BRITTLE

 

BRITTLE

 

To immerse in thought past events,

That shook me uprooted from the trust,

My school friend from childhood,

Both knew very well, each other,

Knew our parents, close friends,

Family visits, we play enjoyed,

The closeness grew with age, reality,

Studying together occasionally,

Worked out school tasks problems,

Exchanged notebooks, interacted,

Gift on birthdays with greetings,

Life unknowingly crept into college,

No more walking together n advised,

She went to college with girlfriends,

Taste how soon changed, our gossip,

Attending class, enjoyable, messages,

Paper, torn drawing funny caption,

Circulated among friends a game,

Turned to comment on a teacher,

Drawing of girl students, comments,

My childhood girlfriend, classmate,

I found nasty comments on her,

School break turned into fighting,

Who wrote the comment was beaten,

I was dragged to the principal later,

I never told what was written,

Faced punishment, begged for excuses,

She asked at home about the incident,

I remained silent, and she got angry,

Till we passed college, she knew it,

I was hiding this episode, a fight,

Classmates linked both in love,

Assumed undesirable rumors,

What they discussed, known avoided,

Never knew, but my girlfriend marked,

Found to be remorse, introverted, sad,

She was worried for me, questioned,

Questions frequent met a wall,

In me, unfriendly she interpreted,

After repeated efforts, I failed,

She disconnected friendship totally,

We found the world separated,

University, then service came in life,

I just remembered her, sweet memory,

Our gossip walking to school,

Sharing gifts, chocolates, new pens,

Years, distant friends were changing,

I found the woman in life loved her,

Thought we both to get married,

Once we gossiped at a park, I told,

About my childhood friend to her,

She was surprised, told she knew,

She was her friend at university,

We got married by now, settled,

Never disclosed this incident to her,

It happened my school friend visited,

Visited her university friend only,

She got shocked to find me, curious,

Introduced my wife as my classmate,

That broke our bond little surfaced,

I knew she remembered clearly,

At departure, she enquired again,

You beat that boy black and blue,

Will you please tell me the truth?

My voice was brittle, cracking, said,

It was an obscene message on paper,

It falsely linked our deep friendship,

Old paper brittle, dust is in my heart,

 

@ Bijayananda Mishra

 

LIMIT

 

LIMIT

 

A childhood dream was fulfilled,

Cost of study, merit a daydream,

Struggled in my teenage, in school,

Mathematics books several,

Problems, arithmetic, geometry,

Algebra formulas hundreds,

Trigonometry, calculus etcetera,

Long questions, each set of problems,

I was lost in jungle solving,

Problems willfully made complex,

Formulas hundreds, one suitable,

Choosing the wrong method waylaid,

Arriving at solutions right is very difficult,

Exercises thousand in school books,

A lantern was burning till dawn,

Just one geometric problem to prove,

The night was passing without a solution,

My mind was engrossed in the problem,

Supposing possibility, impractical,

Sat quietly in my room, drew,

Sketching process of construction,

Data, problems never solved, supposed,

Completed once a drawing is noted,

Noted in reverse, solves a problem,

Simple deductions, mind inquisitive,

Seven decades passed but feeling,

Life blossomed as a budding engineer,

One solution arrived correctly,

It took days, forgot lunch, dinner,

How many scolds  by parents,

Unmindful introvert, awkward,

A clue mind proposed, start first,

Ran for my table workout soon,

On pen, pencil, paper stacked,

Exercise notebook piling up heavy,

Could not buy papers, another way,

Chalk box, duster, cement floor,

Every day used to sweep my room,

Bags of chalk dust collected, disposed of,

Not preparation for an exam, addiction,

The high school examination was over,

First division in result joined college,

Mathematics never left me,

Graduation postgraduate degree,

Fundamental formulae from school, 

Still relevant post-graduation,

Mathematical operations four,

Addition, subtract, multiply, divide,

Operation integrate differentiate,

A lifetime passed with numbers,

Computer science post graduated,

To date fails to find correct logic,

A thousand codes of program fail,

Never could give the right solution,

Trial with cut and paste, alteration,

Weeks pass to find the correct logic,

Programming instantly provides results,

Computer a machine as accurate,

Generate numbers millions quickly,

Each number from zero to nine,

Error or answer printing fast,

Decimal numbers hundred correctly,

On the computer screen, look at the size,

The size of decimal numbers is phenomenal,

Thinking where engineering ends,

Expanding universe infinity exists,

A drawing on paper to materialize,

Accurate to decimals, sky scrapper,

Accurate to a bridge, highway, rail,

Accurate to rocket engines from cars,

Accurate to ship thousand tons exact,

Exact to pencil paper, drawing, logic,

Failed to date to find, where the limit is.

