Magic

 
Magic

We humans have abilities that awe
That when unhemmed by ethics and by law
Can lead to great calamities indeed. 
No magic can suffice, when few will heed

The voice of conscience and the pull of heart
As ears are deafened and we're pulled apart
By hatreds born of ignorance, instilled.
And so are prophesies, of hate, fulfilled.

****** 

So you and I and others have conversed
On how to end the wars with which we're cursed,
As more and more of science, art, and craft
Are used to wage what reason sees as daft—

What every heart and wakened conscience feels
Descends on people, trapped, and blindly steals 
From these, its victims, all, including life,
And so maintains the never-ending strife

That heaps, on generations, more of woe,
With senseless hatred turning friend to foe
As every act unjust and every blow
Begets its offspring, violent even more.  

******

So each of us has asked, in silence and
In speech, if anyone can understand
The sense behind this senselessness and show
A way by which to stop—or even slow—

The rush to our destruction: sober those
Whose hubris causes hearts and minds to close,
As blissful, willful ignorance parades
As truth—and blatant lies inform charades

Performed by rogues, as legislators cheer
The murderers of children, feel no fear
Of judgment, further seal their hearts
And practice, daily, more deceiving arts.

*********

If I could wave a "magic wand", I would—
And make those evils disappear, that should.
So bombs would all reverse, and bullets too—
And then we might be smiling, me and you—

As every missile sent and every shell
Would turn—and so return! It would be hell
For every bully, armed with war machines,
As "magic" gave the rest of us vaccines

Against their bribes, their threats, and all the fear
And horror. So these wars would disappear—
Of mass destruction, misery, and death—
Replaced perhaps by even worse! Regret

Could then descend on well-intentioned me
As all my "magic" turned out, not to be
The thing I'd hoped for. Squeezing evil, I,
Would see its means to lengthen and defy

My efforts to contain it. So elastic
This scourge of ours could be, that only drastic
Measures might suffice to bring to end
This evil that afflicts us all, my friend!

*********

And what could truly be more drastic than
To end our species, twinned as woman-man?

It might perhaps be time for diving deep
Within the wilds of psyche, through the sleep

In which we often spend our waking days,
With steps, as usual, on accustomed ways
Of habit born of training, so we see

What seers saw, informing you and me,

In wordless ways that cannot be expressed 
In verse or prose, of That which so impressed
The ones who saw that they awoke from sleep,
Enlightened—and connected with the Deep.

******

It’s only this, it seems, that could provide
The insight and connection that abide
And so inform the heart and mind to steer
Away from that which then is seen as clear. 

Is it “good and evil”? Simply, “right and wrong”?
Or was and is this cleavage, all along,
Misguided—clouded by a lack of sight
Of those connections needing pause—for light?

Our feelings, thoughts, and words and deeds, we see, 
Are ripples on the surface of a sea
That can be whipped by winds to stormy waves.
And yet, beneath, there’s peace—a strength that knaves

Cannot perturb. And some may call this “faith”
And others, “insight” or “connection”. Fate
Can put us each in peril and in stress, 
But only grace can change a “no” to “yes”,

Delivered from the heart—and not by force. 
So endless lies and wars may take their course
With cities laid to waste and no one spared.
The spirit lives—in those who saw—and cared. 

And this, dear friend, is all I have to say
To end the many words I’ve said today.
There is indeed a magic: it’s within;
It gives us strength to see—and not to sin.

2025 March 7, Fri.
Berkeley, California 

Danob-03-দানব-০৩-Demons-03

 
‌দানব

হে হতভাগা প্রজাতি,
নির্লজ, নিষ্ঠুর, বিনাশী,
আতঙ্কের অস্ত্রে, ভয়ের শাস্ত্রে,
নরকের অভিজাত বাসী!

নিজেকে 'মানব' বলেও,
মানবিকতার করেছো ক্ষয়।
গর্বে, ছলনে, দানবের বেশে,
দানবিকতায় পেয়েছো জয়।

******

অশ্লীল, হিংস্র কাজে মেতে,
নিজের স্বার্থের উন্মাদ খোঁজে, 
হয়েছো ক্রমশ অশিব পিশাচ, 
মত্ত, বেদনা-ক্লেশের ভোজে।

বাহিরে-অন্তরে দেখে,
টের পেয়ে, ধ্বংসের রথে,
বিবেকের ডাকখানি শুনে,
ফিরে এসো শান্তির পথে।

সোমবার, ১৪ই অক্টোবর, ২০২৪ খ্রি.
বার্ক্লি, কালিফোর্নিয়া
--------------------------------------------
Demons

We are beings of the rabid species,
Shameless, cruel, destructive,
With weapons of terror and scriptures of fear—
The elites and enforcers of hell!

