After a long time

A long, long time: after a long time,
after an age you may say,
I started what I had wanted to begin a long time ago.
I did not think I had it in me, back then.
I do not think I can do it, even now.
I am doing it anyway.
Strange, the way things turn out to be.
It feels good to prove myself wrong,
at least this once, it does.
It feels good to discover the possibilities
in a new set of words, and the new ways
in which sounds come together, following rules
that are not as I know them.
It feels good, to listen, and to begin to understand
even if a little, what a month ago was
gibbesrish-ish.

 

Published in: GloMag March 2020

Sunday evening

Sunday evening is worse than Monday morning,

The fear of death, says Sir Francis, is worse than death.

A sickly feeling rises and churns in my stomach,

even now, after I’ve lived through such seven hundred

and seventy non-workingSundays. It’s the same every time.

It starts rising from Saturday. In the morning

a panic reminder rings, a tightening in intestines.

Saturday evening warns me that the next

will be the last before death comes again.

Published at: https://cactifur.com/2018/02/19/rajnish-mishra-sunday-evening/

The master of beginnings

I’m the master
of beginnings; neither middle, nor end,
of steps that hang, neither rise nor fall,
of sounds that are, reach ears mean nothing.

Try not to call me, or meet me (never).
Mail me. Mails are good, convenient too.
There’s no guarantee that I’ll mail you back.
I respond or reply at my leisure
for my pleasure.

Had you been a little less
than you, I’d suspect you, but you, as you are,
I can’t suspect. If I do, then the end of
the middle comes.
Then, apocalypse comes.

 

Published at: https://thenir.wordpress.com/2018/03/07/three-poems-rajnish-mishra/

Tricks language plays

My daughter, eight, looked at me
with eyes: half-inquiring, half-afraid,
eyes with faith, half, at least,
and asked suddenly: Are we born again after death?
I looked at my wife. Our eyes met.
She smiled: that corners of the eyes,
so-it-did-happen smile, and I knew
it was not she who dropped
a hint to the child
of death or birth, or both.

I did not, I know. We don’t discuss death
at home, especially with children
awake or around: never with them around.
No, not death, the old enemy, no talks
in the recent past with anyone.
Death horrifies me.

So, I sat back,
took a pause,
filled my eyes with light and strength,
that fills the eyes of those
with half-faith, at least,
and told her boldly that half-lie:
‘No, you don’t have to die if you say no to death.’
I knew I was half-true.
Tricks language plays!

 

Published at: http://www.pikerpress.com/article.php?aID=6868

I don’t go out

I don’t go out, nor meet any one.
I don’t have anyone I’d like to meet.
There is no place I’d like to go to.
My days are the same for five days a week.
My nights are same for five nights a week.
No friends, no relatives, no colleagues come to meet
me, nor do I ever go out. All is hell that’s not heaven.
My home is my heaven. No, this is not my home.
This is the house in which I live.
My home is away, a thousand kilometer away
from this city where I live and make ends meet,
nothing less, and nothing more.
I have heard all the lectures, of how I should now
call this place that gives me shelter home,
this city my city, and this life heavenly.
I’d love to. I’m for it, rationally, but heart,
the emotional part of my mind,
has fifty-one percent share
and controls my life and thoughts
and poems. 
 

 

Published at: https://www.redfez.net/poetry/isolation-i-dont-go-out-2607

Sparks of Inspiration

No poet is poetic
Even half their life.
(Don’t push me hard
For data verification).
Sparks of inspiration
(That some call divine),
Stray moments of life
With the fire of creation.
Then, Darkness again.

 

Published at: http://spillwords.com/sparks-of-inspiration/?cn=bWVudGlvbg%3D%3D