 

@ Bijayananda Mishra

 

 

    

EXIT

 EXIT

 

It was passion, intense, hankered,

Grew up with education mastered,

Skilled programmer analysts well,

Adopted life of a coder minted gold,

Never believed the day, touched the moon,

Degree, post-graduated with merit,

Felt life precious, contemplated a lot,

Computer, the jukebox, I can play,

It sings programs musical payment,

Million fingers earning typing fast,

Eyes glued to screen, inert senses,

A bright screen displayed the world,

A mouse can catch point anywhere,

The company pays handsome,

My life manipulates data in graphs,

Forecast, prophesies scientific,

Transacts million, lightening speed,

Paperless office highrise building,

Work here for twelve hours focused,

Pigeon hole, a chair, computer screen,

Keyboards life was busy for a decade,

There was an exit door to a big hall,

In another concrete tower allured,

Hall semi-dark, colored lights,

Soft music, rhythmic footsteps,

Drinking elixirs of life, sedated,

Forget the name, address, place, future,

Eyelids heavy, limbs swaying,

Hugging unknown, kiss n love,

No one is a stranger here, angels,

Blaring closing hours early morning,

A flat cosmetic, small, polished,

Used to fall flat on the bed, till refreshed,

Dawn breaks at a desktop screen,

A day begins, challenge life, minting,

Checked bank balance to million,

Happy contented, money is power,

Power gives ultimate happiness,

Money n luxury for wild imagination,

Possible under the earth, decade over,

It was a holiday sneaked to a beach,

Crowded families, children playing,

Socked to find missed planet forgotten,

Fresh wind, wet moisture soothing,

White foamed waves approaching,

Roars were inviting to get soaked,

Kids were playing, alert parents,

I felt jolted to reality, was single,

Alone in a big world, missed life,

Trickling reality, bankbook if fake,

Fake world, my jukebox, pigeonhole,

Exit not to dance bar, to drink life,

Exit not to get sedated, dance wildly,

Exit not to throw tired limbs on a bed,

I ran to the hotel room, crying bitterly,

Money, millions; give my decade,

Give a decade back, I self-imprisoned,

Lust for money felt only honey,

I was drinking poison in glass, drugs,

Madness crumpled my heart hard,

Breathless, I was searching for fresh air,

I shouted at the beach, want to live,

I have a beautiful wife, children,

The exit wished desperately to live,

To live, I sighed, borrowing a decade.

 

@ Bijayananda Mishra

STRANGULATION

 

STRANGULATION

 

 

