Farewell
We left the house! No! Lost it!!
To repay our growing debts
Three years of drought and
three years of flood
In the vageries of weather
we poor farmers withered
Sweat dried; returns eluded
Crop loans intact remained
With one last look
At the doors locked
We bid farewell to the
sweet home we held
So dear for many a decade
And reached the open world
To join our own crowded creed
Of former farmers in dire need
To eke livelihood as casual labour
In the same fields we once owned
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Guillotine (Revised)
Her heart is a guillotine
Alas once placed I, mine
Out rolled, two pieces anon
The time-doctor was cool
Cobbled the two halves with his spool
My fake pride daubed some smile unguent
But remained raw that fatal lesion
With clotted blood's red stains
Reminding me the worst ever let down
Well! Never enough of the learned lesson
This fool of a heart still moans in pain
Pines frantically for a love sign
Of what virtue is it’s reckon
From a cloudless empyrean
Expecting a soothing rain
poem by Sathya Narayana
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I, She And Silence
First, first...
Over phone...
"Hello"... "Hello"
For hours… sweet talk…
Many a laugh…
3 years later...
Face to face
"Hi"... "Hi"
Two shy smiles…
Silence...
Two cups of coffee...
Silence...
While parting two broad grins...
Silence…
She turned aside …bit her lips
I sighed…scratched head
Silence…silence…silence…
[...] Read more
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Poor Gandhian
A Gandhian by name ‘Saheeman’
Aged about ninety nine
Called on officer Mr.Suborn
And complained with great concern
“Your subordinate Mr.Paisaman
Demanded thousands fifteen
For sanctioning my pension
Oh God! What’s happening to my nation”
Mr.Suborn thought for minutes ten
Scratching his coarse skin
And said “He is a greedy swine
I’ll teach him a good lesson
Don’t worry my old gentleman
I’ll see your job is done
With less than half the strain
Give me just thousands seven.”
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Choice
Some wake up sharp by the daybreak
Take a bath; wear ashes or tilak
Liberally on their foreheads and bodes;
Burn incense and light oil wick;
Before their deities and join the world
To swindle, squeeze and abuse the weak
Some rise late by eight or nine
After a seesawed night of spilled over wine
And go out to help the maimed
Unfed, oppressed and distressed
If one asks me to make a wise choice
I don’t mind siding with the sinful looking latter
In spite of the God-factor with the sinister former
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Dilettatish Hunger
Sitting in my porch lounger
I satiate my dilettantish hunger
With nocturnal devour
Of succulent silence
I dwell hours agape
In a blissful mope
Gazing at the sleeping milieu
Wondering once more
At the infinite beauty He heaved
With His magical caduceus
On the Earth’s canvas
From night-long vigil
I hardly pick few speckles
Of His boundless spectacle
I stand in awe of
His grand oeuvres ever-growing charm
That remains a connoisseur’s conundrum
Till the daybreak
[...] Read more
poem by Sathya Narayana
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What A Feeling
What a feeling it is to say, “This is my own house”
For one who lived years in a rented residence
What a feeling it is to say, “I’m full to my neck”
For one who starved for weeks, being out of work
What a feeling it is to say, “This rag is so warm”
For a half-nude hobo who lives under sky-dome
Small pleasures, yet great gratifications they are,
For those grieving souls, in sheer indigence
The poor are poor; but poorer are the ravenous rich
Who can never reach these richer indulgences
poem by Sathya Narayana
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After Sixty................
You learnt
Something or a lot
For sixty years or more
Keeping your nose
To the grindstone
It’s time to halt
Come on! Throw away
Those grammar books
Discard those language lessons
Try something akin
To your hunching spine
Help fellow humans
Or chant the names
Of the Divine
Of what use, is stock pile
When it is not for consume
Of what use is knowledge
[...] Read more
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Idled Idealist
He is an idled idealist
A muscled, imbecile
A savant to no avail
In search of a new world
While blurring are lines
Between good and bad
Between right and wrong
Dithered of discerning wisdom
He is stranded in the middle
Of labyrinthine lanes all around
Towards which side to stride?
Left? Right? East? West?
Fuddled is the ideal vanguard
No friend to walk together
Nor even a foe to offer
A decent fighting pleasure
In this social warren
[...] Read more
poem by Sathya Narayana
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Let Us Forget
He lost his parents
In communal riots
But he forgot it!
Acquired was his fertile tract
For a paltry amount
But he forgot it
He has to fast many a night
Unable to meet rising costs
But he forgot it
Shattered were hold-fasts
Of many a proletariat
But they all forgot
Nothing to surprise at all
It is easy in this democratic State
To keep people in a hypnotic state
[...] Read more
poem by Sathya Narayana
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