Blessing

 
Blessing

 
How blind we are to pain and misery—
Except when it affects us or our own!
How many smiling faces turned to grief,
How many vanished, never to return!

 
They still exist, within our inner realms.
We hear their laughter, see them smile and weep.
Their voices echo deep within us still—
And so they stay with us, until we leave.
 
 ****** 

 
How many images of scattered gore
And spattered blood—so red, that then congeals!
How much of terror and of horror, yet
They each are gifts that we can cherish still—

 
The images we saw, upon the screen,
Of men and women searching for their kin
And never finding them, because they’d been
Entombed below—or burned and blown to bits.

 
****** 

When death releases us from torture, pain,
Then death becomes a blessing and release.
And though we watched from very far away,
We learned the lessons, while the victims paid.

Some say their cause was hopeless, that they should
Accept their fate and bow and fade away.
We saw the children play, so full of life.
We saw them die. And yet they gave us life—

******  

For we were blind and now our eyes can see.
And we were deaf and now we hear again.
Our hearts and minds were opened and were blessed.
We bear their witness, with their joy and pain.

Can lives be lost to madness and regained?
Can laughter light those faces once again?
Alas! No miracles can bring them back to life.
And yet they live within us—gifting strength.

2025 October 12, Sun.
Berkeley, California

Treachery and Terror

  
Treachery and Terror
 
What use are treaties if they are
Ignored and violated—
Not once or twice—repeatedly,
With greed and lust unsated?
 
When leaders lead in treachery
And the rest of us are blind,
Then those who deal in lechery
Leave all the rest behind. 
 
So public crimes and private ones
Compete in cruel sin,
And horrors terrorize the world—
The one we all are in.
 
****** 
  
If one has more of weaponry
And even more of lies,
And allies who support one’s acts,
Then all resistance dies—
 
Or so one might believe, until
It rises yet again
In phoenix-form, from fire and ash, 
To strike back yet again.
 
But this is not acceptable.
It can’t be tolerated.
This challenges one's dominance—
So genocides are slated.
 
2025 September 30, Tue.
Berkeley, California
 

No Verses

 
No Verses
.
So many verses written—scribbled, typed,
And posted, sent to others far away.
So many more that come at times to mind—
From where—and wherefore—who can truly say?
.
Adrift upon the stream, we near the sea
And hear, afar, the waves that crash and roar.
We sense the dark—the endless, waiting deep.
No verses there—or minds—for evermore.
.
******
.
The dawn that once brought hope now brings despair
As tens of thousands die—or wish they could—
As those who live are filled with grief and pain—
And most, who witness, now have understood
.
That evil often triumphs, laying waste
To all that’s good and precious: tenderness
And quietude—and love and due respect—
As Mammon grins and profits from duress. 
.
****** 
.
How many are the ones who've died in waves,
As lands were conquered or were laid to waste, 
As guns and bombs replaced the clubs and swords,
And Greed and Fear infected all with haste?
.
I hear the children laugh; I hear them weep.
I hear the dying, burned and blasted, moan.
I fear departure, leaving those I know
To fend for selves, with others, or alone.
.
****** 
.
But who among us chooses time or place
To enter or to exit from the stage
On which we walk and act and say our words—
And then depart—at ripe or tender age?
.
The dusk, descending, whispers now of night,
And I will venture out, beneath the stars,
To breathe and try to find a passing peace,
As all around delight in distant wars.
.
****** 
.
So many verses written—scribbled, typed,
And posted, sent to others far away.
So many more that come at times to mind—
From where—and wherefore—who can truly say?
.
Adrift upon the stream, we near the sea
And hear, afar, the waves that crash and roar.
We sense the dark—the endless, waiting deep.
No verses there—or minds—for evermore.
.
2024 October 3rd & 5th.
Berkeley, California
.

Horrors-2024-03-19

 
Horrors

So many voices, so many eyes,
So many horrors that can't be unseen.
And yet we are silent, yet we are blind,
For the world we have made is a thing that's obscene.

We turn from the truth, to the comforting lies.
We shrug or accept what the news-readers say.
It's as if we have covered our ears and our eyes,
Or are trained, as are soldiers, to simply obey. 

Genocides happen, and this we should know,
And not just in Europe, and not only for Jews.
But this is the present, 2-0-2-4,
And who will be next, and yet not in the news?

The Frankenstein doctors, creating their monsters,
Were able to hide them from view.
But now we can see them, and yet who will stop them?
Not our leaders, complicit. It is me and it's you. 