We may call ourselves 'human' and yet
We have destroyed our own humanity.
With lies and with pride in our monstrous ways,
We have triumphed in monstrosity.
‌
******

In obscene and violent acts,
In the mad pursuit of our “interests”, 
We have turned from humans to demons, 
Drunkenly feasting on suffering and pain.

Looking around, and looking within,
Perched on our chariots of destruction,
Hearing the call of conscience,
Let us turn to the path of peace.

Oct 14 and Nov 21, 2024
Translated from Bengali: Nov 21and 25
Berkeley, California

Kill What You Eat--and Eat What You Kill

  Kill  What You Eat—and Eat What You Kill

  While walking in the park, I met
  an elder—and we talked.
  And what he told me gave me pause—
  and later gave me woe .

“Kill, what you eat, yourself, my friend,”
  the elder said to me.
“Do not depend on others, who
  are slaving, out of sight.

“The food you eat, the clothes you wear,
  your trinkets and your toys—
  attempt to kill or make yourself,
  or know their provenance

“The lights and gadgets in your home
  and where you go to work,
  the vehicles on which you ride,
  the roads on which they run—

“the fuels for these things as well—
  are made for you by others
  and brought to you by others or
  the conduits they have made.

“These actions all rely upon
  the slaughters, small and large,
  of beasts (and even human ones),
  and plants—and things that we

“may think are lifeless, yet have lives,
  although of other sorts—
  the mountains, plains and valleys and
  the oceans, lakes and streams.

“If you would have the hearing, you
  would hear their groans and screams.
  The air, that we are breathing, too,
  has a life that you can feel."

  And spreading out his arms, he then
  inhaled the city's air
  and slowly then exhaled that breath,
  let down his arms and smiled.

“This air we’re breathing, you and I,
  though often breathed before,
  would be as fresh, if not for Man,
  as when the plants had risen.”

  He said these things—and made me think.
  I thought: he must be mad.
  And so I said goodbye and left—
  but could not sleep at night.

“Kill what you eat,” he’d said, “and eat
  whatever you've killed, my friend.”
  as he'd gestured 'round at the earth and the sky
  and the trees and the works of Man.

  Kill what I eat?  Oh, how absurd!
  And eat what I kill?  That’s mad!
  I tried to put this out of my head,
  but I felt his words return.

  And ever since then, I've felt unease
  and even unwell at times.
  As I'd like you to share in my misery, I
  am passing this on in my turn.

  2018 December 27?, Thu?day
  Brooklyn, New York 
  

Breath and Heart

The images are not directly related to the verses that follow.  They might give you a sense of the season and the sights here in Brooklyn, New York.

Click on an image to see it in a somewhat larger and clearer format.  If you are using a web-browser on a traditional computer, you can then also click on the thumbnails for the other images. This might not be possible on a cellphone.

For an even larger, clearer projection, against a darkened background, you can, in most Windows PC web browsers, use the f11 key to toggle to full screen view.   

     

To return to this post (if on a computer), use the esc key, or click on the white X near the top right of the dark background.  On PC's, remember to hit f11 again to return to normal viewing mode.

After the Snow. Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. 2017 Feb 9.

Crossing Manhattan Bridge. 2017 February 19.

Trees. Starrett City, Brooklyn. 2017 February 19. 

Breath and Heart 

There is, to everything and everyone,
a softer side, that’s gentle, calm and mild—
and there’s another, that is hard and harsh,
oblivious to the pain and harm it does.

If only we could mouth a mantra that
could turn the others to their kinder selves,
then many of our troubles might have ends,
and all the world become a better one.

But finding no such spell in all we’ve learned,
the only thing we still could do might be
to turn ourselves towards our gentler halves—
to dwell therein, aware of breath and heart.

So when the anger rises or the fear,
observe it rising, as you would a wave—
and see it rise and crest and then subside—
so mind and heart can clearly work again.

