Mahatma Gandhi
While travelling through
Rural villages
Encountered the poverty of
Womenfolk
Having just single linen to wear
Washing one end of it
While wrapping their body
With the other
And then try wash
The other end...
Till each Indian get
Enough to cover their body
I too will restrict my clothes
Mahatma Gandhi said,
And managed with
Single dhoti and shawl,
And came to be nick-named -
Half-naked fakir...
The situation of the womenfolk
Or men-folk are same today as well
Our politicians witness it too
And wear
Costliest costumes...
21 December 2021
We die for land everyday,
With blood and sweat spent in it,
Just to end in two yards of grave,
But look at the poor fisherman,
With half stomach wrapped in dhoti,
Standing on the golden shore,
With zeal at it's zenith,
To conquer the vast sea in front,
With a piece of wool wrapped on wood!,
Or!
To colour the ocean with own blood!
Sunny day it was ,yet he walked miles away.
Bare foot on the ground ,with mud all round,
He walked anyway.
With a white dhoti and a lathi,
He used to say the word Azadi.
Finally the day came and was called as Independence Day,
When all the Britishers were castaway.
Now the soilders are the one who took his responsibilities,
Be it a sunny day or a snowy day,
They stand erect on their way.
While they fight and bleed red,
we sleep comfortably on our bed.
Fighting with enemies & sacrifying their lives,
So,that we can peaceful live our life.
Because freedom is not free!
She also dies
to be reborn in hallucination.
Her spouse’s corpse
is wrapped in a white dhoti.
She makes everything
safe within the walls, slamming
the windows and doors.
Bacteria perform the post-funeral rites
before the burial.
A smoldering Frankincense gulps down
the fetid smell.
She’s one among the multitude who
can’t see *Mangalyaan
landing on the lap of Mars.
No one can alter
the earth’s flat shape in her mind.
Her peace feeds on the
scraps that a pretentious priest drops.
Her lips rain mantras,
yet shoots of life don’t sprout from the shroud.
She waits
within a circle of illusion.
There’s a meaning
in meaningless waiting.
*Mangalyaan – India’s first Mars mission
Poetry Nook Weekly Contest Winner
When all the world is a giant burden,
Banerji sir, my colleague, a true SST Allen.
“Maan ki bat Modi ke Sath; rest other shun,”,
Says always my friend Banarji, never stun
Or stagger or startle, never remains barren.
Best friend who teaches Dhruvi and others Balkan,
Or India with psychology, without an apron.
Kenil, Hari, Bhavin, Shivani had some unban;
With Favourite dish of Dada, a fish; talks on Patan,
Sings hymns, buzzes about Mahakali one.
Says, “Your age is less than my profession.”
Scolds us, “Worst batch of year” – a Pun?
He is Bangali babu, wears dhoti, kurta even,
Talks about SST, and about doors wide open.
He is a Brahman, takes plausible action,
Wearing a chevron, is our Divine’s lion.
Meshwa, Diya, and Pitambar are clearly won,
With Aryan, Harsh, Nupur, Dishal and billion.
Let it be Shakespeare or Keats or Byron
He is through with all, has a great fortune.
Appreciates my Monorhyme and region
Never keeps quiet, but is pure bullion.
Dear to my students, Esha, Jeet or Rohan.
Prosper a lot is my wish, Oh! Aaron!
The world dims to a standstill in shouting
incoherencies the fluttering heart spew, clinching
on today through the vagaries of inertness,
and seeking liberty, he sings the song of
life.
Then the finality of death.
And Agni's dance.
The soul ascends from the smouldering
cinders gradually dying and strives for salvation
in aether, becoming one with the universe,
as the universe was always him.
Fifteen days of mourning. Eight opinions.
Five brahmins to feed.
Twelve pieces of jewelry to melt.
Fish to eat.
Dhoti to wear.
Lassi to drink.
Judgment to fear.
On the sixteenth day,
a completion is attained,
and things return to normalcy.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 09 / 01 / 2017
A man like this,
Who sacrifices his entire life
for the betterment of our country
uniting whole nation.
Who reached his goal
digesting every tension.
India become independent
without any war,
without any aggression.
It is only possible due to such a great son
He is our ‘Bapuji’ , father of our nation.
A man like this
Who spent his life
wearing a six feet ‘dhoti’,
eating food of a common man,
walking miles & miles by foot,
talking the secret of non-violence,
brought our independence
spending life in the prison,
defeated our enemy without any gun.
He is our ‘Bapuji’ , father of our nation.
A man like this,
Who was a man dressed god.
Didn’t need any post
Even after our freedom.
Still, we could not able to feel
the heart of a sacred idol.
Could not able to read
the message of a sacrosanct soul.
Who struggled entire life for our freedom,
he was shot dead by a blind Indian son ,
He is our ‘Bapuji’ , father of our nation.
-------------------------------------------------------------
This poem is written to commemorate our great freedom fighter & father of our nation ‘Mahatma Gandhi’.
Life lays mines of challenge on his way,
but Karithandan is a tough warrior.
An English engineer whirls in the current
of confusion at the foot of the mountain.
Enchanted by the white smile,
Karithandan climbs down slowly.
The tribal hero scrapes through the mist,
which looks like death, and unlocks
the padlocks of the shrubs and the wild roots.
The engineer follows him, uttering, ‘Wow!’
A familiar knock. She opens the door
of the tribal hut, when a dark shape,
clad in white dhoti, disappears in the distance.
A deep love works transient miracles
even under the eaves of death.
Columbus discovered America, I studied.
Karithandan’s discovery of the way to Wayanad,
but I read nowhere, for the engineer
bartered his two bullets for that credit.
Bullets could shatter the chest, but couldn’t the truth.
Pendle War Poetry, U K has published this poem in Selected Poems Anthology 2013
(Wayanad is a natural paradise and a bio-diverse wild region among the
mountains in Kerala, India. During the British rule in India, a
British engineer discovered the way to Wayanad with help of a
tribesman called Karithandan. To take the credit of the discovery, the
engineer killed Karithandan.)
A sound of orient
-
He looks like a fragranced oasis in this city;
a lean, yet muscular man in a dhoti,
sweaty; playing flute, a plateful of bland food
in front of him, his humble surrounding, the hut.
A village man, who has once come in chasing dream,
is now a part of this city, a part of speed,
all except his flute and customary dhoti.
The dizzy sound travels up, to the fifth floor terrace,
to the sad man and sadder woman, to the sadists,
to the dying and to the dead. It climbs up like veins.
His is a life, with its own brands of pain and love,
not demanding, the way sometimes this city extracts.
The days and nights extract a man.
He hauls out others or vise versa.
A sound disappears in sleep,
becomes a village in the vale,
where dreams move like sheep.
~© 2009 - All Rights Reserved Kushal Poddar.
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