2024 March 19th, Tue.
Berkeley, California

Sacrilege

 
Sacrilege

The only g*n*cide memorialized,
The only one in which we all are drilled,
Repeatedly, through schools and books and films,
With monuments erected, tributes paid,
With pilgrimages due, from those on high
Before we vote, is that which stands alone.

No other slaughters, even those that cleared
The continents on which we settlers live,
Can ever be compared to that Event
Of horror that is singular, unique.

And so our taxes can be used to send
Not only funds but lethal armaments
With which to maim and slaughter thousands. This
Cannot be questioned, nor compared to that—
The One whose name is all but deified.

So through this means, such horrors still are wrought
As might make even hardened mobsters pause
And yet are waved away or justified—
For there can only be that G*n*cide—
That One, that Only, Duly Guarded Thing—
That shields the ones who massacre and starve,
With critics charged with vilest heresy.

And so it is that all the horrors past
And all the ones succeeding that Event 
Of special, primal status, never count,
Nor those that happen right before our eyes.

So truth itself is buried deep in lies,
As bodies are—the dead or still alive—
Beneath the tons of wreckage. Still, we see
The women, children, elders, blasted, burned,
With cats and humans, huddled, homeless, starved,
And lies repeated—till a nation dies.

And some of us have slowly come to know
That even mentions of the victims or
Their land had been forbidden, seen as crimes,
Within the realms of those who’ve realized
With ardent help from other nations, this—
The crime of crimes. And now, in other lands,
The moves are underway, or well in place,
To stem the images and stop the words. 

The goal is not to simply end the lives—
And so the people—but to wipe, erase
The names themselves. What’s nameless can’t exist—
Or so the thinking and the feeling goes,
As power and wealth direct our human flows
And shape our sets of facts, our thoughts and views
By every means—including nightly news.

So is this something new? No, not at all,
Except for what those windows let us see
And hear, as if the ones who sobbed and screamed
Or spoke to us in fright, in measured tones,
Were present where we are, and not where lives
Are snuffed like candles by the blasts of bombs. 

And so we now will see those windows close,
Unless we rise together and resist
And dare to say the word we’ve all been told
Is sacrilege—and yet is naught but truth.

For what had occurred in the past and then
Repeated in our lifetimes is again 
Revived and walking, dressed in black, with scythe,
But wielding now the weapons we have wrought
That burn and blast and bury thousands, while
We coddle those who perpetrate these crimes. 

2024 March 12th, Tue.
Berkeley, California

Progoti-প্রগতি

 
প্রগতি
 
 প্রগতির গান গাইছো তুমি—
 নতুন যুগের জয়।
 নিষ্ঠুরতার অন্ত কোথায়?
 জীবের চোখে ভয়।
 বোমার ঝড়ে ঝাঁকছে ভূমি,
 কাঁপছে শিশু, হায়!
 
 মা-বাবা যে কোথায় গেলো!
 কোথায়, দিদি-দাদা?
 এই প্রগতির দাপট দেখে,
 ভাসছে চোখে ধাঁধা।
রাত পোহালো, প্রভাত এলো।
ধুঁকছে, রক্ত মেখে।

এই প্রগতির উগ্র প্রচার 

হচ্ছে যতই দেশে,

গানের ধ্বনি উঠছে জেগে 

ততই তীব্র ক্লেশে।

 
 রবিবার, ১০ মার্চ, ২০২৪ খ্রি.
 বার্ক্লি, ক্যালিফর্নিয়া.
 
 

Ghouls

 
Ghouls

Spare me from the ones who feel no doubt,
Who think they know what things are all about—
The jaded cynics, firm on fear and greed,
The zealots, fixed, of each and every creed,
The ones who walk in furrows others plough
Or practice paradigms, not asking how
These came to be, nor ever asking why
The weapons flow as women, children die,
The ones who close the eye and ear and mind
To all beyond their own exclusive kind,
Who use their labels, stamping each in turn,
To silence those who scream when others burn.

Oh spare me, please, from humans, turned to ghouls,
Who've found their grooves—and clearly lost their souls,
Who still can party, while the children die,
And still have gall enough to spread the lie.

2024 March. 1,  Fri.
Berkeley, California

The People of the Lie

 
The People of the Lie

They feel that they can kill and lie—
And lie and kill again,
For anyone who dares resist
This terror is a “terrorist”.

Their aim is to erase, delete
A culture and a people, yes.
They claim that they are, everywhere,
Forever under constant threat.

They think that they can terrorize
And cheat and steal and lie,
For they control the ones who seem
To rule—another lie!

They desecrate and they destroy.
They look on others with contempt.
They burn and blast and bury babies, 

Saying, “We are civilized.”

