Featured Poet - Dr. Tamali Neogi

IF I AM LOST

Remember the evening I opened the door to you,

the fair child in curly hair,

you crawled in straight,

without looking at or hearing me.

Where is your mom, dear?

Swimming across the mountain lake, flooded with moonshine,

inattentive is the angel, 

to the sights and sounds of our awkward life, 

the great Master's Art,

the prothalamion to be eternally sung,

in marriage bond are this wondrous creation 

and the arid world of fruitless actions,

where lies the meaning, dear?

Better to be in your own world, 

in light or in dark but far different from ours,

in vain, the lesser beings try to judge the ways of God!

But dear, 

penetrating deep into an unintelligible world, 

if I am lost,

Stuart, my little child, hug me once.

Do not forget that evening, 

I first opened my heart to you,

beginning of an uncompromising effort,

the angel, alien, guest to my lonely room.

TRUE MINDS

A bare footed man walks along the peach road,

in hottest month of Summer,

or the nude woman, my elderly sister, 

running across the rooms of white palace,

feeding dolls like her lost children.

Heard the story from Grandma,

a man didn’t speak for thirty years past,

defying death, yet lose in prayer,

morning and evening,

high fever couldn't stop daily visit to his factory,

located in an imaginary map,

in his semi-functional brain,

Oh sister, oh father!

What sadness leads you to such madness, or

as villages to bomber planes,

are we not victims of unknown enemies? 

Or the defenceless towers of your true minds

are turned to dust by deep turmoil within?

Why not the dormant volcano in fragile human frames,

but fall if shaken to roots? 

You see, an ill clad barefooted man,

in hottest month of Summer,

beg food through betrayal,

forced destitution,

and carry the cross for our sins.

NO WINGS TO FLY

 What new forms your sanity may assume,

You will forever remember what I am going to say,

When to you, a man is turned into a big insect,

no wings to fly,

Take him as an insane,

for this is a world of man!!!

Done.

IN A DARK CAVE

What a compulsion it is!

Time caresses my happiness in a dark cave,

precious stones decorate my dreams,

floating upon waves of pleasurable thoughts,

Ahh! Who allows light to enter?

Disintegrates the grand symphony of obsession, 

I am the hearse of reality.



THE SAME DESTINATION

Whatever the route I choose

to escape the trauma,

I reach the same destination,

as if in a dream, lost in a maze,

I croon the most desperate song, ever.

Can you hear me? 

Am I making an intelligible sound? 

Don't know, don't know,

me too a stranger here. 

Machine driven men and women, 

where's the time for dear ones?

Worry not if the babies too prefer their utopia,

for yours is a mechanical civilization.

The black child of the brick house,

unresponsive, puzzling, 

as is dense fog on December morning, 

to human efforts of fine solutions. 

Whichever route I try to escape the trauma,

I reach the same destination. 

Here curses bloom like daisies,

if you hear me, please respond.

BLANK EYES

Lost in the yellow world of full blossom, 

valley of inordinate beauty,

reason flying like drunk grasshopper,

no coordination between the dancing nerves, 

in inexpressive agony, is our lost man of nature,

blank eyes looking upward,

let Heaven interfere,

else, no Desert Sage in sandstorm,

fancy ceases to be nectar.