

 

Oh! To praise you with my scanty words is like comparing a little lamp with the Sun.

But, a humble and hearty gratitude may be my anniversary gift of an enviable proportion!

 

N.B. The 17th Marriage Anniversary of the poet fell on 7^th June, 2020.

 

 

TO MY DESDEMONA

 

O my Desdemona, the very Venetian dazzling damsel!

In your matchless beauty you supersede all, and excel.

A million Monalisas lag far behind before your lasting lustre

For, you are surely the brightest star in beauty's luminous cluster!

 

Yes, you dominate the domain of glittering grace

The rest are miles away in the bewitching beauty's race!

You replicate beauty's mesmerizing and irrefutable definition

While your counterparts are merely your shadowed simulation!

 

Oh! To your captivating beauty, the gaping, gasping eyes get glued

Whosoever terms "You are simply beautiful." must be biased and rude!

But, I perceive, and call you a sprightly and spellbinding 'Fair Rose'

For, out of your galvanizing glance, a soothing vernal breeze blows!

 

Thus, may your beacon of beauty keep shining and guiding forever!

May your beauty sanctify the unholy minds like the purifying shower!

 

 

 

 

A SONNET THAT ALL VALENTINES WOULD LOVE TO HUM.

 

Your curly, cascading hair does ever coax and caress me

Your placid, pacifying plaits do ever pamper me

Your flashy, fascinating forehead does ever fondle me

Your bewitching, breezy brows do ever baffle me!

 

Your exuberant, electrifying eyes do ever enchant me

Your glittering, glazing glance does ever gloat me

Your nice, nibbling nose does ever nudge and numb me

Your lovely, lithe lips lustrously do ever lull and lure me!

 

Your mellow, melodious mouth doesever mesmerize me,

Your fine, flashy, fluorescent face does ever flatten me,

Your chaste, chuckling chest does ever charm me,

Your goggling, gaping grasp does ever galvanize me!

 

Yes, your hushing, heartyhug does ever hypnotize me

Your beautiful, bejeweled being does ever become one with me!

 

 

AN ODE TO MY LOVELY PYARI GUDIYA

 

Oh! In the evergreen garden of my perennial love

You are, beyond an iota of doubt, a fragrant and unfading marigold

That sings more merrily than a melodious cuckoo to my heart's elation untold

And dances more gaily than the purring ripples of a rivulet beside a lush grove!

 

Oh! In the sugary, succulent orchid of my eternal love

You are, past a shred of doubt, a ripe, relishing and coveted custard apple

That exudes to me more sweetness than a soothing shower to a desert dry and drab

That pours on me more elixir of mirth than a mother's bosom milky, sweet and supple!

 

Oh! In the frabjous firmament of my fervent and undying love

You are, even without a speck of ambiguity, a shy, sincere and shiny Moon

That ever bestows upon me more lights of affinity, felicity and fidelity than a dove

That is better known for its cascading of eternal peace, and raining blissful boon!

 

Thus, o my LPG!  Who can deny that I am grateful to you for your infinite bounty

Sans which I’d have been a hallmark of hollowness and a grain chaffy and empty?

 

 

 

TO MY EID KA CHAND

 

You are a glitzy gem I have found from among the mounds of pebbles

"You deserve to dazzle till eternity!" remarks my rapt heart and revels.

I suck solace from your company as a bee extracts nectar from the blooms

You are my brightest beacon in whose presence run away the cowed glooms!

 

You are a splendid repository of virtues asCordelia who was better known

For her charming beauty, total honesty, unalloyed candour and rare devotion

Who was ever away from theevils of vanity, falsehood, envy and pretension!

Thus, how can your Edgar dream to livea hollow and harsh lifeof separation?

 

You are a soothing breeze of the vernal wood that heals my wounds of woes

With its touch of pure love, steady loyalty, solid sincerity and sweet serenity!

You are indeed an Elysian EidKa Chand dancing in my life's blissful bay

Your painful set robs off my prized joy, while your smiling rise makes my day!

 

Let our season of spring of sweet and sacred love never come to an end!

Let our immortal bond of ecstasy reign for ages to guide others, and transcend!

