On a Maniac

I’m a maniac.
So is everyone
Or they are just dull—by default.
I’ve always been excited
About something or the other—all my life.

I was, for instance, a cricket maniac once,
Swinging the bat,
Though I didn’t swing well at all;
And watching matches day in day out.
But match-fixing dampened my spirits
And the media reports proved an effective antidote.

Currently, I’m a poetry maniac.
My poems sometimes have traces
Of pacifist mania, or purist mania,
Or sometimes a political mania.
Thus, poetry for me is a mania matrix.

Now that I can write a poem,
Good or bad, on any theme,
People, especially my kith and kin,
Avoid me nowadays,
As though I was a pest or plague.
They fear:
I may put any of them in a poem
And post it, too.
Once, I made an in-law the theme of a poem.
And ever since,
We have not been on speaking terms.
I wrote on my spouse
And our relationship took a different turn.

I wrote good things
On a pet cat or a doggy,
Which they could not understand,
Let alone appreciate.
I wrote on the rose in my garden
And before I could publish,
She did perish!

I wrote on my best friend
And he did appreciate.
Another on a bosom friend,
Whose whereabouts are still unknown!

The leaders I write in praise of
Are all dead and gone;
And so can’t hear me.
Those who live
And whom I invariably censure
Won’t hear me.
I won’t praise leaders living—on principle.
It may be too early, you know.

A coterie of readers, in my homeland and abroad,
Do read my poems and compliment me,
But are a microscopic minority.

Still, I write--
Because I’m a poetry maniac!

***
Won III Prize in the Poetry Contest entitled "Mania," sponsored by Lewis Raynes, November 8, 2017.

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