My memories belong to the long lost alleys of time
Which cling to my mind as cobwebs
Blurring my already fading vision
Refusing to depart peacefully

As I move haltingly forward in hesitant steps
Not really sure, never certain
Fervently longing for the past to retrace its steps
To revert to my eventful past, glorious and inglorious

The moments drop silently as rain
On the fabric of accelerating time
As I long for my belongings to keep pace
To paint my present with an evergreen brush

Alas! They keep on falling back
For they belong to another period, a different time zone
Rooted in stasis, overweighed with the burden of the past
Overwhelmed with the uncertainty of the future

Subir Chakraborty
3rd June 2022

Life just happened
Life always just happens
With scant respect for all my plans
Scattered with randomised turn of events

Sometimes it offers more than I expect
Filling my cauldron with ecstasy
Elevating my doddering self-esteem
From the realm of the ordinary to the phenomenal

The dizzying moments are intoxicating
Exuding an aroma of arrogance
A certain numbing of the mind
Perhaps a dulling of the wisdom

But at times, life draws me down to the depths
A hopeless, unstoppable cesspool of misery
Where I clutch on to mere half-straws
To keep my sanity and sensibility in balance

Where after a bout of self pitying, I realise
That the hurt is necessary for me to heal
For through those throbbing strands of pain
The truth reveals itself gradually, aiding the process of self discovery

Subir Chakraborty
13th April 2022

The sunrise speaks in gentle whispers
To the dew drops, which lie scattered on grass
Pregnant with the sweet dreams of yesteryears
Reluctant to stir from their trance-like state

The sunset speaks in mellowed tones
For the day in its realism and crudity has just passed by
Signalling both joy and frustration, sometimes in unequal measure
Differentiating between illusions and the struggle for existence

The moonlight speaks in hushed silence
Enchanting the earth with its silvery hues
Drenching young and old hearts with hope and love
And possibilities, and feelings and unspoken words

The Milky Way navigates the sky in all its majestic splendour
Illuminating our very being, our consciousness
Lighting up our souls with cosmic effulgence
Informing us about our universality and our oneness

Subir Chakraborty
2nd April 2022

The journey
Takes me to different places
Destinations; intended, unintended
Desired, undesired, indifferent

Some fragments cling to my mind
As if they were waiting for me
As if meant only for me
As if in a way predestined

A tiny experience
A little something to learn
A little something to unlearn
A myth to be shattered, broken

Till they coalesce with my being
Creating a ‘new me’
Each moment, everyday
While discarding the ‘old me’ along the way

Subir Chakraborty / 5th April 2018

Hope lay in the clouds pregnant with rain
In the unseen dew yet to fall on virgin grass
In the pulsating rhythm of our unfelt heartbeats
In the unknowability of the distant future

Hope came in all hues and colours
In the unpainted canvas of our minds
Lighting up the rainbow of our imagination
Unhindered, unimpeded, unchained, unleashed

Hope for humans, humanity, this earth
The ceaseless fountain of universal optimism
Of shared beliefs, of familiarity, of peace
Devoid of hatred, warmongering and deceit

Will that hope ever become a reality
Creating a utopian world of equality and justice
Where humans can hold hands without hesitation or fear
Chained only by the bondage of universal love

Subir Chakraborty
17th March 2022

The women and children sleep in fits and starts inside a bunker
Desperately clutching on to each other
Hoping for some modicum of comfort
From the closeness of shared space
And the shared hopelessness of their combined fates

While being startled continuously by monstrous sounds
Of bombs, missiles, tanks, airplanes
Soldiers tearing into each other
Immersed in the blood and sweat of slain adversaries
Submerged completely in the mechanics of death and destruction

While men and women in formal suits
Sit in round table meetings in luxurious environments
Playing games, proposing, opposing, abstaining
Practising the fine moves of aggressive and passive balance
The subtle art of gaining advantage in international parlance

Meanwhile, the children and women are holding on to their last straws
Hoping against slender hope
For that elusive ray of maturity and wisdom to dawn in the minds of the leaders
Who can only talk and do little else
While the civilians in the war zone
Absorb their pain through their silent prayers

And the aliens watching this drama from outer space
Think about the stupidity of the earthlings
One earth, one planet, only one refuge
Yet seeking glory and grandeur in ridiculous warfare
And engaging in chest thumping amidst all the human misery and subterfuge

Subir Chakraborty
4th March 2022

My mind is a jumble house
Of scattered dreams
Of fully baked fantasies
And half baked truths

Fragments of my life lie intertwined
Riding the apparitions of my unconscious
Seeking an outlet through the partition
To coalesce with my reality

Knocking continuously
At the forbidden boundary
Trying to nudge it open
To reveal a deep, hidden story

Am I prepared for it
Shall I be able to come to terms with it
I do not know for sure
As I hesitatingly hold the door

Not knowing for certain
Whether to open or bolt it forever
From the conscious recesses
Of my ever wavering mind

Subir Chakraborty
20th Feb 2022

All stories need not have an end
Any definite or finite conclusion
Or even a hero, heroine or a villain
Or a convoluted plot, moral or a lesson

Isn’t that what our lives are all about
Just a day to day habitual existence
As each morning melts into eventual dusk
To thereafter turn morning again

I seem to prefer it this way
With the passing of scores of years
Where a slice of life can prevail independently
Without any attachments, restraints or fears

The culmination of a story or a novel
Can be left to our individual imagination
To mould it the way we feel like
Or left suspended like a pendulum

Subir Chakraborty
28th Dec 2021

My moment exists in me
And I exist in the moment
Which one comes first
And which one second

I travel through time
And time travels in me
Can one exist without the other
In seclusion, without a beam

I am me
And you are you
The ‘youness’ exists because of I
And the ‘iness’ because of you

Strangely relative our existence
Where nothing subsists in isolation
Yet we spend an entire lifetime
Beating others to our destination

Subir Chakraborty
5th Dec 2021

The duel between environment and human greed
Has its genesis from prehistoric times
Playing itself over and over again
Down the ages, as the clock chimes

Unlearning, learning and unlearning again
Has been the story so far
Leading to destruction, construction and destruction
And the earth in need of periodic repair

The human mind tends to ignore
What really lies very far ahead
For the modern credo firmly states
That in the long term we are all dead

Should we have a sense of responsibility
Towards the generations yet to come
Or should we wantonly destroy this earth
And then look for another one

A good way to begin
Would be to keep our ears close to the ground
And hear the earth pleading for protection
From the marauders in the crowd

Only then would we know
Of the right steps to take
To save the earth from depredation
And all that would follow in its wake

Subir Chakraborty / 26th March 2018