And who then are these people? Why,
They’re just like you and me, my friend,
For truth and justice call—and yet,
We find our comfort in the lie.

 
2024, February 9th, Fri.
Berkeley, California

Blindness, Evil and Greed

 
Blindness, Evil and Greed

“Out of sight is out of mind.”

And this, the rulers know.

So humans can be blasted, burned,

In places far away—

And other species tortured, killed, 

In places out of sight,

So those of us who do not see

Can watch our TV shows

And carry on, as if these things

Were mere imaginings.

 

And there are those, with hardened hearts,

Who find their entertainment

In parties on a hilltop, where

They watch the bombs exploding

Within the city they have cursed

As children burn and die—

A cause for celebration, since

They might “grow up to fight”.

 

So people who are prominent

Quite publicly declare

Support for endless massacres

And even loudly cheer

Destruction, death, and suffering,

Till those they see as “vermin”

That plague the promised land 

Are dead or fled and cleared.

 

So some are blind to evil, while

Some others seek revenge—

Not “an eye for an eye”, but a hundredfold—

Not soldiers fighting others,

But bombs that rain, for months on end,

On those defenseless, trapped—

On children, women, elders, men,

Removing limbs and skin,

And leaving others who survive

To perish, buried deep.

 

So some are blind or seek revenge,

And these are everywhere,

But others simply want to clear

The nuisance that resists—

That stands against their endless greed—

By chance—or act of will.

 

And these are they who start these things

And these are they who steer

The rest, through lies and influence,

Towards more and more of war.

 

So what we see in Gazza—that

Is not an aberration,

But just the latest episode

Within that local roil

Of death and grief and suffering

That never seems to end.

And there are others we forget

Or never even knew of, 

Who suffered through their genocides,

Unseen, unheard—as though

They never had existed.

And some, who visit where they lived,

May find their silent bones,

And linger, for a while, perhaps,

Where once they'd built their homes,

Deserted now—or filled with those

Who came and took their place,

Not knowing or reviling those

Whose crime was mere existence. 

We think these things are far away

In distance or in time,

And see no reason why we should

Be bothered by these troubles. 

Yet all the world is joined and one.

In blindness or in vision,

What happens there will happen here, 

Unless we see and act.

2024  January 25th, Thu.
Berkeley, California 
 

Erasure

 

Francisco Goya, 1814: The Third of May 1808

Erasure (Tap/click on images to see in full size.)
.
We're not allowed to use restricted streets,
To cross the border or the fence or wall. 
We're humbled as we wait, in patient lines,
For hours at checkpoints all across the land
That once was ours to freely move in. Now,
We're caged and treated much as beasts might be. 
.
The ones who fled can nevermore return.
And we, remaining in ancestral lands,
Are those consigned to be the wretched caste—
To live our lives within our prison walls
Or serve as labor, cheap, for masters harsh
Who view us as the dregs, untouchables, 
Who must be kept in place—or else dispatched.
.
So terror still is used and horrors wrought,
As all the world is told that wrong is right
And fire and force are lent to crushing might.
.
The sea, in which we'd fished, is ours no more. 
Our groves destroyed, our orchards snatched away,
We're robbed of means of basic sustenance—
And even of the gifts of cloud and sun.
.
The rain is deemed our masters’ property.
We can’t collect it for essential use.
The solar panels some had dared to try
Are torn away by soldiers or destroyed.
For everything, we must depend upon
The whims and mercies of the ones who rule.
.
******
.
The names of cities, towns and villages
Have changed, along with their inhabitants. 
The mention of the name of the land itself
Is not permissible. Our people too,
Who still remain, along with those who fled,
Are not allowed their own identity.
.
Our songs, our symbols and our flags are banned,
Our homes demolished and our bondage pressed, 
Our bodies burned and scattered, turned to dust
That sinks within the sea or drifts away.
.
******
.
And every day, the ones surviving learn
The lessons they had learned before anew,
And like the tides and winds that cycle through,
The seasons come, of death and misery—
Of bombs dispatched from air and land and sea—
The gifts of benefactors, "brave and free".
.
So burned and buried children scream for help
As all the leaders of the world applaud
Or else have only words with which to say
That something should be done about this hell.
.
The ones who speak of this are deemed to be
In league with those who take to arms to lift
The boots that press upon our necks and free
The thousands kidnapped, never charged, yet kept
For years and tortured in the dungeon cells.
. 
******
.
Can mere existence be a crime—a threat 
To those who shudder at the presence still
Of those that they have striven to erase?
.
The young may still rebel; the old comply.
They bow their heads in due humility.
.
Indeed, we must be silent, speak no words 
That might affright and so offend the guests
That we had sheltered in their time of need,
And who have claimed not just the land alone, 
But full, exclusive rights to life—and memory.
.
******
.
And yet—and yet, our songs are softly sung
Or even chanted loudly as we die.
And still we wear the scarf and headdress and
We raise the flag that still defies the lie.
.
So some are broken by the hammer and 
Some others fight in every way they can—
By simply living still and shedding tears
And smiling still on meeting you and me. 
.

