By Balachandran Nair MJ
No more and no shall,
The lamp posts in the dark
Take the wind out of my sail,
As ghosts—a habit so bleak.
The hanging, and moving ropes
In the dusky, but eerie, shadows
Make me completely breathless
As some venom-spitting evils.
No more and no shall
The cutting words of my boss
Send me brooding to hell
Over my imaginary inadequacies.
The stories of achievements
And the heroics of my peers
Send me suddenly into a cocoon,
So defensive with frustration.
No more and no shall
The sight of yesterday’s boys,
The heights they easily scale,
Make me cringe and crib in tears.
No more and no shall
The avalanches of natural
Disasters—not one, many, still—
Fresh, plunge me into a shell.
The hypocritical leaders, and
Their amphibian traits of twist
And turn: my systolic is meddled,
Diastolic taken for a ride worst.
No more and no shall
The myopic part of assessment,
With blinders on, raises hell—
Lot of dust of wrath in my heart.
For now, I am a retired stoic,
Cold-blooded, and I have become
A python, enjoying the dark magic
Of caverns of a cave called home.