We present this work in honor of Diwali.
I did not come on this earth as a seed,
To fall in the circle of births,
I am not the elements
Earth, water, fire, air and ether
I am beyond the primordial universal self and the individual self,
I am the Supreme Consciousness.
This poem is for you.
It’s a reprieve.
It says
nothing in your little black heart
can frighten me,
I’ve looked too long
into my own.
Thank you for the gift
of your uncertainties.
We present this work in honor of Gandhi Jayanti.
The land resists
Because it cannot be
Tempted, or broken
In a chamber. It records,
By carefully shuffling the leaves,
The passage of each storm, rain
And drought. The land yields
In places, deliberately,
Having learnt warfare from the armies
It fed. The land is of one
Piece and hasn’t forgotten
Old miracles: the engraving of a bison
On stone, for instance. The land
Turns up like an unexpected
Visitor and gives refuge, it cannot be
Locked, or put away. The land
Cannot sign its name
It cannot die
Because it cannot be buried
It understands the language
It speaks in dialect.
We present this work in honor of Janmashtami.
O Krsna
mother
heart of my heart,
O dark one,
with beautiful eyes,
have mercy on me,
my birth is low,
my reputation black as night.
O dark one,
with beautiful eyes, please,
have mercy on me.
The Vedas proclaim you
champion of the low
savior of the downtrodden
like me.
Kanhopatra surrenders
again and again,
O dark one,
have mercy on me.
We present this work in honor of Muharram.
Rain has come, and fields and fruit trees sing,
Spring has come, and Love, the Lord of Spring,
Dandelions have lifted up their faces,
Cold has gone and every wintry thing!
Forget-me-not the forest graces,
Iris and the lily spring will bring.
Gather violets, O Narcissus,
Winter’s ashes from our door I fling!
The water bird the lake embraces,
How can frost upon your petals cling?
We present this work in honor of the 320th anniversary of the poet’s death.
I will not lift my veil,—
For, if I did, who knows?
The bulbul might forget the rose,
The Brahman worshipper
Adoring Lakshmi’s grace
Might turn, forsaking her,
To see my face;
My beauty might prevail.
Think how within the flower
Hidden as in a bower
Her fragrant soul must be,
And none can look on it;
So me the world can see
Only within the verses I have writ—
I will not lift the veil.
We present this work in honor of Dr. Ambdekar Jayanti.
Leave your books behind.
Since memory,
Like knowledge, is a traitor,
Erase every hoarding of your horrible past.
At last, when you enter her world
Of fraying edges and falling angels
Don’t barter words where touch will do and be the truth.
For once allow her silence to sear, strip your life-layers
Because she who knows the truth will not know the tale.
We present this work in honor of Buddha Purmina.
Through endless ages, the mind has never changed
It has not lived or died, come or gone, gained or lost.
It isn’t pure or tainted, good or bad, past or future.
true or false, male or female. It isn’t reserved for
monks or lay people, elders to youths, masters or
idiots, the enlightened or unenlightened.
It isn’t bound by cause and effect and doesn’t
struggle for liberation. Like space, it has no form.
You can’t own it and you can’t lose it. Mountains.
rivers or walls can’t impede it. But this mind is
ineffable and difficult to experience. It is not the
mind of the senses. So many are looking for this
mind, yet it already animates their bodies.
It is theirs, yet they don’t realize it.
We present this work in honor of the poet’s 115th birthday.
The rain is about to fall,
Come through my window, butterfly.
Outside, when they become wet,
Those charming colors will melt away,
The flower will fall to the ground,
It won’t be able to save you, small butterfly,
Come through my window, butterfly!
A little one will manage to catch you,
He will place you in a small box and take you away,
After, he’ll paste you into a book
You’ll die, then, butterfly,
Hide inside my window, butterfly.
We present this work in honor of Bihar Divas.
This is how the shloka goes —
women, nails and hair
once they’ve fallen
just can’t be put back in place
said our Sanskrit teacher.
Frozen in place out of fear
we girls held on tight to our seats.
Place, what is this ‘place’?
We were shown our place
in the first grade.
We remembered our elementary school lessons
Ram, go to school, son,
Radha, go and cook pakora!
Ram, sip sugar syrup,
Radha, bring your broom!
Ram, bedtime, school tomorrow
Radha, go and make the bed for brother.
Aha! This is your new house
Look Ram! Here’s your room
“And mine?”
Oh, little loony!
Girls are wind, the sun and the good earth
They have no homes
“Those who don’t have a home,
where do they belong?”
Which is the place from where we fall
become clipped nails, fallen hair trapped in combs,
fit only to be swept away
Houses left behind, paths left behind
people were left behind
questions chasing us, too left behind
Leaving behind tradition,
it seems to me I’m as out of context
as a short line
from a great classic
scribbled on a BA examination paper
But I don’t want
somebody to sit down and
analyse me
to pigeonhole me
At long last, beyond all contexts
with real difficulty
I’ve gotten here
Let me be hummed
like an abhang,
unfinished.
Poets Corner 