December 13th, Wed.
Berkeley, California
 .

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Epilogue (added Dec 14th)

.

The world looks on as children, women die,

And leaders join to propagate the lie.

And some applaud the massacres, as those 

Who’re troubled still by conscience and decry

Relentless crimes are marked as “haters” who

Must shut their mouths or face the consequence.

.

The orphans know that they will never see

Their parents. The parents see their children die.

Their worlds are blasted, emptied, drained of light.

.

There's little food or water fit to drink.

The homeless huddle as the winter comes,

And hundreds share a filthy toilet, wait

In line for hours for bread—as prices soar.

Diseases kill the ones who still survive.

.

Our throats are parched—and then the rain arrives.

The children dance and smile, collect the rain.

And so, despite the misery and pain

That span the generations, we survive.

We're still a people not as yet erased.

.

Pablo Picasso, 1937: Guernica

G1z1

 
G1z1
 
G1z1, G1z1, burning bright!
Thunder roaring through the night!
Which the mind that held this dream
Of hearing huddled thousands scream?
 
In what dark imagination
Rose this scheme to end a nation?
Of what matter
To whom will emptied parents cry?
 
Hear, beneath the weight of rubble,
Those who’ll soon be out of trouble—
Some within an hour or four,
Some within a week or more.
 

Hear the endless lie that spouts

From the shameless, lying mouths. 

See the faces, on the screen,

Perched on suits and ties obscene.

 
******

Draped in darkness lay the city,

Hoping for a trace of pity,

Praying for an end to lying,

Till the time arrived for dying.

Set alight, the parents burn.

To whom will muted orphans turn?

Stripped of skin, the children die.

To whom will emptied parents cry?

Hear, beneath the weight of rubble,

Those who’ll soon be out of trouble—

Some within an hour or four,

Some within a week or more.

Fifty days of searing pain.

See! It’s starting once again!

Fifty nights of burning flesh.

Hear! The torture starts afresh.

****** 

 
Believers raise their hands and eyes,
Beseeching still the G1z1n skies.
Firm remains their ancient faith,
Accepting will, divine, as fate.
 
For those like me, who don’t believe,
What still remains that might relieve
This pain that’s just an echo, yet
Is something we will not forget?

There’s nothing, naught, except to strive
To end this curse while still alive—
To try, by every means, to bend
Our species towards this horror’s end.
 
Could those of us, who pay our taxes,
Refuse to pay these, till the axis
Joining this to endless pain
Can never, ever work again?
 
2023 December 1^st, Fri.
Berkeley, California

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

With many bows to William Blake:

The Tyger

Syria-II

Syria-II

I asked the one from Syria,
from al Sham, as he had said,
the reason why he’d left there,
and traveled here instead.

I had heard that he was drowning
but by luck had still survived.
From the cold Aegean waters,
he’d been pulled and then revived.

He looked at me in silence—
he didn’t speak a word,
for he didn’t know my language,
and my question was absurd.

So I left him where I’d found him,
and walking then I saw
the eyes that I had looked at
and that is when I saw.

So I stood there as if rooted
and I saw the world anew,
and it wasn’t as I’d known it
and I didn’t like the view.

So let me try to tell you,
if you’ll bear with me a bit,
as I sketch for you that vision,
if I even have the wit.

******

There is emptiness and dullness.
There’s the reason that is gone.
There’s the lack of any meaning.
There’s the numbness and the ache.

There’s the past that isn’t leaving,
there’s the present hell to bear.
There’s the hope that has departed
and the future of despair.

There’s bewilderment, confusion.
There’s the sleep that lasts awhile.
There’s the madness then that rises
and the fear that will not die.

There is shock and there is trauma
of the body, mind and heart.
There’s helplessness and trembling
and the orphan’s silent cry.

There’s the parent or the sibling
or the spouse who didn’t die.

And for all this, there are reasons—
for there must be reasons why.

******
 
So the arms are flowing freely
from the nations of the west,
through the sheikhdoms and through Turkey,
and the wars are raging still.

So the Russian jets are bombing
and the shells from all are bursting
and the cities lie in rubble
and the drones come in to kill.
 
So the Sunni and the Shia
and the Christian each would flee,
but there’s nowhere left to go to,
and the snipers shoot at will.

