How like Eos,

How like Eos,
Thou arrive riding Phaeton and Lampus,
Draped in fleecy clouds,
Hastening across the streams of Oceanus,
Blinding me to see
Amidst the bright, Horae,
Thy feminine hours
Climbing the arc of heaven,
And at that moment
I can only sing thee,
For thou hath made me,
Like a creator,
Like a damsel who brings light to the mortal,

A candle I turn then,
To worship thee,
As by thy glory
Thou light me,

How like Eos
Thou bring dews of the morn,
O, the daughter of Hyperion,
How by thy rise
Thou create words in me that fly.

Would leave a few poems as buds,

Would leave a few poems mine
As buds in your sky to shine,
And with your flower basket
You would there arrive, sacred,
To pick them up, one by one,
And you would then put them there,
Singing a song perhaps to fill the air,
Which song would you then sing,
I have that sense preordained, I think,

Your song would be full of Love,
Which could only be borne by wings of dove,

And hearing your songs so blissful,
My poems from buds would bloom colorful.

Come, winter's heather,

Come winter's heather,
Like Erica,
And by thy feather
Let me be blown...

With thy breeze in my sail,

With thy breeze, freed, onto my sail,
Broken, felled, the string,
Ready am I,
Sinking I wail,as I sing,

The morn has gone futile,
The afternoon trails by a few miles,
Tie me not there
Whence the shore is so near,

For thou the boatman,
Woken, I spend the time of sands,
Waves of the sea,
Whence play with me;

I will befriend the storm,
Will not be by frowns torn,
Leave me there,
In the face of the gale,

For thou the boatman,
For thou, I sail.

(It is a transliteration of a song by Rabindranath Tagore, done by me. My humble tribute to the greatest poet and writer of our land. The original bengali song can be found at pg 404, no. 24, Collected works,  Birth centenary edition, )

S1

'I think I am just like her...'
That way she started to jabber,
I knew whom did she refer...
In S1, we both had seen her,
Her hair which flew in the wind,
Her face happy and sad,
Her talks going round and round
Reaching nowhere yet right there,
Where,Stanislavski  recast Shakespeare,

'My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite'
She did heave a sigh, seeped in, heartful a tone,
With the play opening lines by the passing light,
Stanislavski as would have wished,

And I had traveled thousand acres of green,
And few hundred miles
To find the smile
Of a blossom,
That bloomed  true,
Raised by the time's hue,

'I think I am just like her...'
She repeated with assertion,
And a theatre broke,

The streets looked like taken out
From the setting,
Lighted dim,
A bit in a haze,
With purple feet
Hurrying to meet
Big roads.

Just before dusk,

Just before dusk,
The sky tells upon a bay,
With te deum laudamus
Singing the passage of a day...

An ode to Lofn,

To what shall I liken thee Lofn?
Thy cold breeze lighted and softened
That sends the air to run
Cooling hearths, an unusual turn
Of thy way to spread winter's song
To what shall I liken thee, Lofn,
As thou take and pull me along
To the land of Edda, albeit norse
As thou cause a winter to hold up, stilled, a pause,
Like a Fiore, overwhelming the canvas wide
With colors of his beateous mind  laid up alright,
Like a mariner upon arrival at a place
Hearing the murmur of Lethe, a bless,
Like a man yet to make out
What can cause lotos petals to sprout
Lines in a heart like offshoots
Of too much poetic a root,
To what shall I liken thee, Lofn,
Thy cold breeze lighted and softened
Whence sings winter's song warm.

On 'the corn field' *

The corn field
Flooded by yellowish gold
Had the whispering breeze to play with,
And a lad, a ploughman's son,
There how with his plough homeward did tread,
His strawhat, slanted down,
Could not stop the sun to greet-
Him, swayed by the picturesque treat
Of the cornfield, bearing the dreams of his toils,
By  the light of fading day so beautifully lit.

(Note: * a painting by Berthe Morisot, the american impressionist painter,)

And like smoke of incense, a misty morn,

And like smoke of incense
With cold breeze's breath
The morn arrives misty dense,
Filling the heart's field with poetic sense,

And imagery of life,
Like a landscape draped in fog,
Curtained by a screen translucent,white,
Drops from angel's hands,
To sing the songs of soul,
Iike a holy rite.

