When pleasure lies
On a bed of pain
When to lose is to win
With a sense of gain

When to conquer the peak
Is to actually surrender
As you finally summit
It makes you ponder

Going down the aisle
With your daughter’s arm
Are you losing a daughter
Or gaining a son

Making that kind gesture
To an elderly couple
May cause you inconvenience
Perhaps some trouble

But that feel of satisfaction
You derive in the end
May more than justify
Your temporary pain

Can gain exist in isolation
Without any underlying pain
Still being contemplated
Still unexplained

Subir Chakraborty / 3rd March 2018

When the gods shall paint a rainbow
Across the arch of the sky
I shall tiptoe down your heart
Without a shout or a cry

Subir Chakraborty / 28th Feb 2018

The narrative of the revolution
Runs deep through the veins
The unshakeable self belief
In the ideology of change

Change for equality
Change for justice
Change to classlessness
Change for freedom

Scores of lives are sacrificed
Near, dear, not so near, unknown
Those who could mourn
And those not old enough to bemoan

And yet when change happens
The narrative begins to ferment
Over a period of time
Unnoticed, slowly, silently

The rot seeps in
Surreptitiously through the system
Initially in ones and twos
And then as an avalanche

Humans demonstrate once again
That ingenuity and creativity
Can always find ways and means
To subvert idealism, ideology

The detritus begins to stink as years pass by
Till there comes a time
To dream of another ideology
A new revolution

Subir Chakraborty / 4th March 2018

I lie in silence looking at the ceiling
You too lie in silence, sinews taut
Our fingers crave for the touch
But they fall short, miserably short

Subir Chakraborty / 16th Feb 2018

I stand in the echo of
Myself
Waiting to decipher
To discern

My true self
Undiluted by sophistication
Unsullied by rumours
Unhurried by punctuality

My image bounces off me
My sounds I strain to hear
The echo crisscrosses the distance
Befuddled, in deep despair

What I can see
Is not the true me
What I can hear
Is a voice unfamiliar

What I project
Perhaps not what I am
Unknown to the echo
Hides the true man

Subir Chakraborty / 14th Feb 2018

When youth decides to fade
And the halo begins to dim
When the leaves start to fall
And autumn seeps in

It’s not the big successes
Which make you gasp
Nor the big ticket events
Which adorned your past

Time to take in the small things
And begin to savour life
Time to shift gears, and enjoy
The non-events in your stride

Time to watch the butterfly
Emerge from the caterpillar
Time to watch the birds
Sing with rare ardour

Time to try out new hobbies
Time to uplift your mood
Time to reconnect with friends
Time for a renewed childhood

Subir Chakraborty / 18th Feb 2018

Ha! Democracy
Nah! Democracy
For better or for worse
Sheer ecstasy

The first world preaches
And the third world listens
Freedom and equality
Together they glisten

What they forget to teach
Are the smart lobby groups
Hiding behind the curtain
Along with their troops

When the third world adopts
They are taken aback
By the sheer inconsistency
Of democracy at heart

And by the time they realise
The goons have stepped in
To wield their power
With democratic sheen

The common man aghast
At the sheer enormity
Of how ideals lie twisted
And mauled in totality

How routinely identical
The common man’s plight
Shrouded in uncertainty
With only hope in sight

Ha! Democracy
Nah! Democracy
The common ideal
Uncommon notoriety

Subir Chakraborty / 14th Feb 2018

The romance of youth
Is torrid and tumultuous
Laced with impatience
Spirited and incautious

The romance of mid-age
Haltingly strolls
Burdens and responsibilities
Taking its toll

The romance of old age
Goes like a dream
None of the impetuousness
Of the late teens

Or the ambivalence
Of the mid-life years
When career and children
Intervene between the layers

Strains of early years
Now a distant memory
Of successes and failures
Laced with history

Each day a pleasant saunter
In the autumn of your life
Just holding of hands
And looking into the eyes

Subir Chakraborty / 10th Feb 2018

Man woman
Woman man
Equally unequal
Delicately imbalanced
Soothingly volatile
Lovingly cruel
Cruelly caring
Uncaringly sympathetic
Sympathetically egoistic
Egotistically tender
Tenderly hurting

Yet
Beautifully bonded
Affectionately disposed
Sweetly murmuring love songs
Life long

Subir Chakraborty / 20th Aug 2017

I can hear the antique
Whisper out its name
I can smell the antique
Wafting out its fame

Lying discarded, neglected
Sitting silently in a corner
Ruing its past glory
Completely lost, a loner

Yet the pride remains
Of a long glorious past
A time of bravery and valour
A period turned to dust

Holding the piece, I wonder
When my time shall come
When I shall lie unnoticed
Stranded, deserted, abandoned

The antique now speaks to me
In a voice loud and clear
Do not dwell in the past
Nor anticipate the future

Live your life here and now
Enjoying every minute
For who knows when
You shall become an antique

Subir Chakraborty / 8th Feb 2018