 

 

 

AN ODE TO MY LIFE'S MONALISA

 

Thy garnishing gaze does fervently galvanize

Like that of Monalisa, thy devout da Vinci,

To etch thee on his heart's canvas to shine to immortalize

As the Dark Lady had once spurred Shakespeare's sensuous fancy!

 

A sweet smile on thy luscious lips

Enlivens the wordy brush of thy Burman to paint his awaited masterpiece

That had once turned Johnsy, a rigid dying pessimist into a staunch optimist

As Portia’s amazing portrait had been for Bassanio's eyes a ravishing feast!

 

Thy enchanting vocal cord does supersede a nightingale's serenade

And mesmerize me to embellish and eulogize to my soul's content

As the melodious songs of the cuckoo had once an irresistible invitation sent

The enraptured Wordsworth to capture and treasure hers in his life's vernal glade!

 

 

 

YOU ARE ONE OF THE COSTLIEST CASKETS OF ALL THE FEMININE VIRTUES.

 

O my love! Lakes of honey drip from your lustrous lips

Seas of nectar spring from your relishing kiss!

Your smiles incessantly shower an alluring grace

And oceans of ambrosia rain from your ecstatic embrace!

 

O my love! The milky Moon envies at your lively glance

The mercurial Sun marvels at your scintillating elegance!

At your luminous presence, opulence is in abundance

Ah! Fountains of serenity does your sweet affinityenhance!

 

O my love! Your blithe company compels dark sorrows to flee

Your blissful association ameliorates my mundane glee!

Yes, in your exquisite loyalty lies life's all happiness

Indeed, your pure and fair love lifts me to win life's Chess!

 

Yes, you are one of the costliest caskets of all the feminine virtues.

So, to be blessed with an angel like you, who won't throng the queues?

 

 

THE LANGUAGE OF MY HEART

 

O my darling!I know not indeed, why do my restless and euphoric eyes

A sky full of dreams, with a hidden rapture, none other than you, dream?

Why does this delirious peacock of my mind dance like a leaping stream

And make you a meek appeal, "May I be at your disposal forever, please?

 

O my darling! My sullen lips are rapt to empty the language of my heavy heart

When you are unthinkably and unbearably out of my reveling, rejoicing reach,

But, no sooner do you come close as a remote wave does smooch the beach

Than it sprints faster thantime to a merry realm of oblivion to start a new part!

 

O my darling! Legions of unspeakable thoughts live awake in my obsessive mind

The more I suppress them, the more they obstinately fancy of none other than you!

As they gradually grow stronger in my tranquil turmoil a Shakespeare in me I find

And pen volumes in your adoration better than any other avidword-weaver can sew!

 

Do rely, o my distant ally! Nights and days I spend time with you in a silent hub

What is ardently hummed forever by the devout votaries of Cupid as "Sweet love"!

 

N. B. This is an English version of the original Odia poem “HrudayaraBhasa” written by the poetess BharatiRath, an English teacher.

 

 

A POET

 

Oh! An insightful, sensitive and imaginative poet 

Can travel at an unthinkable and immeasurable rate.

He can perceive the dancing, joyous flowers in an entrancing heaven

And collect the precious pearls at the fathomless bottom of an ocean!

 

A poet has an access to the impregnable bowel of the earth

He can relish the taste of the tantalizing death and blissful birth

He can suck the sugared, mouthwatering nectar as the busy bees

And, he can blow faster anywhere than the omnipresent breeze!

 

A poet can play with the huge fatal whales and the dangerous sharks

He can fly with the jets, and sing with the cuckoos, nightingales and larks

He can jump onto the shiny, silvery and serene bosom of the Moon

And, he can claspeasily the blazing Sun in a twinkling of an eye at noon!

 

A poet can swim swifter thanships against the fiercest currents

He can sniff the fragrant flowers’ rejoicing and spell-binding scents

He can easily set fire on the incombustible water, stone and feelings

And, he can excel any goldsmith in moulding the bejeweled rings!

 

A poet can rule over the invincible kings, emperors and monarchs

He can pace untiringly as time, and sing sweetly as cuckoos or larks

He can meticulously convert a dry desert into a lush, fertile oasis

And, he can construct in the space an edifice of peace, mirth and bliss!