So the cannons still are booming
and the shells are coming near
and the planes again are diving
and the eyes are full of fear.

For there’s Assad and the rebels,
There’s al Nusra, ISIS, more.
There’s the U.S., France and Britain,
And they each have bombs galore.
 
******

Iraq was torn to pieces
and Libya was destroyed,
and Syria’s been on fire,
like Afghanistan before.

But who can dare to question—
to ask the reason why?

There’s hunger, thirst and hurting
and the itching and the fly,
and the games are on in Rio
and there’s more who’ve yet to die.

******
 
This is what I saw then
and I thought on it a while,
but then I looked and saw you
and so I had to smile.

So now that I have told you,
you can bear it till we go
to the shop there. There’s a salesman
you should really get to know.

2016 August 27th, Sat.
Brooklyn, New York
----------------------------------------------------
   
Related (from 2013 August, three years ago):  Syria
http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2013/08/syria.html

   

Choices

Choices

It’s been awhile but now I’m writing
Once again in metered verse.
And some of those to whom I’m sending
This will smile or laugh—or curse.

And since I’ve blanked out my emotions,
I consider now my choices:
How to give a form substantial
To the whispers of my voices.

******

Should I only draw my pictures—
Not with crayons, but with words—
Painting sunsets, valleys, mountains,
Fields and skies with flying birds?
 
Or should I chant in rhythms ancient,
Sounding vowels in my words,
Seeking rhymes and rising, falling—
Trilling like the singing birds?

Or should I write of what I’ve eaten—
Rice and cabbage, lentils, curds—
Writing also of digestion
And of what I’ve left as turds?

Perhaps it’s time that mathematics
Filled my verse with roots and surds— *
Or perhaps, I should write dirges
For Armenians, Turks and Kurds…

******

Should I fill my lines with nonsense,
Wasting my and readers’ time—
Though they offer still amusement,
Spoken out aloud with rhyme?
     
Or should I write of what I’m thinking,
How I view this sorry world?
Will you enter in the prisons,
In the hells in which we’re hurled?

Or should I write of feelings pleasant,
Sing of happiness and love,
Or raise my head towards the heavens,
Howling at the moon above?
 
Who can answer whence or whither,
Give us half a reason why
Each of us is born to dither
Just a while—and then to die?

I’ll be gone and then my verses
Will be lost, as all things are.
Why then should I write of living—
Joy and sorrow, peace and war?
 
******

Who will read these verses, written
In my notebooks in the night?
Who will bother still to mouth them,
Holding scribblings to the light?

Mine are verses born of grieving—
More of black and gray than white—
Yet there’s gold and silver in them—
Sparkles, hidden, of delight.
 
So I write, as if by random
Breezes blown, till gone from sight—
Like a little sailboat, bobbing
Through the heaving swells of night.

Should I end this poem neatly—
Tie the ends and pull them tight,
Or should I leave them hanging loosely,
Wondering why I chose to write?

******

There!  It’s done, for better or—
As often far more likely—worse:
I’d felt the mists and rising vapors—
Asking for my rhyming verse.

Whence, these beings of the ether,
Seeking, each, their human voice?
Why is it—that we are bidden,
Yet appear to still have choice?

2016 May 13th Fri
Brooklyn, New York
(first two stanzas, central single stanza and
last two stanzas added 2016 May 16th, Mon)

====================================
 * Listed here are the uses of the words:
    (a) “surd” in mathematics and phonetics;
    (b) “root” in mathematics and linguistics.
====================================
    

Amerindian—II

 
Amerindian—II 

Every region of the world has song –
be it of wind, of water, trees and birds –
or that of wolves – and humans, with their drums,
their flutes and zithers, rattles, horns and more –
or just their voices, raised in hymns and chants...

And now we've learned that whales have songs that ring
across the oceans, sounding through the deep…

But only in the Americas have I
discerned a rhythm strong and primitive –
perhaps in ancient times a common one
that then was masked by various overlays –
or else evolved on these two continents –
that cardiac rhythm of the single beat.

This underlies the music of the North
and of the South, persisting till today –
and even when the Andean pipers play,
I still can hear that strong primeval thump –
the beating heart that haunts these continents,
where most of those, who once had danced and sung
amid that sound have long been “disappeared”.

Amerigo Vespucci – he's the one
whose name now marks these realms and those who've come
across the oceans to these western lands.
How may tongues were here, before we came –
how many still are spoken in the South…

I hear the medicine-man,  I hear his wail –
I hear the wolf-like yelping of the braves…
And I also hear the stomping of the feet –
the heart that’s beating still, amidst defeat…

And in the powwow, as the dancers dance,
I listen – and I hear the beaten drums.
Those drums, those feet, those pipes are speaking – but
it’s when we’ll listen that we’ll understand.