Strangulation chocked breathe,

Causes death consequently, reveals,

Dissect the mortal body check,

Please check thoroughly, O’ doctor,

You shall fail dear, your book too,

Can never find, voice choked,

Silent death creeps in the land,

Watch subtle presence very near,

Picks up your outbursts, cries,

Records condemnation, scorn,

Observes, note hatred, anger,

Passed in second thousand miles,

Censors writing, posts, messages,

Restrict viral cyber media quickly,

Arrested in the dead of night,

Undone, order from an authority,

Obey blindly, execute, imprison,

Hay writer, Raj has gone for good,

Democratic right, liberty by birth,

Citizen, born on the soil, right automatic,

Only hunger killed his frame slowly,

Denied to study, read freely,

Land demanded blood to learn,

Money to enter college, fee rises,

Boarding cost of study untouchable,

Once, he shouted and threatened,

Demand to be skilled freely,

Booked under violence threat,

 An imprisoned case will be a decade,

Unknown face sick, wrote letters,

Letter to judge, ministers, authority,

Lost in the way a machine checks,

Blocked crying heart treat dangerous,

No dynamite, gun, sulfur, gelatin,

No grenade, explosives, his pen,

Far explosive engulfs the nation,

The public will vote against corrupt,

Vote against nepotism, sectarian,

Vote against anarchists, goons,

Mandate against powerful grabbed,

Voters bribed, fooled illiterate once,

A billion people wiser now choosy,

Seek honest, dedicated, true secular,

Lust absent for family, faith, race,

Voters choose a leader youth writes,

Censored the pen, locked up,

The lure of bundles of currencies failed,

Large bungalow, assets, gold, plenty,

Rejected this person, machine’s vice,

On postmortem, nothing you could find,

Could not diagnose a voice choked,

Taunted to reality tagged extremist,

Only once demanded free food, shelter,

Free education, cloth, medicine,

For jobless, destitute, untouchable,

A woman, thrown out of the house,

Demand right to live with dignity,

Treated by law as offensive, penalized,

Banned all speeches, it evokes emotion,

Independence, freedom, birthright,

Yet to touch them, they exist, denied,

The shadowy machine was searching,

Found today the seed before to grow,

Ruler fear revolution may evolve soon,

A forest of rebels will spread,

Dismantle the powerful decided to elect,

Thrown out the body to a dark chamber,

Not Andaman but in city languishing,

Died today sick, untreated, news,

No postmortem effective can highlight,

Truly death due to strangulation,

Not breathe but human voice censored.

 

@ Bijayananda Mishra

 

 

STRANGLED

 

STRANGLED

 

Confide openly, secrets hunting,

Sin tells conscience heart admits,

Rejects mind but tags blunder,

Argument learn to get experience,

Pious, ever heart human observed,

Inkling lust trickles desire acute,

Human life challenging why fear,

Known life perishes, curiously a fact,

That born here must die in time,

Life struggles, meet from the start,

Disease, abnormality, hunger links,

Feed till the last rest often needed,

Sleep at night must contemplate,

Half of life sleeps plunder forcefully,

Death is predatory, hideous, cruel net,

Accident curse of life, less announce,

Takes away sight, hearing, limbs,

Cause vegetative stage, non-functional,

Looked at mirrors, image less reflects,

Death accidents happen so suddenly,

How much human life be watchful,

Ever conscience speaks, no silent,

Mind captures heart to watch and hear,

Short life, O’ human, enjoy till the end,

Everybody will die someday, think,

You, be a traveler, discover the world,

Eat and drink taste elixirs of life,

Reject firmly, lust is a poison potion,

Born find limbs perfect achieve a goal,

The soul demands freedom to choose,

Where conscience pricks debar,

Constantly goading to inhibit life,

Teenage, adulthood till age-fighting,

Ruthless was a bitter fight within,

Invisible break applies forcefully,

Paralyzes mind frigid fatal fears,

Projects nightmares, dreams cast,

Sweating gets awake at night,

Find life fights in the dreary desert,

Thirsty, dying for a drop of water,

Drop is the hunger for wealth,

Yes, wants heart for money plenty,

Knocks every corner, at doors, a pity,

Impatient, failure causes desperate,

Depression is Death Valley, morass,

Impregnable fortress dark room,

Ghost imaginary vicious appears,

Ghost is self worries, tension, fear,

Hears weird sounds of beasts,

Dead of the night on a soft cushion bed,

Sweating profusely lighted room,

No one is there to threaten fellow,

Fully awake, sleep won’t touch,

Pills fail together, sunken eyes,

Feel rotten smells around, shaken,

No bad smell, bedroom fresh,

Darkroom of a fortress, only bedroom,

Maddening effects between feeling,

Belief, disbelief, plays mind dirty tricks,

Conscience under a canopy of lust,

Watching knows everything silent,

Knows very well consequence nearer,

Failed spirit now to get strangled,

Strangled once not to see, hear,

Strangled once not speak, taste,

Strangled to drink the wine of touch,

Mind brutally captured soul, a captive,

The soul was no more strangled,

A white dove fled beyond to freedom.  

 

@ Bijayananda Mishra