She lingers still in memory  ( guardian)

                 Tall in silk green sari,

                 her gait is  elegant,

                 merges with green lawn,

                 reading poetry in the leaves,    

                 upfronting grass, looking

                for a talisman in stem

                brooding for   safe   entourage,

                her flawless body sings a

                soulful melody like Lucy.

               Cool rain showers from above

               reaching pattern less void

                envisaged ere long -  months ago

                a dream, new fulfilling life,

                what  a pleasant  gift in offing.

           She moves along, her recital of poem

           touching there and here. Her   nimble

           feet bracketing in turns and twists.

                                   

                       

A view inside park

A view inside park     

             

This two-legged searching

For a select corner in the park of

three decades of solid front:

with its congregations and

happenings a passing through

your mind, retreat into serenity.

Entering into senior citizen’s mind

A rehearsal of emotional stress

and calculations of life’s entourage

with permutations and combinations of

household ding dong in your memory;              

you view yet another perspective too,

a middle class, salaried, rent and loan

fees and hikes, school uniforms

with content your forte.                            

Kits and kites thronging every corner.

The nebula Of life visibly moving;

Not love for Life in any corner

of park. Park, still, silent receptive,

middle class gossip and concern.

                                                                 

The Housewife ( after ( guardian)

1)       The  Housewife   ( AFTER GUARDIAN)

This  is my house, my   dutiful pride : yet,

Dueling with   duties and responsibilities

 Unbounded like steams of smoke  and kettle        

Not  doused in a   busy kitchen.

My   routine  like the  cawing of crows

Starts by five in the   cheerful  Dawn,

Cheering me too, with the chanting of

Birds in the garden around; breakfast :

Tea or coffee always there, but the hurry

To the work spot  by  sire  and  children

 Commutations in the jostling crowd,

 At times the lunch boxes left behind.

A   view cannot be digested by  mother

And housewife like me. After  cleaning

And    dish washing, ironing with sweat

Running on your forehead .

Mushrooming all the sordid aspects

and realities of life, expecting the

unexpected  and solving the

irreconcilable are order of the day.

By the time  you sit  and swallow

The  little  crumbs of breakfast;

 The knock on the door  by courier

You cannot  chide him for he is on

His mission to earn his liveslihood.

At  the  end of  the  day, after all

You are  a housewife, housewife only.

Each corner of the house, each utensil

Preparing you for the next day.

      

The light changed by ( after Guardian)

 The light changed by ( after Guardian)

 We no longer walk the same path,

 No longer interact the same way

 by the light, though our eyes are

 the same; stars and sun and

 moon come and go their

 ordained path. Some poets

 call it as their wooing perhaps.

  

  Dark too unravels much to

  our selves of shell and coiled move.

  No longer same hands,

 as in the past, our channelized roots  

 take us through new and strange.  

 By the same river, woods,

 Yonder rivulet, crows and

 Sparrows ruled their roost by

 Agelong trees with each individual

 tradition and green foliage

 the pride and stay of our village.

  Oh ! God, now the ripe time

  For us to depart to different zone

  Formatted by our karma ;

  Allow our souls to merge with

  The Alone or with stars 

  and journey into a realm

  Of His Will. We comprehend

  His motive and mysterious

  Purport of Life’s entourage.

How are the children Robin?( Guardian)

How are the children Robin?( Guardian

Since months children have left homes

For the silly reason of scolding and comparison

Over results in exams. Parental impatience or

A matter of right unrightfully employed?

I cannot imagine years of their absence,

Oh! I will get delirium the very thought

Would drive me so. What if failure in exam?

Life is only one. The road is empty now,

At least I expect that road should always be

empty for the children stay in my mind forever.

They are children reared in the same roof

Under the common tutelage of aunts and uncles

A joint family system, yet parents hold and weild

Rights when studies and medals come into play;

The sweet voice and the T-shirts worn by them

Always linger in mind and the books and drawing

Pencils-  a sad reminder of their stay.  A heavy rain

Is frightening, for cannot imagine where children

Hide and protect themselves?  When are they returning?