For every corner of the Earth is blessed
or cursed with such a mix of things that it
alone possesses, though the Earth is one...

What names did they, who now are vanished, have
for these, the lands that stretch between the seas?
We cannot know – but still can hear that thump.

2015 March 14th, Sat. 11:55 pm
(last stanza added March 19th, Thu. 9:04 pm)
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York
  
Please see also: 
  

• Spirits  ( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2013/12/spirits.html ) 
• Here Was My Village  ( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2011/05/here-was-my-village.html )
• Amerindian  ( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2009/08/amerindian.html )  

Dua, Insaan Ko–दुआ, इनसान को (A Prayer – to Mortals)

  
The Hindi-Urdu text below (in Devanagari script) is followed by a loose translation into English and then by a transcription into Roman.  As my Hindi and Urdu are both weak, any corrections or suggestions would be welcome.  -- Arjun

----------------------------------------------   
  
दुआ, इनसान को
 
इस्लामियत को ढूंढ़ते हुए,
इन्सानियत को खोना मत।
 
हिन्दुत्व को गढ़ते हुए,
मानव-धर्म को तोड़ना मत।
 
यहोवा या यीशु के नाम से,
खून-खराबी करना मत।
 
पैसे या नाम का धन्धा मे,
सचाई और दिल को भूलना मत।
 
शनिवार, २५ अक्टूबर २०१४ ईस्वी
ब्रुकलिन, न्यूयॉर्क
  
----------------------------------------------
   
A Prayer – to Mortals
 
In search of an Islamic state,
Do not, a being’s rights, negate.
 
With Aryan yearnings in your mind,
You still have reason to be kind.
  
In the name of Yahweh or of Jesus,
With murderous evil, do not smite us.
 
To fame or fortune, while en route,
Remember still the heart – and truth.
   
2014  October 25th, Sat.
(translated November 1st, Sat.)
Brooklyn, New York

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Dua, Insaan Ko
  
Islaamiyat ko d'huun'r'hte hue,
insaaniyat ko khona mat.

Hindutva ko gar'hte hue,
maanav-dharm ko tor'na mat.
  
Yehova ya yiixu ke naam se,
khuun-kharaabi karna mat.

Paise ya naam ka dhandha me,
sacaai aur dil ko bhuulna mat.
      
xanivaar, 25 akt'ubar 2014 iisvi.
bruklin, nyu yo`rk
  

Hear and Remember

     
Hear and Remember
       
(includes verses excised from "When Will the Killing Have End?")
      
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seven of the following fifteen stanzas were excised, for the sake 
of brevity, from the poem: When Will the Killing Have End . The 
other eight stanzas were added later.  Images have also been
added. 

Pablo Picasso painted Guernica in 1937, after the bombing, by
fascist forces, of a village with that name in Spain during its civil 
war. The image could only be fitted at a small size in the blog 
column. It is better to view it at a larger size, by clicking on the 
image. You will then see also the other images, in a click-able 
gallery.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
   
They each are blaming the other,
As the people are caught in between.
The earth and the sky and the ocean –
Do they watch, as we suffer, unseen?
  
******
  
To those who had started the cycle,
To those who have kept it alive,
We ask, "If your conscience is missing,
Do you know, that you will not survive?
 
"Your hands have been strangling the living.
Your mouths have been spouting the lie.
And yet, there is truth and there's justice.
And these will be there, though we die...

The Shootings of May Third 1808
Francisco (José) de Goya (y Lucientes)
oil on canvas, 1814; Museo del Prado, Madrid
image source: http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/goya/

"Hear, from the ones you've forgotten,
Hear, from the ones you deny.
Hear, from the ones who are dying.
Hear – and remember – our cry."

******
  
How many, today, will be dying?
How many, beloved, who're dead?
How many, to fight, will be vying?
The streets, with their blood, will be red...
        
How many, from death, will be fleeing?
How many, the children who'll die?
How many, the burned and the blinded?
How many, who'll wish they could die?
 
Our hearts, they are thirsting for vengeance,
And yet, they are breaking with grief.
Where is the road of repentance,
The light of the hopeful belief?

Who are the ones that will profit?
They know that we suffer and die.
Where, in our age, is the prophet
Who tells us the truth, not the lie?

Cambodian Refugees, Thailand
Steve McCurry
(c) Steve McCurry
image source: http://stevemccurry.com/blog/wars-children

What could have set this in motion?
How can we bring it to rest?
Who has the will and the power
And chooses to do what is best?

