-By Bimalanshu Mallik
(That had she done so who can say
What would have shaken from the sieve
I might have thrown poor words away
And been content to live
– W. B. Yeats)
These moving arcs above my eyes
Are compartment lights in my train.
I am bound for blue, countryside skies,
To bury a memory, and be whole again.
The landscape en route is an old friend.
He’s caught me mumbling many a time,
When remembrance has reopened a wound,
And I've sought physic in my rhyme.
Friends have recommended a quiet motel
Outside the market; but for old times' sake,
I'll put up at the famous W. Hotel,
And rent an old room of Victorian make.
Considering this’ll be the last time there,
I'll make a list of places before I start
Making sure to visit the temple square,
For prayers may revive my comatose heart.
I shall be in the sun, the singing breeze
In my hair—but search no more for yellow roses,
For one whose dreamy smile, merely on lease,
Made me pay for love in bleeding doses.
I'll walk through the same fruit vendors' lane
For one must always respect the past
Recalling togetherness, despite the pain,
And salute wisdom, as I look my last.
And near the bus stop, the old women
Singing and selling fish all day long,
Won’t know I’ll never be back again,
And yet forever, they’ll be in my song.
To be free, one's folly one must retrace,
Examine how, in a trice, nimble sanity
Stumbles on dreams and strays,
While despair grows with dawning clarity.
"Nothing matters now," says the mind,
"Pick up dying dreams and leave.
In the hearts of the beautiful, you'll find
Love falls like water through a sieve."
I yearn for a withdrawal in the mind
From all that’s hateful, loving, or kind.
They say it’s the sign of a dawn impending
And laughter and tears slowly blending.
Siddhartha! Here I am, O sage of old!
Won’t you lead me out of this gloom?
O cast me in some ancient mould,
Impervious to both love and doom!
Pray for compassion, O floundering mind,
That you and I may shelter find.
Pray for a complete nullity of sense.
Pray, pray—O soul, for deliverance!