A parrot cry in garden is a   clairvoyance and good augury

They will return soon.  What for we live, parents live

If not only for children? our life our breath only for them.

after Carnival( Guardian)

After Carnival( Guardian)

 Being pretty be stable

Ye,merry pairs of pretty eyes,

Pretty lips and slim structures,

Be cautious while going in ferry wheel,

If you reel or whirl on the house of mirrors

Hold on tight, hold on right with the

fear and principle, anything might happen

in a fraction of second.

All fine, if you are  a lovely pair,

Can be giddy in the zipper wheel

Can have a loosening feel,

Double or half, look through

The mirrors, be steady and stable.

h

rotten orange

tasty in his

mouth

haiku

rice balls on the bank

grandma’s soul

lingering

 river side

 sieves and clothes in

 endless queue

A take after “Moving on” Guardian)

A take after “Moving on” Guardian)

You call it abattoir, I call it slaughter house.

But the deed is the same in all quarters.

How often I crossed that horrendous sight

On my way to market, from my location

away from the busy throngs of crowds, coins.

Blood oozing, woe to the hands that raised the

Cruel weapon in the name of trade and taste.  

One cut into two halves, chop the head and legs

Deed is done. Some are hung upside down;

My village made blood and tannery;

Coal. Charcoal, and logs of wood,

Firewood embers the  other side.

Things are drastically changed now

As change is inevitable everywhere.

Now it is transformed into colorful

Garment store for all  ages;

I see the colorful garments hanging

In the wardrobe on hangers;

Those days were the animal’s skin

In the same spot; What a difference

Time has  affected! Autos and mobiles

Frequency of trade not for tongue

But for skin and celluloid show.

haiku

  Her birthday

every corner is a

mushroom of ants

haiku

 crayon

 Color in child’s

 lips

 full ripe

 tomato’s  skin

 newborn’s  soft  texture

  winter’s chill

 I am the size of my

 Pet  puppy on bed

 the  dawn

its twitter a mantra

in the  air

paper boats

replacing  water  in

my pot

 river boats

 oars singing tales of

 forgotten days

riverside

paper boats

fueling my muse

My days of hostel stay

My  days  of  hostel stay

 -

 It  is  not  a  room of one’s own

 but  meticulously shared by

 many  a  two legged, gulping

 their own predicament in hard times.

 Oft,gulped plain  soda ere trending

towards  coco cola  or the like of it.

 back to  seven  or  eight decades of

 unsophisticated living and life style

 threadbare in  our  view;

 no stringent  laws or stipulations,

 for the warden himself

 was the  self-willed owner.

 Each  corner of the same room

 was monopolized by ants’ rows

 all the more  by the edges of brooms.

 Egrets figure in my  diagram note

 now, recalling  those days of crows

 and  mynas  dancing in branches

 echoing through my windows.

 A room of one’s own still lingers

 in memory for it nurtured many

 fostering their  agile roots of learning.

 

   

Airy march

 Bone flute ( Guardian)

Airy march

Yesterday the same swans on the

Foamy river, white feathered, brooding

In water, consoling us – the visitors by the

River in search of messages for their

Wounded hearts.  Divine as white and

Calm, yet emitting signals of serenity often;

Elders with pots, children with socks and

Youth vibrant with expectations of future’s

Living and lure thronging here, harken

The acoustics from afar, could be some

Commerce and trade delving into their

Riverside apparels. Today the clan

Swimming with a whooper cry on the

Blue; the bone flying and singing in mid air

Journeying to unknown destinations now.

On the banks we all sit and watch  the

Airy march sing their glory.

A change in tone ( after Guardian)

A change in tone ( after Guardian)

  Welcome, come, into this fold,

  this  hearth which you frequented

  Not once, but oftener at your free will,

  but Time’s cruel naughty, jaunty

  excursions detered you for sometime.   

  Me ever extending arm of  cordiality

  You are welcome here.How often we

  Walked through the rustled path, held

  green in our hands, conversed with  them;

  My memory verdant with recordations   

  Of dinner and plates cling clang in

  Kitchen sink. Your hurried step homeward

  Was always ringing in and around the house.