What do we know of the working
Of all that has brought us to this?
When people are crushed and forgotten,
Who will be speaking of this?

Yet more of these lies and this killing?
Yet more of this darkness of grief?
When will our breathing be easy?
When will we have some relief?
       
******
  
To those who had started the cycle,
To those who have kept it alive,
We ask, "If your conscience is missing,
Do you know, that you will not survive?
  
"Your hands have been strangling the living.
Your mouths have been spouting the lie.
And yet, there is truth and there's justice.

And these will be there, though we die...
      

Guernica
Pablo Picasso, oil on canvas, 1937
Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain
image source: http://www.pensarora.org/art

"Hear, from the ones you've forgotten,
Hear, from the ones you deny.
Hear, from the ones who are dying.
Hear – and remember – our cry."

******
  
The earth and the sky will remember –
The sea that has tasted our blood...
And those, who have wrought the disasters,
They will pay, for the things that they wrought...
  
 2014 June 8th Tue (stanzas 5-11) 
& June 11th Fri (stanzas 1-4 and 12-15)
Brooklyn, New York  
     
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Note:  The poem, When Will the Killing Have End,
can be read by clicking here .
---------------------------------------------------------------
      

Language

                  
Language   
                   
A language is a living thing.
It breathes and grows and pulses.
It melds with us when we are young.
It’s always at our service.
And yet we are as cells that serve
The mind that lives in language.
  
How varied are our human tongues,
In rhythms, sounds and structures.
And yet they are projections, each,
Of that, which can’t be spoken.
        
******
   
A language is a living thing
That shifts and sways and dances.
The songs we sing are sung through us.
The singer true is hidden.
But in our speech, we hear it talk.
It lives in us as language.
  
So every dialect’s the same,
However each may vary.
And that’s because the mind’s the same,
That’s there, in every sentence.
      
******
  
There is a tongue that has no tongue,
And so cannot be heard.
And yet we know that it is there,
By inner sense inferred.
And each of us can feel it speak
In silence, if we listen.
   
So premonition, like a cat
That walks on velvet feet,
Comes padding by.  A faint “meow”.
We turn -- and it is gone.
      
******
  
A language is a living thing,
And yet, it’s like a shadow
That changes form with time of day,
With latitude and season.
And when the clouds are blowing wild
It vanishes.  We seek it.
 
And as the sun breaks through the clouds,
It’s born again.  We see it.
We know that it was always there.
So language is a shadow.
 
******
   
While languages, from others born,
May live their spans and fade,
In wanton acts, we murder them
As remnant speakers perish.
So as we kill the species, so
We kill our cultures too.
  
And what we’ve done is vaunted then
As progress.  Such advances
Bring tears to those remembering
The riches and the nuances.
  
******
    
As we may love a being that
Has a face and limbs and body,
So also we may love a tongue
That’s living or has perished.
As none can substitute for one
Who’s gone, so naught -- for language.
  
How tender is that love we feel
For a tongue we learned as infants…
How grievous is our loss when we
Have none, with whom to speak it…

******
   
As lovers are devoted, so
The poets are to tongues,
For a dialect has its flavor that
No other one can match.
As women have their essences,
So languages have musks.

For even as two siblings might
Have characters apart,
So sister tongues have melodies
As different as birds'.

******
   
How humble is a patois,
How regal, classic verse.
Yet each has provenance the same,
Like those, of women birthed.
They rise in rustic habitats
And end as they began.

And urban speech, where finance rules,
Is rapid, clipped and terse,
But where horizons far are seen,
The speech there slows and broadens.

******
   
Some languages are musical
And others seem more rough,
But that, imbibed with mother's milk,
For each, is sweet enough.
The lullabies of of mother tongues
Give sustenance to us.

And language can be used to lie,
To subjugate, confuse,
Or it can light the way to truth
And liberate, refute.

******
   
Like sea reflecting sky, a tongue
Can alter with our moods.
And so there's speech that's like a gun,
And that which soothes the heart.
But blame this not upon the tongue
Nor give it credit false.

For language is a living thing
That changes as we do.
When madness rules our lives, our tongues
Reflect that madness too.

2013 November 23rd, Sat.
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn
  

Evening Mass

                
Evening Mass
         
As I was walking by St. Finbar's Church,
I heard the organ and the evening mass.
I heard the converts in the basement sing.
I heard their voices as they rose and fell.
It seemed, in this our world, that all was well.

But, recalling then the history
Of those who sang of faith and mystery,
Remembering then, how their ancestors died
And for a bit of peace and justice cried,
I knew this world of ours was far from well,
More distant, yes, from heaven than from hell.