Behold the fear and make of it your friend.
Observe the anger as you would a child’s.
Forgive the ones who act as though they’re blind,
and cleanse your heart of evil.  Do be kind.

2017 March 16th, Thu.
Room 208 (teacher’s room)
Telecommunications (formerly Bay Ridge) High School
Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York
   

Ignorance

 
This is dedicated to the memory of my late friend, Dr. Kenneth E. Rich.  I think he would have appreciated some of the things I write about here.

Ken was the antithesis of the person shown in several of the images below.  (Some wiser folk are also depicted.)
 
Could these two--Kenneth Rich and Donald Trump--belong to the same species?  I am sure that questions such as this have arisen in the minds of other beings through the eons.
  
-- Arjun
-----------------------------------------------------------------
  
Ignorance
 
There’s ignorance that comes from circumstance,
and then there’s ignorance from lack of caring or
from shutting out the things we neither know
nor want to know.  The first is curable,
by effort or by change of circumstance.
The other is, it seems, incurable,
unless there is a genuine change of heart.
 
 

Donald Trump, real estate heir and Republican Presidential front-runner, U.S.A., 2015

 
The ills that plague the “nations”—all the wars
they wage against the others or within,
and also all the conflicts in our lives,
arise, in part or totally, from this—
those darknesses which fate may serve to us
or those with which we choose to be content,
while damning all who dare to point towards light.
   
 

 
The senses, heart and mind can lead us each
to liberation or to bondage deep.
Gotama and so many others past had seen,
in quietude, the ills that work within.
And by observing these, they found that all
that rises also crests—and ebbs and fades,
unless we feed it, through our ignorance.
   

 
How easy it can be to fall in sin—
to add yet more and more to endless grief.
How hard it is to turn away from this—
to face the dreaded emptiness and be
aware of all that soils the space within
that only can be cleansed when we release
accumulations gathered through our lives.
 



 
The virtues old remain our virtues still—
compassion, courage, patience, honesty—
and all the vices that we celebrate
are still the vices that can lead to grief.
And chief among these vices still remains
that ignorance that blinds the heart and mind—
for which we even are content to kill.
   

    

Humility, when learned by those that pride
has led astray, can serve to check its reach.
But ignorance and hubris, hand in hand,
breed havoc, as they kiss and copulate.
The times we’re in, like others past, have carved
these two as idols, intertwined, to which
we sacrifice, while shouting foolishness.
   

When tossed upon the storms that roil the sea,
it seems that we are helpless.  Yet we find
that we can still observe our plight and breathe—
releasing, as we breathe, the pain we feel.
And knowing that the ones who wound have lost
that sight, for which we then may pray for them,
we might regain that calm and peace that is.

   

The wise have learned—how little, what they know,
how vast, that ocean dark of ignorance!
So when they find a piece of light, they smile
and hold it up to see, for just a while,
before they let it float upon its way.
The ignorant persist in ignorance,
insisting that the “others” go away.
 

  

To answer noise with noise, and violence
with violence, may seem the only way.
For see—the quiet ones are silent still,
and those who shied from arms are buried deep.
And yet, aggression—that of speech and deed,
and even in defense, can only lead
to more of this—and more of ignorance.
 

 
So let us pause, or slow, amidst the haste.
How many lives were saved by only this?
Defend yourself and others, who cannot
defend themselves—but know, that path can lead
to more and more and even more of grief.
So be aware of what you do, and see—
the one you strike has eyes and heart as you.
 

   
I saw a frog that sat beside a lake.
I looked at him and he looked back at me.
I’d heard him croaking.  Now that frog was mute.
I saw his muscles tense, as if to leap.
And so I froze—and breathing, looked at him.
We stayed there quite a while, that frog and I.
It seemed we talked—of truth and ignorance.
 

Does Wisdom Come With Age?
http://news.discovery.com/animals/videos/why-cant-chimps-speak-video-140919.htm

    
2015 November 29th, Sat.
Skyway dhaba, Bath Avenue
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn
 

Sticks and Stones

    

Sticks and Stones

  

A word can be a stake to pierce a heart, 

Or serve to heal – to lift a downcast soul.

So sentences can tear a being apart

Or help to make a sundered spirit whole.

  

And some might say that words are only words –

Not weapons that can injure bodies – yet

The mind, unshielded, takes the words to heart.