 

A poet can glide and slide on the shivering icebergs without getting cold

He can scale the sky kissing peaks like Everest without any rope to hold

He can swing slickly without swings wherever and whenever he wishes

And, he can tame a poisonous cobra, and caress even if it scarily hisses!

 

A poet can lick venom, and swallow hemlock without being dead

He can suck ambrosia from the syrupy and soft blossom's honey head

He can tumble down with the falling showers without getting hurt

And, he can visualize a prolonged war that was in the long past fought!

 

Who else can wreathe the richest garlands with the magical alphabet?

Who else can surpass the enviable excellence of an ever adorable poet?

Who else can undermine the inimitable aptitude of an appreciable poet?

And, who else can retain the unparalleled quality of an extraordinary poet?

 

Whoelse can belittle the exceptionalgenius of an adept poet?

Who else can underestimate the knack of a marvellous poet?

Who else can transcend the rare faculty of a proficient poet?

And, who else can retain the unique flair of alaudable poet?

 

Whoelse can wield the pen as poignantly as an adroit poet?

Who else can turn down the potential of an accomplished poet?

Who else can retain the vision of a gifted and visionary poet?

And, who elseon earthcan be so great as an exemplary poet?

 

YES, WHO ELSE CAN BE SUCH AN ADORABLE LIAR? 

 

Oh! She wakes up much before the dawn 

She toilsand sweats even long after sun goes down the horizon

She is a big and useful book of moral lesson for all to read and learn

She lieswillingly that one may be saved from reproof or humiliation!

 

Oh! Starving,she voluntarily and generously serves the dishes 

Until the gluttonous children are more than satisfied or overfed

And the greedy in-laws say "Our hunger is over, so nothing else is needed."

To her Mr.'s query, "Is there anything left for you?" smilingly says she "Yes"!

 

Oh! She deliberately dares to face the music:

If the cat licks away all the milk for daughter's carelessness 

Or, the son is plucked in Maths and has scored in other subjects less

Or, the drunk hubby scolds her parents for dowry, and beats her without logic!

 

Alas! She is an easy prey to her sister in laws' irrelevant criticism

A constant victim of her sadistic mother in law's heckling and cynicism

She is such tireless engine that ever plies without any complaint or blast

She lies with reliable excuses that peace and happiness in family may last!

 

Yes, who else can be such an adorable liar to be loved most in society

And be unconditionally blessed to attain salvation and beat mortality! 

 

N.B. This is a translated version of an Odia poem titled "EtikiMichheiSie!" written by Mrs. BharatiRath, an English teacher by profession. 

 

 

 

 

TO MY FATHER ON HIS 43rd DEATH ANNIVERSARY

 

Nana, had you been all along with me

In the turbulent sea of life, forlornly I would not have to swim,

I would not have to walk in the alleys lonely, gloomy and grim,

Really, so sad and sorrowful would not have been my life’s Film!

 

Nana, had you not left me before I was barely two years,

I would not have to pass alone through so much deafening chaos,

I would not have been snowed under so much bitter adversity,

I would not have to exist like a negligible and pitiful ‘anonymity’!

 

Nana, had you not been neglectful of your health,

I would not have to miss in you the invaluable wealth,

I would not have to be a hapless, pitiable and playable ‘puppet’,

I would not have to be blown helter skelter with ‘a dry leaf’s fate’!

 

Nana, may I always be a good man with your heavenly blessings’ rays!

Nana, my own sourest experiences teach me to humbly and solemnly pray:

“May no child in the world ever fall to Father’s bereavement’s painful prey!

May all the begetters under the Sun keep making their dearest children’s days!”

 

 

N.B: The poet's father was a postman, who breathed his last due to his neglectful attitude towards his health. He did not go for treatment after an iron nail got pinched into his foot, which got contaminated coming in contact with cow dung due to walking bare foot and working in the field in the rains, leading to his tragic end. He left behind him his widowed wife, three sons and a daughter. The poet was youngest. At that time he was about one and half years. Then a traumatic and pathetic period for his family started. The poet struggled almost 40 years to settle for which he remains indebted to God as well as his family members.

 

 

This book is dedicated to "Dhan", the poet's deceased baby daughter.

 

Copyright: Dr. Shankar D Mishra