I heard the Guatemalans in the basement sing,
I saw some coming down the street to join –
In Sunday best, a little family...
I saw them cross themselves before the church
And quietly enter, by the side, to sing.

And I remembered then, how they had fled
Their country, ravaged by the endless wars,
How cash and arms had streamed from here to south,
How many then were hunted, massacred...
How those surviving lived from hand to mouth,
How many homeless ones had grieved alone...

And so they traveled north, where money went,
And some had papers, others never did.
They took up humble trades and quietly hid,
For they were quiet people, most of them –
Except on Sundays, when they donned these clothes
And gathered in the basements, there to sing.

A simple story, told by a simpleton.
The truth, you can be sure, is more complex.
But you will have to sit and talk with them
In Spanish or in Quiché.  Then you'll glimpse
The many threads that weave that history
Of silent ones – of faith – and mystery.

For these are “Indians” – not my Asian kind,
But folk of  these, the western continents.
And those, who've traveled far, from Central Am,
Are quiet folk, of stature small and slight.
But when you talk with them, you'll see, at times,
Some traces left – of a soft and ancient light...

And all the weight of ages – Maya, Spain,
The persecutions and the silent pain,
This past, you'll feel – or hear in cadences,
The muted tones of those who've suffered much,
But haven't walled themselves; they're forest folk,
And used to sounds of death – and silences.

So when they sing of Jesus on the cross,
They know of what they sing, for they have seen.
And when they sing of resurrection, they
Have tears that flow – as those, who're grieving, pray.
Far from their homes, in a foreign land, they sing,
The ones they left at home – or gone – remembering...

I heard them singing in the basement and
I briefly thought that I could understand...
And for a moment, there, by Finbar's Church,
My heart was touched and filled, with grace divine,
As pastors poured the sacrificial wine.

November 17th, Sun.
Brooklyn
  

Syria

Syria
                 
I saw the horrors on the Internet,
Of little children lying dying, dead,
Of adults kicking, spasming, being held,
As poison did its cruel work on them.

And if I hadn't had my dinner, then
I probably would rise from watching this,
With dinner warmed and ready, and would  eat,
While chatting with my wife on this and that.

I wonder what we all would do if all
That's perpetrated in a war or peace,
Would reach our screens, so sights of burning flesh,
And sounds of screams were heard as watchers dined.

I wonder.  Then I think, how every day
The men and women drive to work and sit
In front of screens – and guide, to targets, bombs
That then explode in places far away.

And some of them may see the ones who burn,
Who run like ants with clothes and flesh aflame,
And some are children, mothers burned to death,
Or maimed, disfigured, left to rot in pain.

And each of these must then, in turn, arise
And drive to homes where they can eat and talk,
With children and with spouses, some of them,
At peace again at end of working day.

So if indeed we saw what nations do,
Be they perceived as foes or closest friends,
I wonder if the world might change or not.
I think I still might eat and carry on.

But then, of course, we haven't reached there yet,
And if it goes like this, might never do.
We'll see the horrors that we blame on those
We see as foes, but rarely what we do,

Each land has troubles of its own enough,
But when the powers use it as a stage
On which to fight their battles, then we see
Unending grief and endless misery.

In Syria, we see what might be us,
If we have come from India or a place
Where many peoples mix and live as one,
With tensions past and present underneath.

We know the fuse, when lit, will burn and then,
If not put out, will lead to lethal end,
A death not brief and merciful but one
That makes of life and land a living hell.

2013 August 31, Sat.
Brooklyn
   
Strange Encounter    

Broad and Deep, the River

Broad and Deep, the River

Broad and deep, the river, oh,
Broad and deep the river!
See the river's steady flow,
Broad and deep, the river!

The ships, they come a-sailing, oh,
Broad and deep, the river!
See them come and see them go,
Broad and deep, the river!

Who are they, the sailors, oh,
Sailing down the river?
Some are young and some are old,
Sailing down the river!

Where are they a-sailing to,
Sailing down the river?
They're sailing to a city, far,
Sailing down the river!

What are they a-carrying, oh,
On those sailing ships?
They are carrying men and gold,
On those sailing ships!

How'd they get the men and gold
On those sailing ships?
It's looted gold and men in chains,
On those sailing ships!

The ships, they come a-sailing, oh,
Broad and deep, the river!
See them come and see them go,
Broad and deep, the river!

Broad and deep, the river, oh,
Broad and deep, the river!
See the river's steady flow,
Broad and deep the river...

2013 July 5th, Fri.
on the D-train to Manhattan,
crossing the East River
over the Brooklyn Bridge