The Great Debate started,
Parliament was the open forest,
electors were divided into two groups—
Sir Fox's, and
The Lion's,

The first group wanted to overthrow the Lion
from the sovereign head of the forest,
It was a tough job to confront Lion directly,
So, Sir Fox, appointed a Monkey as the Chief campaigner,
and that monkey appointed other monkeys in the business,
Scaring them with a story of vanishing trees, and living on
the land increases the mortality rate if Lion Party continues.

Monkey, the chief campaigner exclaimed,

“We are not living in the rule of law but in the rule of Lion,
All are equal, but the continuous target of a particular community,
Like a beautiful deer, by another community in majority
should be banned, Deers bring historic and aesthetic
significance to the forest
And need to be treated as the same,”
Deers bellowed gleefully hearing this.

Cows felt hurt,
their exclusion from Monkey’s speech
proved to be a setback to the Fox’s Party,
Cows were the most targeted community
by the Carnivores, everyone in the forest knew,
Potential voters were lost to Lion’s Party.

Polarising speeches of Chief continued,
It brought Rhinoceros to its side,
Seeing rhino in political rallies,
Hippopotamus chipped in,
To counter the increasing weight
Political advisor of Lion, i.e, Tiger,
persuaded Elephant to become an official
member of their party.

Hate speeches increased in numbers
Giraffe, the bearer and upholder of law,
Overlooked everything,
the long neck looked tilted towards
an ideology.

Rumours became truth,
truth became rumour
Monkey was good in it,
And an army of monkeys were excellent.

Parrots, Pigeons, Peacock,
****, Cuckoo, Cat,
Loved the importance they got,
Disseminated the Fox loving songs.
The listeners felt threatened,
They had an enemy living between them
and they were considering them friends,
They thanked the Parrot, Pigeon, Peacock
for pointing them out.

Now, biped hated quadruped,
Quadruped hated reptiles,
Reptiles did the same to amphibians,
And in this way the whole animal kingdom
danced in chaos,

The fiery speeches of Sir Fox helped
in creating illusion,
The slogan of the Man as a common enemy
was changed to, Feline as a common enemy,
Felines joined Sir Fox’s Party,
And Canines ran to Lion’s Party,
Obvious was difficult to observe
Obscure was easy to see.

**to be continued

The mystic Sadhu
chants cryptic
mantras,
I hear
the Hammssss of his voice,
He is lost in his world
Like I'm with mine,
Above me, the bridge
clanked gleefully
announcing the arrival of her lover;
Shimmering in white, honking
it moves slowly like a big serpent,
Ending the tryst
with a flickering red light.

Several mounds, smoldering woods,
and one body stuck to
the trunk of the bridge
swirled in me the fear of
leaving this world early,
leaving all that I strived to
achieve, and leaving all of
it in the middle.

Buses pass on the next bridge
A hand came out
and aimed the stream with
something, probably a coin,
to compensate for wrongdoings,
Coin-collectors waiting like a
starving lion in a zoo
pounced on these throwings,
aiming the spot  
with a magnet like
a trained ninja in nocturnal warfares,
After a few unsuccessful attempts
A boy yelled in joy
"Har Har Gange".


The Ganges was like this
from the beginning,
She was moderate in demands
offering so much
at the cost of a penny,
Throw a coin and
you are absolved from all your sins.

This is my home now,
God knows for how many years more!
The stack of books
upright arranged
in the shape of my dreams looks
disorderly and unorganized,
Loneliness in the shape of an injured cat
Invades the room, meowing, every night,
sniffs scattered objects,
And eventually rests in my lap
effusing air of some stale memories,

As the days move on like a tired traveler,
The stains on the wall are clearing
to my eyes,
Sticky notes like land mafias
appropriates space from the wall,
Che Guvera with a clenched fist
returns a red salute,

The 'fist' forwarded memory of past,
and one by one
Dreadful images reemerged in my mind;
Mother in hospital bed, pale and weak,
gasping for breath,
I sat beside her
waiting for magic,
Several breakups
especially the last one
that hurt most
where I choose this not  her,
And last but not least
my COMRADE days
participating in protests,
bearing batons, and living
like revolutionaries
fighting the corruption in
the system,

But now I yearn to be
part of the system,
As this series of pictures end
The motivation I consumed earlier,
watching twenty minutes
long video subsides,
And all of a sudden I rummage the bed sheet
to look for a hidden pack of cigarettes
which I bought yesterday,

Choices change as we proceed on
in life,
I do regret some of my decisions
and regret them badly,
I have cried at night,
Laughed like a hyena,
I'm weak feigning to be strong,
I see many reasons to quit this task
but one that keeps me
going on is the picture of an ailing mother
dying in a government hospital.

How
Easy was the
Beginning...
How difficult
To end it in
The same
Zeal...