The Song of Razia Sultana
Talk to me, o ye dessert’s dark slave,
Eras have gone, but I bear solitude —
A mighty queen of a dark firmament —
A realm more inflicting than servitude.
Alone and weary among the glitz of stars,
Stars so noble! yet none for me.
I sit alone in my obscure nook
And covet the moths so blithe and glee.
Tough all the sky belongs to me,
Yet in agony and pain I live.
With comrade none to cheer my woes
None has solemn love to give.
And stars are there in service mine —
Snobbish the shiny, civil the dim;
They bow to me all day and night,
None has an eye for a life too grim.
Wait a night on a soggy meadow —
Grasses bright with a silver sheen,
Croon a song with vows of love,
Will listen to you like an eager teen.
Will sit by you, and you speak of love,
And palms, and dunes and desert’s wonder.
Add my vows to the paeans you sing
And soothe your pain with feminine splendour.
Stars shall not be guests tonight —
Those are the heads with elitist brains.
And the bugs of the night must hop in joy —
Praying that our love forever sustains.
Let’s elope on a beautiful night
To a charming grove on a rivulet’s side.
The trees adorned in apparels green,
Shower petals on the handsome bride.
Donned as commons on a mossy marge
My charm reflects in the shimmering rill.
In arms of a slave, I relegate myself
And leave behind the regal thrill.
In a land beyond the kingdom great,
Sans the kings and men that bow.
Love shall bloom in a wilderness
On twigs that face the daily sough.
And come before the break of dawn —
When the night has a little shade from you.
For the shining sun will kill for us
The moments that are rare and few.
The Asylum of Peace
Far away from the bustling crowd
And from the spell of modern techniques —
Somewhere far in the depth of hearts,
There is an unknown asylum of peace.
The Asylum where minds convalesce
After being paralyzed by life’s austerities.
There they regain their vigour and health
Are freed from spectres of perpetual worries.
But the lousy brains addicted to screens,
Squander their precious days and nights.
Trapped in the schemes of algorithms and bots,
They simply succumb to bits and bytes.
The Dream Peddlers
Every night, with dreams in their haversack,
The nocturnal peddlers walk from door to door.
They sell the dreams of a verdant hill,
Where the sun reclines on the meadows grass.
Where the stars are shining on a flippant rill
And the rocks are shimmering like polished brass.
The dream where the sky is low
The stars are hanging within my reach.
The night is spreading its glittery glow,
And the moon shambling on a sandy beach.
The hill, the rill, the stars and the moon —
They all dissolve in a vast vacuum.
And form an Arcady where angels croon
And a tree of void where fairies bloom.
The fairies and the angels burn their wings,
And resurrect in a hollow where peace echoes,
And nothing where no memory brings —
The vicissitudes of life and the violent throes.
Every night, with dreams in their haversack,
The nocturnal peddlers walk from door to door.
The populace is plagued by mortal pangs’
In the city where insomnia pervades.
And anxiety attacks with its deadly fangs
And dejection haunts in many masquerades.
The tired minds when retire and slouch,
Night after night they struggle to sleep.
They lie awake in their beds or couch
To start at the hollow that’s vast and deep.
The anxiety galore of the banal drudge,
Assumes the form a raucous ghoul,
And whacks the mind and brashly nudge
And pulls the mind in a noisy pool.
A dream is left for the bleary eyes,
But the anxiety grabs and callously grips —
And garrottes the dream until it dies,
With not a sigh of death on its lips.
Every night, with dreams in their haversack,
The nocturnal peddlers walk from door to door.
The Gomati
This was once a river!
Perhaps this was just a childhood dream —
The pristine banks and the glittering stream,
At dawns where the horizon glimmered,
In nights where the moonlight shimmered!
Perhaps there was once a gulmohar copse,
And flocks of birds on the leafy tops.
They adorned the bank with yellow flowers
And blushed with joy in monsoon showers.
The grass on the banks was shining green
with dew on the blades, pure and clean
Alas, now as I pass the river, I deem
Perhaps this was just a childhood dream.
Was it forever the trench so black,
Perpetually carrying this filth on her back!
It seems to me like a gutter or a trench
That exudes eternally the toxic stench.
It’s the epitome of the public negligence
And the society thriving on nature’s expense.
It’s the mockery of the human-stride
And the testimony of their unwarranted pride.
Wasn’t there once a joyful stream!
Perhaps this was just a childhood dream.
A Nation Was Born
A nation was born from the bleeding womb
Of a moribund land, shackled for centuries,
And trampled beneath the imperialist boots,
The songs of freedom were just obituaries.
A nation was born on a stark dark night
To the smell of smouldering flesh ablaze
By a zealot mob, sans compassion and love
To the angst and the agony of the impeding days.
A nation was born with severed limbs.
A sword plunged in the infant’s heart.
The blood splattered on history’s page
And daubs blood on that grisly part
A nation was born derelict and despondent.
Famished for the years and the eras bygone.
But the crops were burnt to ashes and dust,
The tempest of odium went on and on.
The nation was born to a father's blood
(Has just kissed the neonate’s cheek) —
To the darkest hours in the recent times
When demons jeered at cadavers’ reek.
A nation was born in benighted times,
Yet there was some hope in some —
instilled with the ideas of justice and peace.
Ingrained with the insight of great wisdom.
A nation was born, and the nation will thrive.
The nation will rise to the zenith of time.
The nation will wash the blood and gore,
The nation will wipe the dust and grime.
A nation was born, the nation will rise
To the summit of peace, justice and love.
Will leave behind the agonies of past,
Will soar to the sky like a pious dove.
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