  Now on the different path: some hiatus.

  Camphor with incense stick would enliven

  My spirits now in low flame.

  Things are different, still you are welcome

  Come feel free; yet the present differs

  From the past, easily identifiable.   

HAIKU

       summer grass mowed 

         earthly smell I shall      

            never forget

Outside the  rut  

you  walk through many on  the platform

Sidelining sleepers, hawkers  and pavement

Dwellers sleeping and  eking out their precarious

Living; a day gone is a   day risked and   wisked

Away  by  Time and  its subtle doings ;

Here is one  among many  previous night itself

Flanked by  bed-sheet all torn and through

Gaps  a possibility of  widening the decored

Looks  further and   further.

. All for  ration  rice  and oil and  kerosene  to

make  the poor hearth warm  and   burning; 

Stale commodities,yet luxury  for them   now  

Their tent now and    living mode Who cares

Whether  he belongs to the  suburban or same

Vicinity or from inside, All  the   same, belly

Pinches and  one  has to go  on, a  mechanical

Local newspaper  reporter clicks , All over, 

Tanka and haiku

you illumining

at one click or switch booming

sudden power off

immerse  all in  pale of dark

belittled by a candle

for him

bedridden for long  

all around hollow

homeless

every corner in platform

  his privilege

Cool web ( after Guardian)

Cool  web ( after guardian)

So supple  and  sweet are  children;

They mumble  in their spongy  web

Of their velvety mouth water dripping

at times. Fragrant Rose  and  twitter

and  Dawn with chirp of birds go well

in their ebullient streak of brush stroke.

Yes! Children can not spell the crude

Warring world and ammunitions of war

thundering for miles and miles ahead.

Cannot Spell the dry  arid cast around us.

We have the gift of speech and articulation

to hurt and  hurl words of abomination,

to twist  and  roll to stiffen and snub

not merely to chill a day but to chill

others with daggers of words and speech

taking  nowhere.Always  in a cool web of

language we are balanced with safe entourage.

But we if lose our grip and language,

If we surpass our boundary to enter into  

Another arena of limitless cacophony

We encounter  a  trap before death

traps us into  negation  and null. 

workplace haiku

closing  the  loan file

please come  day after  morrow

more auspicious

 why this post applied

 i  like   teaching  for I can

teach and  preach

 I said we  check in 

12 0 clock’ he gave call

next noon

collective praise

collective  stab lurks  somewhere

 innocent victim

Microbial wonders

Microbial wonders  ( After Guardian's  Microbial Museum)

It sails from sky, the ship   with  showers
coming down, blown by ripples,and winds
and  sea breeze.  More  than "one  hundred  and
fifty thousand years of snowfall"running  into
bubbles and frothy foams into streams and rivers
and  joining oceans atlast. Sometimes contaminations
and careful rain harvesting  storage too.   The majestic
ship  gets crumbled to  and  "prehistoric pestilience thaws",
A way of mixing ancient with modern genes, of course
so many species breed  and spread living and  luring
in water.  The  powerful water is all pervasive without
which  life is dry   and dry spell . The  future  is  thawed no doubt.

Fruit gathering after ( Guardian)

Fruit gathering.

If cooking is her  veritable  taste

to appease the taste buds  of

her mouth, her  gardening in her

pillared house  is her forte and  a  must

revitalizing her lost energy and propelling

in search of flow. Often she would speak

to her plants and  trees. Mangoes  and guavas

copious and  covering the entire stretch;

at times ,from the  other door, urchins would

stone and enjoy the  yield for the branches  

  are  munificently bent towards their  roofs.

Greater pleasure is her distribution to her

Neighbors  and  friends and  relatives.

 Her recipe of mango pickle still relives

In my mouth . After her departure, woe

to the  brokers and  buyers that bought it

and crumbled into pieces; for storied apartment

is in the offing for  their dreams.

 Even the debris abounds the sweet taste

and  fragrance of the  fruits. Now lost from

my taste but lingering in my memory.