monsoon is delayed
cries out aloud night and day ---
thirst unquenchable
The Missus is angry, Rufous told his wife.
Are you sure? She sounds like that a lot.
Her husband just flew off with the babysitter.
That young thing! What? His wife was outraged.
I think so.
The wife grabbed the binoculars.
That’s not the babysitter; that’s his son!
His son looks like a girl, Rufous said.
I have told you this time and time again.
Male peacocks are the pretty ones.
The plain ugly brown ones are their wives.
Rufous did not want to acknowledge his wife’s smartness.
So he kept looking, hoping something would happen to validate
At least a tiny bit of the story he fabricated about the neighbors.
His wife smirked, knowing exactly what her husband was doing.
Thirst! Thirst!
Scorching thirst!
What a terrible night!
From head to groin
From hip to tip,
Fire rages.
My entrails shriek and crackle,
As twigs in a forest fire.
My nostrils flare,
With the reeking smell of burnt flesh.
My tongue and gullet,
Melt like plastic on exposure to heat.
Like a hornbill,
I thirst for a drop of water.
Wow! Before me is poised a chalice,
Full to the brim
With scarlet, bubbling liquid
As elixir, suddenly lowered from Heaven!
Extending my hands to hold it
And drawing it close to lips
Oh! How I missed it by a whisker!
By what magic
By what vanishing trick
From my chalice of the night,
The wine drained out
Leaving not even the lees
What terrible betrayal!
Its dry emptiness
Stared at me
I felt myself gyrating in darkness
Was it a dream or an illusion?
Reality or fantasy?
21. Jan. 2022
The Chalice of Night Poetry Contest
Sponsor- Chantelle Ann Cooke
That car swishes
along the forest road.
Who cares
about a poor bird in the age of lynching?
Its beak with berries in it
freezes.
Its mate hears
wing-beats that never near.
A bird lover’s thoughts grow
from the carcass.
He climbs up
the tree trunk
and drops
figs
through the slit in the sealed nest.
Beaks rise
from the enervating hunger.
The world needs
his deed.
Drooped wings
are countless.
First published in Pif Magazine, US.
*A mother hornbill never comes out of the sealed nest until its egg hatches.
Which flying bird shall I choose to be?
Would Bird of Paradise suit me?
Owl, falcon or hawk might be fun.
Bohemian waxwing is on the run.
Trumpeter Hornbill or Military Macaw?
King vulture or Jackdaw?
Flamingo with her peachy color?
I can’t decide. I’ll ask my mother.
Random thots
Two hornbills
On a grevillea tree
I look at them eat seed
They soar noisily onwards
Towards the next seedy tree
Send pigeons I had asked Of
Hornbills problems am reminded
There is no washing your hands off
No pigeon just a couple of noisy hornbills
Resting on one neglected grevillea branch
#bubbles_in time
Luis 04,2020
Through the forests of Sumatra
Through the dark and sweaty jungle
Proud and fearless pads the tiger
Pads through bamboo, palm, liana
Powerfully swims across the water
Webbed feet pounding ‘gainst the current,
Unaware of near extinction
Forest dwindling, disappearing
Shrinking by illegal logging
Teak for tables, chairs and profit.
Will our tiger last the decade ?
To our children, ancient history ?
Ancient history, myth and mystery
With the sun-bear and the hornbill ?
Spring to action like the tiger
Planting trees and education
Guardians all of unique creatures
We can save the Sumatran tiger.
They each have a yellow extension,
Sure there is much more to mention,
Each is known to do a lot to protect,
Neither is known to get much respect.
The Helmeted Hornbill lives in the trees,
Watch out because they might have fleas,
Now the other is on an ice hockey team,
And uses a yellow stick to help fulfill his dream.
As the bird uses it’s beak as a weight,
I doubt very much the player is ever late,
While we watch the bird fly and glide,
It has been great having him on our side,
They both were born in Brunei,
Watch out for the bird in the sky,
Both care very much for their mates,
Wonder if the wife can stay up on skates?
Shall we go like innocents with heavy
breathing in the pool of blood to find
the innerconnectivity of a boldly beautiful
death ? In the open pit of an ancient gold mine ?
There was a loss of hidden dance, in the
cancer striken human chain, chiseled on the
grey walls of history. The artifacts stolen, even
the ankle-bells of a toddler had gone up for a sale.
A visual oval gives a liable comment. A
flame nauseates a baby doll. The yellow hornbill
puts up a fight for the sake of memories.
There is a huge silence of the rocks, moaning inwardly
None of me was a god. A simple slum’s promised
dream.Hungry roads will lead to a ruined temple.
SATISH VERMA
The swallowtail butterfly defying all distance
Hold its course against the sun
And seek through space a migrant's chance
Of flying to the land of its birth
The hornbill turtle tunneling its watery way
Swim against the tidal flow
To find the distant shore of sand or bay
That popped it from egg to air
And I have seen between spring and winter
The birds from the north homing
Through the crimson evening ere the shutter
Of night falls upon their way
And I here, my eyes beyond the distant sea
Like all creatures before me know
There is a place of birth, a golden memory
And when he calls then I shall go.
Home is where the heart goes yearning
For forgotten treasures now bright
To home at evening my wings stealing
Carry me safely through the night.
trout leaps, splashes back
rapid creek, 'neath submerged rock
angler misses luck
as somewhere...
fish in a glass bowl
swims with neither smile nor scowl
pensive as an owl
while out there...
hornbill knocks on wood
superstition understood
fly away it would
hornbill knocked on wood..
superstition understood..
fly away it would.
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