Seduced in the Sunderbans
Blue above, blue beneath; waters and skies
kiss at yonder point
A thick line stretches with flags of greenery, bold enough
To sustain salty tides, as muddy lands, bronze in sunrays
Swathe itself with the poignant carpet of the Ganges.
Boatman swings as if wind itself in the
unheard stretches,
Vista lucid enough but not to overcome eyes in the clay;
Death lies behind the muck and life too; they choose
to struggle.
Nights alert in sounds; river breezes rumour in our ears-
“Look the ‘Royal’ sees you from behind, from beside,
in front...”
Fake cries of people tilts the launch as feet gather
on a side
Just to beat hope against the blinding trees and bushes.
We hover in coop while roars roam around us
in the chill...
Captivating mist dangle themselves over salty fluids;
Blur off reality in the splendour that seduces us with drunken eyes.
Word-masters may faint penning it from tip to tail for
Where is the tip and where is the tail?
Scintillating silence
Winded by the recurrent chirpings and seldom fox cries.
And the wish to see the king, bothering every moment
Makes the guards utter, “If seen within the cage
it’s royal,
For those who dare to sense it and hear its gasp, it’s lethal.”
Verses bows, prose too, ideas too vast for them; logs of wood
Keeps us- alive till they rot, afloat in them till they float,
Nature’s dearest the ‘Royals’ here, her lap just for them.
Eyes become weary, swollen without sleep, still open
with hope...
While the king dozes, watches us every jiffy through
royal eyes,
Must be smiling seeing the hunters enslaved within
inebriated waters.
A serene approval haunts the heart as we depart, kicks the pendulum
Faster to say, “Come here and float but beware
of seduction.”
Beside the pond of memories
Throwing pebbles in the still waters
Of the dark pond, cornering round my memoirs
I found myself lost in the round ripples
Massaging the chords of my nostalgia
easing off with vanishing thoughts as the
thin waves disappear in the free thinking waters.
The soil bowl dug out in the gloomy mud
gulps the rain waters leaving me thirsty for
the days when my children will revive
my leaping, joyous days of upbringing.
All seems phony now and much more
heavy with wisdom and age.
Cracks on the shore of the pond too
drinks the flowing loam after the long summer.
My cracks stay still and drip in rain as
A herd of cows grazing in rice fields in monsoon
without the thoughts of the farmer with the stick.
My thoughts are weaved with greediness
To think of all those and all that I have
lost forever
and a vain trial will sit here with an
extinguished mind
till the clouds or lightning drives me from here,
nods me and pushes me into my present.
Sonnet Mondal,
Durgapur
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