Upon receipt of a painting,

A painting have I received
From someone who had the time passed by sleeves,
Who had spent a large part of days under the open sky, and the Sun,
Who had made a tryst with Nature all through,
Who had lived life, in farms and barns,
And in meadows, in lands of plateaus and hills,
In places where the days, the songs of heaven seal-
With mellifluous grace and wonderous accompaniment
Of rivers and brooks that to a heart can only melody send,

The  painting done at a location undisclosed
Filled my soul with a dreamy float,
The brushstrokes nimble and crafted with care,
brought alive a bower with sublimity layered,
And colors of country which the painter had caught
Left me struck, dumbed, and with poesy wrought.

A scene idyllic,

I think I have been to that place
So peaceful, pastoral,
Where by chirpings of birds
The afternoon to a twilight falls,

I think I have been to that place
Where Artemis the earth hath blessed,
And the flavour of roses and myrtles
Fill the air of the space...

I think I have been to that place
Where Erato descends sacred,
With a turtle dove at Her feet,
Sleeping quiet , noiseless.

Early wintry morn, a drizzle,

By hoofs making marks
On moist a bit benign an earth,
The mythical horse, known as Pegasus,
Caused fountains of poesy to erupt, once,

And fumigation from frankincense,
Much like Orphic hymns ancient
There on pages of heart happened, ageless,

Early wintry morn thus
With a cold mild drizzle made me fall,
And wet streets became a playground
For leaves of mine to run around.

Ajay...

Getting down from the car,
When first looked around, near and far,
The blue hills, the clouds,
The vegetation, the grassy mound,
I could not believe
I had been once around,
To the same place...
'It got so much changed!'
I exclaimed,

'Have you come here?
Earlier?'
Someone asked,
From that little hut,
The door was open,
At the verandah there were pots of flowers,
And there the owner
Of the voice stood, apparent,

'Yes...long time ago...'

'How many?'

'Hmm...twelve years, perhaps...
And then, there were no such huts,
No sights of habitation,
Only there were greenery around,
And a few tents...'
I reminiscenced,

'And?'

'And...there was someone...
A lad, who used to play guitar,
Late in the evening,
He would sing,
Bob Marley...
Where had he gone?'

Asked her,
Feeling alone
Not lonely though,
For blue hills and white clouds
Were still there,
Shining by the light of the day,
And not faraway,
Just behind the mound of grass,
The Memorial Rock,
Stood, silent,

'Ajay?
Are you talking of him?'

'Yes! Yes!
Ajay was his name...'
I nodded, excited,
'Where is he nowadays?'

'He had gone...'
She said,
And went indoors...

'Hey! Wait!
Where is Ajay?'

I asked again,
She did not answer immediate,
She stopped,
And turned her head,
Towards the memorial...

Behind the mound of grass,
It was there, venerable,

'You will find him there,
Inscribed...
Five years back,
He was shot at,
At the border,
Friendly fires...
That did him...'

She said,
Before she turned to the door,
Again,

'Who are you by the way?'
Asked her,

'Me?'
She smiled, vague,

'No one...
But,
I have his name,
Right here...'
She placed her left hand on her bosom,
Candid, bold,
Her nosetip,
It appeared reddened, cold,

The blue hills
Were getting covered
by clouds,
Or were they? Really?

By thy side, finding Rhadine,

By thy side,
On the white sands,
Once I got the chance
To understand
How by Your sheer clean cool flow
You could someone with happiness bestow,
How You could cover up a soul
And fill the heart's tiny bowl
With your eternal life, forever flowing,
How could you make one to see the Lord's ways of undoing
Everything, and yet giving everything to one,
How could Thou make one to be merged in the profundity and abundance
Of trees, hills, forest, rocks, all gathering mother earth's most blessed sense,
How could You make one to become a saint, a poet, a wanderer,
How could You evoke picturesque Beauty, in heart and mind, fair,
How could You by Your ripples sing the song, of waters of life, an Aoide,
How could You send music to be broken from choked, pent up, a throat,
How could You help one to write a few lines, possessed and illumined,
How could You help one to seek the poem wrapped in kithara, Your lyre
~ a Rhadine.