Our minds affect our bodies, we forget.

  

Be gentle with your words.  The truth that’s said

With good intentions never needs to wound.

Yet words can slaughter, though the culprits’ names

In dailies’ headlines rarely are festooned.

  

2015 April 11th, Sat. 5:33 pm

Brooklyn, New York

   

Morality

  
Morality
 
We’re born in such a world, where beasts like us
must kill to live.  For even fruits, though meant
for eating, still have life until they rot –
and then they teem with myriad other forms.

We take of life to live.  If this is sin,
then all of us are sinners from our birth.
But there are those among us, who have slain
their fellow humans, singly or en masse.

And does it matter, when we give it thought,
whether we have killed a bleating lamb
or slain a human child, that likewise cries –
or trusts us as we coldly end its life?

And some would shout out, “Yes!” and others, “No!”.
But let’s press further. Ending sentient life
within the womb, and ending it outside –
are these not equal?  Hear the angry cries…

And further yet. To take your children’s lives –
is that a greater crime than slaughtering
another’s children?  Who can loudly say
that one is worse – and justify that stand?

At end, it isn’t reason that decides
what’s moral or immoral, right or wrong –
but instincts, of which conscience is but one –
too often silenced by the clamor ‘round.

And instincts have evolved through eons – conscience too.
So every instinct has a purpose, that
has helped us to survive, both singly and
together – as a species and as more.

But instincts operate within a sphere –
for only saints, perhaps, can view what’s far
with equal weight to near, or feel as much
of pain and love for “others” as for “own”.

And so we’re locals, through our genes and more.
And furthermore, the circle that we draw
around ourselves may widen or contract, but there
are always those who fall within, without.

To those within, morality applies –
but not to those without, or so it seems…
For men may slaughter others in the morn
and gently play with toddlers in the eve.

Religion, laws may serve to widen or
contract the region that is covered by
our instincts (of which conscience should be prime),
whose fields are mainly local in their scope.

And so it is, the soldier is condemned,
who bayonets a child, in midst of war,
but he is blameless, who has set aflame
a village or a city from afar.

2014 August 23rd, Sat.
Brooklyn, New York
  

When Will the Killing Have End?

    
When Will the Killing Have End?
    
We heard of your death, my brother.
The grief that we felt was deep.
What could we do but listen?
What could we do but weep?

Some will sing of the glory.
Some will speak of the shame.
What will they know of you, truly,
Who never knew your name?

Who will know of our sorrow?
Who will know of our loss?
Your mother and sister are grieving
For the son and the brother they lost.

You were my hero, my brother –
My teacher, protector and friend.
But now you are gone, oh my brother,
And the killing is still not at end.

We pray for an end to the killing,
We pray for the person that dies.
And yet, how many are willing
To kill or to die for the lies...
                  
  < Please see below the image for the last five stanzas.>

Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica
image source:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet%C3%A0

 



















                                                                                                      .
Who is our enemy, truly?
Where is the source of the dread?
Why should the parents be grieving?
Why should their children be dead?
       
You are gone, from this Earth, my brother,
And never will return...
And why should you?  We suffer –
As flesh and houses burn...
   
I walked with you just yesterday,
And yet it seems a while...
It seems that we are walking still.
I see you turn and smile... 

The love I feel for you is deep.
It will forever be,
Although you'll never walk again
And turn and smile at me...
  
The anger in my heart is great,
But greater is the grief.
And so I will not turn to hate,
For love is my relief.

2014 June 7th, Mon. 11:59 pm
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York
                                                                                        
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note:  Seven stanzas that originally followed the first five,
preceding the image,  have been excised  for the sake of 
brevity.  Those excised stanzas  have been incorporated 
into a separate poem,"Hear and Remember".)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
   

Reflections -- II

          
Reflections – II
    
There is a current deep that we can sense.
We cannot speak about it with our words.
But with that current, we can mutely flow –
Or lose our sense of it and loudly splash.

The one surrendering to the water feels
That fluid lift her surely up again.
But he, who seeks to raise himself above
The surface, finds his struggle is in vain.

We all have fights we cannot, should not shirk,
Unless we choose to still our consciences.
And each of us must fend for selves and those
Who may depend on us to live and breathe.

