A Meditation at Sukhna Lake - from 'The Bearded Chameleon'
Accept you have no inkling of the power
that walks upon the dragonfly water.
Siberian geese each season migrate here,
yet bird and lake exist beyond your will.
You comprehend so little of this, truly.
Brother of fish, brother of water-lotus
when will you frog-kick out toward the truth?
Only the endless saga, coming, going ––
may free your awkward spirit-form today.
Stand witness to the swans, the gliding hours
that slide by here; feel all of sadness,
of happiness beneath the lily-pads,
but realize that neither can be a shelter
under the blue sky that you did not build.
A temporary tenant of the flesh,
only your steady mind can save you now.
The leaf will helicopter from the tree,
the yellow blossom crash upon the water.
Wind knocks you down upon a fatal whim,
as the spirit rainbows upward like a fish
gasping between the earth and heaven. Think
where you will go, where you must go, and go.
that walks upon the dragonfly water.
Siberian geese each season migrate here,
yet bird and lake exist beyond your will.
You comprehend so little of this, truly.
Brother of fish, brother of water-lotus
when will you frog-kick out toward the truth?
Only the endless saga, coming, going ––
may free your awkward spirit-form today.
Stand witness to the swans, the gliding hours
that slide by here; feel all of sadness,
of happiness beneath the lily-pads,
but realize that neither can be a shelter
under the blue sky that you did not build.
A temporary tenant of the flesh,
only your steady mind can save you now.
The leaf will helicopter from the tree,
the yellow blossom crash upon the water.
Wind knocks you down upon a fatal whim,
as the spirit rainbows upward like a fish
gasping between the earth and heaven. Think
where you will go, where you must go, and go.
courtesy: http://chandigarhtime.com
The Black Swans
I saw two black swans
dark as her long hair
among regimental ducks
at the concrete pond,
winching necks up and down
like waterpumps,
dredging out a hissing sound.
Blood-red feet churned
a swamp of ripples.
A crowd gathered to watch,
admire, perhaps envy
as they whirred around each other
like compass needles
in a magnetic ritual.
Exhilarating to see
this affectionate clashing
of wings and beaks, hear
the reckless shrieking
over cicadas clicking in the trees,
yet know for us
it would never be
dangerous and passionate,
who could only ever peck
each other's cheek. I envied
those black brutes --
the white bands across tips
of pillarbox-red beaks,
smeared on like war-paint.
dark as her long hair
among regimental ducks
at the concrete pond,
winching necks up and down
like waterpumps,
dredging out a hissing sound.
Blood-red feet churned
a swamp of ripples.
A crowd gathered to watch,
admire, perhaps envy
as they whirred around each other
like compass needles
in a magnetic ritual.
Exhilarating to see
this affectionate clashing
of wings and beaks, hear
the reckless shrieking
over cicadas clicking in the trees,
yet know for us
it would never be
dangerous and passionate,
who could only ever peck
each other's cheek. I envied
those black brutes --
the white bands across tips
of pillarbox-red beaks,
smeared on like war-paint.
Courtesy: val-laird.blogspot.com
Weaver Ant
I am just one of the chain gang,
a thousand moveable mandibles
rubbing thorax to red thorax, the tiniest
sweat worker in the emerald forest.
The higher-ups send down orders,
then we’re off to engineer
another green-horn cornucopia
trumpeting up the jungle jazz.
See these silk jaws in a dewdrop,
my chomping glue-gun mouth.
I crimp and raise the leaf cathedral,
a little link in the chain of command.
a thousand moveable mandibles
rubbing thorax to red thorax, the tiniest
sweat worker in the emerald forest.
The higher-ups send down orders,
then we’re off to engineer
another green-horn cornucopia
trumpeting up the jungle jazz.
See these silk jaws in a dewdrop,
my chomping glue-gun mouth.
I crimp and raise the leaf cathedral,
a little link in the chain of command.
Mark W. Moffett, courtesy of National Geographic website.
Yellow Bittern
You can hardly
see me near
the lily pond.
I love the quiet hunt
for fish and frog
through water
hyacinth places.
I could stand
in the shadows
at your feet
and you would
never see me
unless I flew up
flushed from the bushes.
My striated feathers
are the trick
of an illusionist.
I cannot explain
this flair
for invisibility.
Some advice?
Don’t reveal yourself
to all and sundry.
Stay once bitten
and twice shy.
When I launch,
shaped like a cigar
into the air,
my striped body
shoots fast;
and then I say
krek-krek, see see.
This is your chance
as my needle beak
passes out of sight
through an invisible
hole in the sky.
from Voices from the Bamboo River
CMS
see me near
the lily pond.
I love the quiet hunt
for fish and frog
through water
hyacinth places.
I could stand
in the shadows
at your feet
and you would
never see me
unless I flew up
flushed from the bushes.
My striated feathers
are the trick
of an illusionist.
I cannot explain
this flair
for invisibility.
Some advice?
Don’t reveal yourself
to all and sundry.
Stay once bitten
and twice shy.
When I launch,
shaped like a cigar
into the air,
my striped body
shoots fast;
and then I say
krek-krek, see see.
This is your chance
as my needle beak
passes out of sight
through an invisible
hole in the sky.
from Voices from the Bamboo River
CMS
courtesy: redgannet @ http://10000birds.com/yellow-bittern.htm
Squirrel Alert
Squirrel, stop. I think you heard,
then bolted up the strangler fig.
