On occasion, in periods of boredom or anxiety or even at complete random, amorphous, fuzzy images enter the faint recesses of my mind. They lay just out of reach, not tangible enough for me to be able to draw them or describe their features and characteristics. These images exist more as a tumultuous clash of conflicting emotions rather than in any concrete form, and the only way I’ve managed to preserve them before they inevitably fade away is through poetry. It was through reading what I had written that I often understood the lessons these images were trying to teach me, and I hope that you all can take away something from them as well.
- A Dell
- Gold Leaf
- Rapids
- Ganga (to non-Indians, the Ganges River, the holiest in Hinduism)
- Road Trip
A Dell
Leaves hang from bowing boughs over
pathways too perfect and arrow
straight to be the work of fate.
Flowers fall onto the heads of
passers-by. A blossom to ignite the
romance of the loved and lovers, the ire
of the dejected and rejected.
Wistful men shuffle along under the
wandering beams of light that find
their way through the minefield of
the holes left by forgetful nature.
No, not forgetful: indifferent. Why should
it care when it can’t? It
cares not whether it is beautiful or
ugly: all is illusion.
The forest simply is. The trees and
flowers have no purpose or goal, they simply exist.
Yet the lovers quarrel, the rejected pine,
and the wistful sob quietly into their shirtsleeves.
And nature sighs, and leaves them be.
Gold Leaf
Dreamed of a sunken isle, the
other day. Filled with ruins and
ancient treasures. I dove and my
hands slipped through the heap and
struck the forgotten skulls beneath. A
surprise: an understatement. For in this
world, since when is all that
glitters not Gold? Gold it was,
but a thin sheet laminating the
mound of the deceased. A strange
sense of remorse filled my heart,
enough to make me begin to
sink, ever so slowly, until my
knees pressed into the doubloons and I
I woke up. Off to Wall Street I go, these suckers ain’t gonna scam themselves!
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah…….
Rapids
Happiness. Sadness. Anger. Pictures
in a children’s book: but what explanation
can you provide beyond description?
You feel because you feel.
Every emotion is a flood of
chemicals, unpredictably triggered by
a thoughtless word, a prick in
an open wound, the right succession of quavers.
We cling to the raft as it groans
and strains and tries to keep
up with the changing tides
without splintering or striking the rocks.
Why do we then smite these
torrents, dam the currents, wish to reside
in a perpetual state of rising swells,
and try to stay on top forever?
The higher you are, the more pain
you’ll feel when the wave
finally crests and crashes down
and you spiral into the whirlpool.
So don’t combat the swells, my friend, for
it’ll only cause you pain, grief, and suffering.
loosen your grip, slacken the reigns,
and ride the rapids as they come.
Ganga
As I sat there, submerged
in the verdant, opaque, cool
water that flowed past Varanasi’s quay
a skull lazily drifted by, beside me.
I felt as if the water,
so cool and calm only minutes before,
was a dark, poisonous torrent
infecting every pore of my skin.
Too late, covered as I was
in droplets of that inky liquid
that is the corporeal body of the force,
the lifeblood we call our mother Ganga.
The skull stalled and drifted, floated
towards the bank a few feet yonder,
gently swaying while nestled within
the saffron shroud that obscured its occiput.
A child? A faithful pet? An old, weary
man on his final journey? A mystery.
We the living share this fate with the dead,
to be ceaselessly borne towards an uncertain end.
And so I emerged from the Styx,
cleansed and defiled, as the fires of hell or gates of heaven
twinkled just beyond the horizon.
Road Trip
Put the pedal to the metal, hon,
and don’t lift your foot up. Lean
on it with all your weight.
All the better if it snaps.
Cause I’d rather I can’t choose
to stop or go or slow while
we careen towards certain death
as the engine’s roar fills my ears.
Leave the steering wheel, hold my hand,
there’s not much time left. You see,
that pedal’s a placebo, so’s the wheel,
we’re in a Hadron collider headin’ in one direction.
Deep breaths, just observe the pantomime
they’re all playing. They think they’re driving
but they don’t see what I see. My dear,
we’re not on a road, it’s a railway track.
Don’t cry, what would you be crying for?
If we hit something, when we hit something,
it helps to remember that we did nothing
and that it was all gonna happen anyway.
So don’t bother, the brakes don’t work,
try them all you like. Lean on my shoulder
as the world becomes a blur, and the
final stop approaches at its own pace.
Those were some of the weird things that end up in my imagination from time to time. As always, to anyone who might be reading this, please leave a comment below with any constructive criticism you might have.
And if there’s someone reading this besides me, I’m glad that I’ve managed to convey my thoughts to at least one person out there in this noisy world.
The Galley with No Name 