But there are conflicts which we make ourselves
And which we then inflict on others ‘round.
Ambition, pride, our selfishness and greed,
Our misperceptions – make this turbulence.

So let us yield our petty jealousies,
Our envies, our ambitions small and great.
And let us breathe, resolve to do what’s right
And turn, from darkness, gently back towards light.
  
Our sight is clouded and our hearing dulled.
We cannot feel, with skin or heart – or think.
Our reason and our wisdom, we have lost.
And why is it that we have lost these things?

The demons that afflict this world abound.
They prey on us and so we do not see.
Our child is ailing or our mother's ill,
But we are sightless or are deafened still.

What form of madness may afflict us each,
We only know for sure when it has passed,
And some of us may never know or care.
So drunkards do their damage – and forget.

There’s fear that drives us into little hells.
We wonder how we can escape from this.
We feel we cannot change the world ourselves.
Yet each can breathe – and then can gently try.

There’s much that three can do that one cannot.
But there’s a concord needed, so that three
May find that common purpose. This can be,
When each is open and is listening.

A trust betrayed can rarely be regained.
And so, we should be careful in our deeds.
For how can there be confluence, when distrust
Has built the barriers needed for defense?

A vessel, filled with water, makes, when thumped,
A softer sound than one that’s partly full.
And much of noise and violence abates,
When all have drunk enough to fill their souls.

And here, we’re speaking, not of alcohol
And other things that have their merits yet
Have also faults that plague imbibers, but
Of essence – joy and deepest suffering.

But when we’re emptied by an ebbing tide,
Then thoughts arise, like sounds within our head,
And we attempt to fill ourselves again,
With silent essence – or with nonsense loud.

So all the verses that I write arise
From discontent and from that loneliness,
To which our disconnection leads our selves,
Those fictions that can gain in strength from strife.

What’s self, what’s not, is fixed by such a line
As is imagined, yet does not exist.
It dissipates to porous nothingness,
Whenever we examine it up close.

We’re made of this and that, in interflows.
And our perception, of ourselves and things
As separate from all around and what
Was there before or will be there, is false.

But who, except the sainted, yields the self,
That last illusion, stronger than the rest,
Whose shattering or dissolution comes
As pain or joy, as torture or relief?

So beings such as you and I arise
As do the nations – and we struggle, fight
When self is threatened, fortifying self –
And so are doomed to our imprisonments.

The humbled, stripped of wisdom too, may seek
To gain their stature back and then take pride
In stupid things – and so are fooled again.
Within an emperor?  A troubled child.

How often have the tantrums of the "great"
Or all their shrewdness caused the rest such grief
That men and women, lifting arms to skies,
Have sought, from infants such, deliverance?

But there are things in which we may take pride,
But quietly – no need, that others know...
Our wee successes give us nourishment,
And so we live on satisfactions small.

When some achievement, in the human sphere,
Gives confidence and strength to us again,
We should remember then our losses past
And so regain our precious humbleness.

Some things we all may know, some other things
A few of us discern. But then there are
The things that men and ants may never ken.
And those could be the most of all there is.

So if we're like the whorls an oar may make,
We're born in pairs and dissipate with time.
But who and where our whirling twin may be,
We do not know.  We turn until we fade.

But we could also be like summer storms
That rise and rage and then are swiftly gone.
They leave behind the wreckage of the trees
As well as blessings that give life again.

What ruin have we wrought – or blessing brought?
We do not know, we live and do and die.
And all our work appears as ashes, yet
From ashes rise the firebirds once again.

Ah, love – that blessing that the heart that sees
Confers on what is sighted – what compares
With you, except that wonder that we feel
On watching, being – as the dance proceeds?

This world, of wonders and of horrors mixed,
Of loves and hatreds – who has sense enough
To know its purpose – or has wisdom still
To live a life, whose damage is the least?

Oh let us breathe once more of this, the air
That others past have breathed, that yet remained
As fresh as when the ancients breathed of it,
Until we fouled it with our devil-mills.

And let us drink of that, which others drank,
Which yet remained as pure as it was then,
Until we poured, within those waters clear,
Those effluents that now have poisoned it.

And let us softly walk upon this earth,
On which so many past have walked, which yet
Remained as fertile, till we made that earth
Ingest the toxins that our mills emit.