It had been a morn...

It had been a morn
To climb that road
Circling the hill,
It had been a morn
For me to walk to feel
The cold breeze that sent
Those flags aflutter
Whispering their spirituality,
It had been a morn
To walk and be bathed by piety,
To get into an unhindered flow of silence,
To feel how chants and gongs usually lend
Beauty to a heart and Peace to a mind to ascend
Tireless, calmed and young,
It had been a morn
To grow by verses of uphill
a journey, long.

Sometimes wonder, how are you?

Some times I wonder,
How are you?

Do you still listen to Chris Rea?
Do you still find time to have a walk by the evening-sea?
Do you still tie up your hair in form of a high bun?
Do you still stand up on a table, and strike a pose, just for fun?
Do you still do doodles on the backpage of your desktop calender?
Do you still put your eye into that telescope to catch a shooting star?
Do you still sing holding on to the comb , looking at the mirror?
Do you still scream at cockroaches, out of childish horror?
Do you still draw a moustache and make faces only to imitate a scene of a play?
Do you still find time to make little pots and pans of clay?
Do you still collect different earrings and hair clips?
Do you still in your closet, somewhere, keep that yellow leaf?

Sometimes...
I just wonder,
How are you...

Nemu Lima,

'Where do you want to go?'
Nemu Lima
Asked me,
Her tiny eyes had curiosity,
Perhaps she had not seen someone
Like me, so wayward, vagrant,
Perhaps she got the smell
Of trees, those which
Spell dreams, a bit vagabondish,
On clothes and eyelids,
Of people who had traveled
Through woods, clouded and thick,

'Don't know...
You tell me...'
I smiled and answered,
Looking at those pebbles, stones, rocks,
That had slid down the slope of the hills,
And the misty shape that
One's soul with liberation from business filled,

Perhaps Nemu Lima saw something,
Some kind of adventurous spirit,
In me, a bit vagabondish,
'How long are you pent up there?
How long have you not taken the mystic air?
How long have you not sung your heart?
How long have you been living from your self set apart?'
Nemu Lima asked,
Her tiny eyes
Curious,

'Many years...
I do not care to count...'
Answered I,
By silence of the woods bound,

'Take this...'
Nemu Lima
Handed me a scroll,
Rolled into a cylindrical container, made of steel,
Shiny, cold,

I took that into my hands,
A thin red ribbon it had,
At one end,

'Tie it around your neck...
And tread...
Across that zone
Which had witnessed an earthquake
And landslide...
Tread silent,
And pray...
Till you reach
Where you want to go...'
Nemu Lima,
Said, her face with a smile set aglow,

'I will...'

I said,
And bowed,

The hills looked like friends
Calling me.

Letters and alphabets,

'We don't live,
We write letters all through our life...'
Once she told me,
Walked as we
Through the lanes of our hearts and veins,
Walked as we close and dense,

'We don't live,
We write letters all through...'
She told me
Once, walked as we,
A few kilometres of our poems,

Up ahead,
We had only alphabets.

Flowers of winter how bloom

Flowers of winter how bloom
And how they set everything colorful,
How they catch the light of the day,
How they toss their heads, spriteful and gay,
How they sing the season's song,
How they bloom like cronies young...

Meeting Reshi,

Heard her murmur,
Two hundred metres
From above,
Heard her, sombre,
As if she was chanting a prayer,
Soft, yet grave enough
To make one stop,
And breathe in the cold air,
And feel the ascetic silence
Enveloping one,
Filled with smell of fragrant incense leaves,
And also of wild red and dark blue berries,

The path made by people gone long ago,
Was visibly enchanting
And a bit perilous too,
Steep,

But I heard her murmur,
Reshi,
The river,
Colored silver
And a bit silk thread like, as I her from distance could see,
She had been flowing there for ages not known to me,

So I started to follow
The path,
Towards her,
And once I reached
And saw her glistening,
And heard her feet sounding jingles on rocks,
I thought that was all I wanted,
And wished,
That was all I had to understand,

I sat down breathless,
I sat down filled with youthful haze,
I sat down silent,
While Reshi ran her length,
Through rocks and white sands.