TRUTH: PARTIAL AND IMPARTIAL
DR Jernail S Aanand
Lies are our staple food.
We feel convulsions
When we occasionally turn to truth
Those who encounter it
End up in hospitals,
Or on the pistoled pier,
If the dose of truth was higher.
Literature is the realm
Of the partial truth
Even history has no history
Of telling the impartial
Unqualified truth does not let us sleep
Try the balm of poetry
Where the wounds are too deep.
Literature introduces us
To the best parts of humanity,
And history to the worst
Yet we love history
Though it always acts like a wamp
Tempts us with its perilous glory
Which bears the death's stamp.
Our silence can make stones speak,
And also shut whirling tempests
Of verbal extravagance.
History is the warbling noise
Of the river of life
In its glorious as well as meanest flow
Poetry interprets and modifies the show.
..........
HOPE AND FAITH
Jernail S Aanand
Hope sustains life
And it is hope
Which makes meat of a man,
Killing him bit by bit
Rather than despatching him off once for all.
Hope is a path kept open
While all the doors
Are closed
Leading to despair
All around the earth and the firmament.
Hope tempts us into living
And keep on suffering
The tantrums of fate
Believing
All will be well one day.
Men who fail in their endeavours
Turn to Hope
To keep the masters
In good humour thinking
The mortals believe in their mercy.
Faith, rather than hope, is
A positive asset for man
Which does not leave things
To the will of gods
Rather put the responsibility on human action.
..............
THE ARTIST
(At a fancy eating joint in the Hotel La Matriciana opposite Operation House, Rome)
Jernail S Aanand
Whatever you have,
Body or mind
You have to exchange it
For food.
It is normal,
And has nothing to shock
If the exchange
Is willing and under no stress.
This exchange
Loses its exalted status
When we oversell ourselves
Because we have to survive.
Even if it is the centre of civilization
The Republic Square of Rome
The Creators of Beauty
Have to beg to run their home.
An artist, a singer, a poet
Perform for the joy of creation
But they have a body too
And a mind to be kept in motion.
When poets or singers sing
In the streets
It is divine
And sends us in a trance
But when next moment,
He advances towards you
With a begging bowl,
All divinity takes wing.
It was half for joy of his calling
And half for his stomach
Yet what a performer!
I appreciate the singer !
But I pity the system
Which has everything for the artless
And nothing for the artist
Whose work is so sublime.
...............
.
MAKING IT EASY
Jernail S Aanand
Easy chairs have been in vogue
Though these days
Ease has filtered out
And now chairs keep you near standing
As they resemble the tables only .
The more ease we find
The greater is the torture
Inflicted on the wooden stuff
Just see how uneasily
They are fixed to give peace to our flesh.
Some species of men are found
Looking so easy in life
I can't help remembering those
Whose bones are fitted beneath
To give them an elevated state of peace .
You cannot be easy unless you give Comparable torture to some one
And all ease which
Twists the bones of another person
Is indivine and unjust.
...............
THE SECOND FALL
Jernail S Aanand
Gods believe in subtle communication
They talk in silences
And gestures
Words and speech are crude arts
In their parlance
Which ignorant people use
Or verbal aids for mentally retarded.
Birds, animals, even insects know
The subtle language of love
Which gods understand
And feel happy to bless them
Man is the only creature
Who has lost this subtle approach
Because of his selfish know-mongering.
Essential knowledge to remain alive
Is imparted to every object
That is why doves and lambs
Have not been forced
Out of existence
They know the basic art of survival
And nature's world is still aglow with life.
Only men, in their selfishness, gathered
More knowledge than was required
To be alive with dignity
The result is before our eyes
See the fast fall of mankind alone
From essential graces
The greatest loss being their innocence and joy .
Gods wonder what to do with
Men with torn psyches who have
Converted themselves into debris
Impatient to overreach themselves.
How to bless this ignorant tribe ?
Who don't know when they abort a tree, they are cutting a descendant from the branch of life.
...........
ROME.
Here, in my hotel room, there is absolute calm
I am in a state of complete self possession.
Only some memories dance their way
Into my mind.
Is man lonely any time? I think never. Life is reduced to memories and emotions and wherever we are, they follow us
But I find time with myself. This place where I stay has started communicating with me.
Here are the three poems I have composed
just now.
A feeling of thankfulness to gods has overpowered me. And from this mental state, spring up these poems inwhich you will find me conversing not only with God but with fellow human beings too.
FROM SILENCE TO DOCTORATE IN NOISE
Jernail S Aanand
The things He created
Were in an Accord of Silence
Spreading fom end to end.
It was the beginning of creation
And gods knew
Things possess communicative powers
Birds, animals, insects
Each one and then our waters
And mounts conversed in silence.
And there was no problem
In understanding each other
So plain was the language of silence.
Things took a 'loud' turn when men
Appeared on the scene
Who took silence for half approval
They decided to kill the trees
They were silent,
And men considered it half approval
They wanted to imprison rivers into bottles
But rivers were in a trance
Men considered half yes when they said no No
Men prayed for more and more
Gods remained silent.
Men took it as their half-approval
When they found nature grumbling
And gods frowning
Men decided to break the Accord of Silence
From silent communication
they came to words
And from words to blows
From blows, to muscles, and then,
Over to machine guns
Silence has now received doctorate in noise.
..........
LIVING WITH GOD
Jernail S Aanand
Someone told me keep remembering God
Go on telling him
You are doing these good things
And you have done this bad
Soon I came to know
God does not like to be kept busy
All the time
No fun engaging him in minor issues.
I realised this thing in a very
Costly way.
Whatever I said,
God often found fault with my words
Finally every time I had to say sorry
God never reverted to me
When I was busy
Only I did it out of fear or to please him.
Now I let God do his work
He knows I am here
And I remember him.
And when in need, he is here for me.
We do not talk now much
I also do not tell people
How much I love him
Or He loves me
He is there in his grand presence
And I am here in mine
Mini presence trying to partake
Some sparkles of his splendour.
........
JOURNEY OF JOY
Jernail S Aanand
Is joy a personal domain?
Entirely individual property?
Something like food
Which we own and eat
When we need?
No it is a protean im mass
Falling and rising each moment
Does not stay in the same shape
Nor in the same mind
Can't trust it.
Every other person around you
Related or unrelated
Can make his participation
In the creation of
This dynamic content
I sometimes feel though we call it
My joy my pleasure, my happiness
It is all an illusion.
It is supplied to you
By people you operate with.
Any one can cause dents in your joy
Turn it into grief
And make you weep.
You are at the receiving end only
When your joy turns grief
How helpless I am!
It is a matter of the heart !
Where is my heart?
Is it inside the vaults of my chest
Oh..I see it like a ball running out
And from there it returns carrying
So much soil and waste matter
Bruised too at times
And sometimes when kicked,
Crying.
Joy which looks so much my own
Rides on my passions
Knocks at several doors
In search of a return feeling
But often returns crestfallen.
Can I erect walls around it
So that it does jump out
Nor expect anything
Nor feel lost
But just stay inside, content with itself?
Gods were unhappy to see me distraught
They suggested another way.
If you love others,
Without expecting returns
Nobody can divest you of your joy.
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