On Rabindranath’s Birthday
On this quiet humid morning
While the world sleeps
The birds are delirious with
A wind of promise
That shuffles their summer nests
And capers through the branches.
They do not know that the voice
Of tolerance has prevailed in France
But maybe they feel a presence
In the essence of their free flights
That whispers to them
That they are the icons of liberty –
Who build, create and express at will
Happy with small mercies, unmarred by desire,
Envy or greed. They tell us
To celebrate the joy of being alive.
Today when we sing your songs
The livelong day, rocked by
The rhythm of your unbounded sympathy
That embraced the world and welcomed
Each dawn the bird songs of freedom and faith.
May 9, 2017, Kolkata
Kolkata: From Nabanna’s 9th Floor
These are my Brooklyn Heights
The ambitious city’s fugitive flight
To escape the tired, tedious streets
And seek the peace of cloud retreats
From here the coils of arteries
Of flyovers, bridges, lines of trees
Are necklaced, festooned festively
In measured strokes of artistry.
The river ruminates below
A distant, sluggish, dreamy flow
The sun slopes down, the grey haze clears
The marvellous Howrah Bridge appears.
When from the depths of heaven’s way
A regal kite salutes the day
Its powerful wings hold back the wind
It glides and views us trapped within
A glass which frames this skyhover
A mighty monarch and rover
Free to glide and free to roam
Free to ride the gust and gloam
And scrutinize each narrow road
And read the city’s every mood
A witness in whose memory
Is held this city’s history.
February 12, 2017 (wee hours), Kolkata
Fireflies
The veil of darkness descends
Draping fields and forest
In obscurity
The silence of those who might
Have spoken hovers like a brooding
Cloud with intensity.
As lost travellers, we stumble through
Undergrowth, wishing for the moon
To emerge
When sparklers of delight startle
Our footsteps, flitting with frolic
From branch and hedge
They twinkle and challenge the
Cold distant starlight as they
Sing of the earth
They hum in harmony, trapezing with joy
They trip with the rhythm of ripples
Of mirth
They glow with the magic of a dreamland
They cascade with the cadence of a fountain
In spring
They dispel the gloom of low looming clouds
Their fairy lights festoon the darkness
With wings
They whisper, they beckon, they urge
Us to join their dance of true freedom
From fear
They lift up our spirits with sparkle and glitter
They scatter our suppressed thoughts and stall
The tears.
June 13/14, 2017, Kolkata