A fight, a fall, a splintering twig.
It wasn't my fault. I'm just as scared.
then bolted up the strangler fig.
A fight, a fall, a splintering twig.
It wasn't my fault. I'm just as scared.
To the Banyan (Ficus benghalensis)
Today the law of five convenes beneath the panchayat tree,
you, the shade-giving seat of each Indian village council.
Ancient toehold of roots and hairy down-runners, you rattle fig leaves in the air
above a muscular girth of governance, long-upstanding to the people.
And no one would dare cut down the dramaturgy tree,
the air-con auditorium where yearly Ram Lila actors tell
eye-and-hand mudra tales below the moon on Divali nights.
You are the buffalo rubbing tree, the lie-down siesta of brahman cows,
the repose of elders on jute string beds where children ping their marbles;
you are the hotel of mendicant sadhus, and rat and vole keyholes for cobras,
the fertility tree at Holi throwing out rainbow shudders of chalk dust.
No one would disrespect the tree of conception, bobbing with plastic hope-dolls,
or plunder the prosperity tree adorned with ornate golden earrings.
Yes, you are your own temple by the mandir. Best of all, you are the shade tree
for village schoolyards. No one in their right mind would want to be reborn
as a low-totem worm through causing the death of a banyan.
You are the sunset prayer-time tree ringing with brass god bells.
Young women circumambulate chanting Ram! Ram! on fasting nights
and marry you, twining red thread about your girth to change their luck
when a manglik girl has serious blots on her astrological chart.
Yes, you are the festival of lights where the rangoli colours
form chalk circles on cow-dung, you the root-shelf for ghee-lamps.
Even Alexander embraced you: one vast banyan tree gave shelter
to seven thousand storm-bombed Greeks along the Narmada River,
blueprint of empire, the first cosmopolis, rhizome hinterland.
Without a doubt you are the Nation Tree, slow epoch builder,
the Wish-Fulfilling Tree, Kalpavriksha tap root to the Vedas.
Of all your followers, the Indian minah, that little black-hooded fellow
with a yellow beak has always been true and stays your best disciple.
Eater of pigmy figs he scatters your seed, kingdom after kingdom.
We, the battalions of Hanuman monkeys cling to your hairy chest
replaying epics in the subplot tangle of trunks and down-root runners
while you stay firm, eco-umbrella, sheltering us from angry gods --
even as coal mines choke the lungs of jungles that you rule over,
even as electric monsoons throw down their El Niño javelins,
even as the ozone continues to be shredded like a flimsy blue raincoat,
still you remain the solid idea, of permanence, a supreme being able to spread
new roots from a single trunk like a city of elephants across the acres.
Stretching through time and space like the web-work of milky star-fields
I only have one question for you, Banyan. How much time is left to us?
you, the shade-giving seat of each Indian village council.
Ancient toehold of roots and hairy down-runners, you rattle fig leaves in the air
above a muscular girth of governance, long-upstanding to the people.
And no one would dare cut down the dramaturgy tree,
the air-con auditorium where yearly Ram Lila actors tell
eye-and-hand mudra tales below the moon on Divali nights.
You are the buffalo rubbing tree, the lie-down siesta of brahman cows,
the repose of elders on jute string beds where children ping their marbles;
you are the hotel of mendicant sadhus, and rat and vole keyholes for cobras,
the fertility tree at Holi throwing out rainbow shudders of chalk dust.
No one would disrespect the tree of conception, bobbing with plastic hope-dolls,
or plunder the prosperity tree adorned with ornate golden earrings.
Yes, you are your own temple by the mandir. Best of all, you are the shade tree
for village schoolyards. No one in their right mind would want to be reborn
as a low-totem worm through causing the death of a banyan.
You are the sunset prayer-time tree ringing with brass god bells.
Young women circumambulate chanting Ram! Ram! on fasting nights
and marry you, twining red thread about your girth to change their luck
when a manglik girl has serious blots on her astrological chart.
Yes, you are the festival of lights where the rangoli colours
form chalk circles on cow-dung, you the root-shelf for ghee-lamps.
Even Alexander embraced you: one vast banyan tree gave shelter
to seven thousand storm-bombed Greeks along the Narmada River,
blueprint of empire, the first cosmopolis, rhizome hinterland.
Without a doubt you are the Nation Tree, slow epoch builder,
the Wish-Fulfilling Tree, Kalpavriksha tap root to the Vedas.
Of all your followers, the Indian minah, that little black-hooded fellow
with a yellow beak has always been true and stays your best disciple.
Eater of pigmy figs he scatters your seed, kingdom after kingdom.
We, the battalions of Hanuman monkeys cling to your hairy chest
replaying epics in the subplot tangle of trunks and down-root runners
while you stay firm, eco-umbrella, sheltering us from angry gods --
even as coal mines choke the lungs of jungles that you rule over,
even as electric monsoons throw down their El Niño javelins,
even as the ozone continues to be shredded like a flimsy blue raincoat,
still you remain the solid idea, of permanence, a supreme being able to spread
new roots from a single trunk like a city of elephants across the acres.
Stretching through time and space like the web-work of milky star-fields
I only have one question for you, Banyan. How much time is left to us?