And let’s resolve that when we leave there’s naught
We leave behind to let another know
That we were here, except a whispering,
A fragrance or a glimmer in the dust...

The foolish seek achievement and create
The horrors that have made, of life, a hell.
The wiser seek effacement, as they work
To heal the wounds ambition always wreaks.

Who seems, to most of us, to be a fool,
Could well be wiser than we'll ever be.
And he, or she, who's worshiped now as wise,
May do, in hubris, what no fool has dared.

When all around are rushing, slow a bit.
The sun and moon appear to take their time.
The seasons take their turns, the babies grow
With all our nurturing – and then they age.

This was – and is – and will forever be.
Within this dance, we move in rhythm, rhyme
That yet allow for breaks and runs and twists.
The moment is – in which we all are free.

2014 May 17th, Sat.
Brooklyn, New York
 

The Price of Sin

The Price of Sin

A fish was swimming in the sea.
It now becomes a part of me.
Its spirit long has left its flesh,
For spirit-nature tends to flee
A carcass, while it still is fresh,
So souls are of encumbrance free.

******
 
Or so, at least, I would presume,
As others mostly do assume,
So all can look at dinners, lunches,
And guiltlessly, those meals, consume,
As well as breakfasts, teas and brunches.

And turning, therefore, to my fish,
Which looks to be a tasty dish,

I see it's sautéed well.  I smell

Its fragrance and I fondly wish
Its taste and flavor will be swell.

I pick the muscle from the spine.
I taste the flesh.  It tastes divine.
It's sad this being had to die
To make, for me, a luncheon fine.
I eat the fish – and do not cry.

But still, a nagging thought remains,
That nags and nags, as certain pains
May do, that we may wish were not,
But still persist, till each obtains
Attention due, that we forgot.

I wonder if, with tables turned,
By fishy chef, I would be burned –
Have salt and spice on scalded skin,
So I, who's dining, unconcerned,
Would fully pay the price of sin.

******
 
And this, I can't but wonder too:
Are our assumptions really true?
Does the spirit truly leave
(As hermit-crabs, their shelters do),
As many smugly may believe,
Until they die – and dinners rue?

2013 September 21, Sat. afternoon,
between Chinatown, Manhattan,
and Bensonhurst, Brooklyn,
on the N and D trains, on
the way home from the
doctor's office in C-t.
  

The Leaf

The Leaf

There are some things we do that we regret –
And sadly lack the power to reverse.
But then, perhaps, we learn a lesson and
May even scribe, in penitence, a verse...

While walking underneath a spreading tree,
I paused to reach and pluck a nubile leaf,
So I could hold it close, to better see,
With 'glasses off to aid my aging eyes.

How delicate the veins within that leaf,
How freely flowing, yet how orderly...
How waxed and green, the side that faced the sun,
How diffident and pale, the side beneath...

******
 
A “heart-shaped” leaf this was, with mid-rib strong –
And veins like branches angling left and right.
A pointed tip and scalloped edge it had,
This little leaf that was my universe...

If I had crushed that leaf, I would have known
The scent released as life departed it,
With all the wonders of its chemistry
Reduced to that, which simian nostrils sensed.

But I desisted, having just before
Committed torture on a feathered sprig
Of evergreen that I had plucked and crushed,
Inhaling odors redolent of pines.

******
 
How far advanced from us, in many ways,
Are plants – along the roads we did not take...
We've more in common with the slugs and mites
And those that crawl until they spin and fly.

How much contrition, for my acts, I felt!
And yet, I'd lunched on animals and plants...
So life, that's grown to feed on life, may yet
Be awed at seeing wondrous mirrored self...

Should I discard that leaf – or let it dry,
While pressed within an aging book of mine,
Itself from limbs of plants composed – and hope
That someone sees – and feels what I have felt?

******
 
I beg forgiveness from you, little leaf.
I know your sisters will bud forth, in spring,
When I've departed.  You're the sacrifice
This beast has taken, for his little while.

But as you wither, starved of water, sun,
Can you forgive the one who rudely plucked?
If you could find philosophy, you'd think,
“At least I touched his heart and sensed him smile.”

I shall not 'prison you within a book.
I'll leave you be to die, while breathing free.
So also, when my time has come to leave,
I hope I'm left, so I can cease to be.

2013 May 25th, Sat.
Brooklyn 
sjanah@aol.com