Love

Young lady, you ask me for my love,
And I tell you it's all yours.
But from that dry smile on your pale face,
I hear a deep sigh of loss;
That only an aching heart can make;
That only a burning heart will listen.

Young lady, I know, you ask me for my soul,
But I only give you my body.
I know, you need my soul to reach my body,
But I reach your soul through your body.
For my soul, you sacrifice your body
And for your body, I sacrifice my soul.

ROAD NOT TAKEN --------------------- Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

--ROBERT FROST

(Courtesy: Ashfaq)

Happy birthday, Kerala

Oh my beautiful land,
that lies between the endless mountain
and the endless sea,
like a narrow green strip
left over from a happy dream.

Oh my beautiful land,
with red muddy roads
along the slow streaming rivers,
impregnated by the tears of
the gloomy monsoon skies.

Oh my wretched land,
deserted by the children
for less green pastures;
to earn the wealth it takes
to turn you a barren land.

Oh my beloved land,
I wish you today,
From a distant land
with a distant taste,
a very happy birthday!

Loneliness

Remember, we tread this path many a night?
Night after night, we had tales to tell.
Tales about us, repeated hundreds of times.
But every time, we broke the stillness with our laughter
The nervous stillness of the gloomy earth,
Awaiting the golden kiss of its lover moon;
That tender touch which made every tip of grass
To rise up in delight like hairs on our skin.

Now, when I walk alone, I remember those nights.
And I wish I could laugh the way we did.
Or I wish there be a storm that blows out your thoughts from me
Like the desert storm that purges the past.
New dunes to be formed, and new footprints to emerge,
Burying the ones that it bore before.
Then I feel, despite the pain it gives, let your thoughts stay in me
For I become lonely, when even thoughts desert me…..

The Magic Dancer

The Magic Dancer came on stage
With a whitened face, and a glittering golden sleeveless attire.
Making stiff moves to the Jhankar beats,
He showed the crowd many a trick in as many moves.

To the dancing tune, he held up his hand
And brought it down with a flower at its tip.
He stretched the flower to turn it a stick
And with every twirl he doubled the stick.

“Magic Dancer……” cried the crowd.
It is the glitter in their eyes that makes him move.
For lack of confidence could dampen his drive
And a moment of distraction could ruin his show.

Many more tricks he showed his crowd
Without failing his dancing steps.
Some watched his feat with utmost awe,
While others thought it’s no big show.

Cruelest indeed are those eyes; which fail
To see the years he toiled to perfect his act.
Those eyes haunt him when he leaves the stage
But he moves on till the last glitter fades….