Geologists say ‘by your leave’,
we’re famously polite:
we wear our heart upon our sleeve,
rejoice at rhyolite.
We’re very patient people, but
I tolerated stuff before
that I’m not taking any more:
up with this I will not put.
Don’t bring to me your xenolith,
preposterous, fantastic:
I’m done with make-believe and myth:
my ire is pyroclastic.
Don’t tell me pressure makes a gem,
discomfort forges what’s sublime:
the aimless drip of frameless time
creates a speleothem.
Some things improve with age, it’s true,
while others just feel dated:
to sleight of hand, to me and you,
I’m simply indurated.
I’m wise to every move you make –
I’m distanced from your wiles,
meanders, stratagems and smiles -
a placid oxbow lake.
Earth is a magnificent place,
a blue marble spinning in space.
It hosts stretches of ice and snow,
jungles, forests, mountains, grasslands,
oxbow rivers and burning sands.
Along with rain, wind, hail, and snow
Earth has glaciers, rivers of ice,
that cap its polls not once, but twice.
And white water, whose untamed flow
carves out gorges and canyon walls;
creating effervescent falls
tumbling down to the rocks below.
Earth is a magnificent place,
where seasons change at Nature's pace.
At Dusk, twinkling stars start to show
while wolves and bears roam the Badlands;
and birds and snakes stock the Wetlands.
From caves to a niche or grotto,
bats live in the planet's bowels;
alongside the burrowing owls
and cockroaches eating guano.
The Earth is a spinning blue orb
where there is so much to absorb;
from the mega to the micro.
Earth is home to the human race
and we've no other place to go:
so let's protect it, just in case.
HOME CALLING
I rose from the soil and water of Barak valley
and like a white bellied heron , reached the sky
above the bamboo brakes and the blue hills
to live in an alien land for trivial needs.
But like an ancient father, the meandering Barak
beckoned me, called me to its banks.
I had blindfolded myself ;
I had lost the vision of my land !
I was deaf to the whistling air of Bhuban hill.
How many years have gone by under the neon light ?
I am not quite sure.
My identity has been left to urban dust.
Now that I am growing old, I hear the beckoning
I can see the blue hills, fluttering bamboo leaves
and the full moon cast over the flowing Barak.
I can see the Sonbil , the wood- duck, the kopou phool.
I want to sit by the banks and may ride a boat
across Barak.
If I sleep for ever in the valley, I don't mind.
After all I will merge back into the soil of Barak.
©pkdas 31/03/2017
Barak is a meandering river in Assam, India.
Sonbil is the largest oxbow inland lake
Kopou is the state flower.