The art of the possible and the impossible
Lie intertwined in my mind
Each nudging the other
Each competing with its adversary
To gain ascendance, victory

Like the double helical structure of the DNA
Each strand engaging, disengaging
Causing confusion and clarity in alternate cycles
The dilemma playing out eternally
To be or not to be, perpetually

When I am riding the wave of my ambitions
A tiny voice creeps in my mind
Casting doubts, causing apprehensions
Did I strive too tall
Did I stake my all

And when I shy away from a challenge
A different voice is audible
Informing me of my lack of courage
Egging me on to take charge of the process
And show the world my raw prowess

The more I choose one
The more the other becomes faint
The more I reject the other
The more I create a bit of self
Perhaps unknown, even to myself

Till what remains behind
Is the clear distillate
The very essence of my identity
For the world to see progressively
And for the self to realize eventually

Subir Chakraborty / 3rd March 2019

The conversation that I start with myself
With ecstasy and distress as players
Translates to a poem at times
Interwoven with emotional layers

When the dialogue carries the fragrance
Of roses, jasmine or frankincense
The words weave magical moments
Of love in its sublime sense

Sometimes the dialogue takes a queer turn
Making it grotesque and ugly
Dragging the words up an incline
Agonising through the sonnet painfully

And then there are occasions
When nature tiptoes silently
Nudging the words one at a time
To garnish the stanzas artistically

And so it goes on and on
My poems continuing to create
A very special world for me
In which I love to meditate

Subir Chakraborty / 26th May 2018

 

 

Life goes along at its own pace
Eventful, uneventful, boring, exciting
Pulling me along at times
Pushing me ruthlessly quite often

There are times when I try to give life a shove
Coaxing it to bend its ways
Giving it a silent nudge
To take me beyond the pale blue horizon

Life is not used to this supervision
Yet it adjusts quietly to the new supervisor
Allowing me to guide it gently
To my desired destination

Only one thing it does not promise
Only one thing it does not assure
Whether the object of desire on attainment
Shall continue to remain as desirable

Peeled of layers of mystery
The destination may lose its glamour
Devoid of layers of imagination
The rainbow may get recast in reality

Or it may not
And the horizon may drop down to my feet
Revealing a world of magic
That may entirely be mine to behold

To take the risk or avoid for fear
The choice is finally only mine
To be a master of my own destiny
Or be a meek follower for life

Subir Chakraborty / 10th May 2019

How does history
Repeat itself by the clock
How is the present
A chip off the old block

Nearly seventy millennia back
The Sapiens migrated from Africa
Hunting and foraging for food
Amidst the Savannah of Eurasia

And wherever they went
They laid to total waste
The flora and the fauna
In their greed to make haste

Today the same DNA
Motivates us to migrate
To faraway lands and places
Offering opportunities on a plate

Leading to an exploding population
Trying to make a beginning afresh
Mindlessly desecrating the environment
And extracting its pound of flesh

Have we really moved on
And become more civilised
Or are we playing the same record
With the needle stuck beside

How do we change our DNA
Of extortion and exploitation
Seemingly taking us forward
While driving us to oblivion

How do we alter the music
Emanating from the gramaphone
How do we change our fate
Apparently cast on stone

Subir Chakraborty / 23rd Nov 2018

Life often beckons me to reach out
In so many subtle ways
To go beyond the mundane, ordinary
To embrace the unknown

I falter, stutter, in life’s greying autumn
For years of routine drudgery
Has gnawed me out hollow
Leaving only a bare skeleton

Can I again become what I once was
Rising like the Phoenix
From my own grave of routineness
To brave the headwinds of uncertainty

Driven to the impregnable wall
I can perhaps reignite the lost spirit
Which once signified my gait
And laced my tongue

Discarding the cobwebs of diffidence
To discover myself anew
Meaningful, significant, unhesitant
Raring to invest in life

How strange is it then
That we pray only for tailwinds
When the catalyst for evolution
Lies hidden in the sting of headwinds

Subir Chakraborty / 22nd Dec 2018

I stood arrested by my immediate present
Not daring to look back with ease
Letting the moment sink in slowly
With tingling numbness, with extreme unease

Did you also feel the same
When you saw me fleetingly that day
Your eyes posing a thousand questions
Your mind reminiscing the near forgotten way

It was indeed brief
And yet it seemed the telling of a tale
When your eyes seemed to half whisper
The advent of a gale

The unanswered questions
Continued to remain unanswered
The half open lips
Left the precious words unuttered

And yet you said it all
Your sheer anguish rising to a crescendo
Only the circumstances as always
Standing like a rock between the duo

Only some strands of air
Separated us that day
Only our sense of individuality
Held complete sway

‘If only and only if’
Will forever ring in our ears
If only we could muster the courage
And scale back the long lost years

Subir Chakraborty / 16th Sept 2018

The peace that I seek
Is not the peace of the grave
Where a thousand mute voices
Yearn to speak and crave

Who cannot utter a single word
Being bound by the code of death
The stony silence of the cemetery
With bodies trapped in a cage

The peace that I pursue
Where a million voices bloom
Where dissensions are appreciated
And conflicts resolved in tune

Where to harbour a difference
Does not tantamount to a crime
Where debates are encouraged
And a disagreement just fine

Where a sense of tolerance
Forms a solid bond of trust
Where lack of convergence
Does not break the crust

Where diversity is celebrated
Enriching the human fabric
Where unilateralism is shunned
On par with radioactive debris

Subir Chakraborty / 12th May 2018

Talks, arguments, debates
Yet what goes completely missing
Is the beauty of sweet interactions
Creating the human bonding

Tourism, airlines, cruises, travel
The mad rush to capture moments
Too busy to assimilate, while
Uploading snaps with comments

The crazy bustle of human existence
Taking you on a new high
Each day that you live
While heaving great sighs

For in the midst of this make believe
You know one thing for sure
That you are missing out on something
Sublime, pristine, pure

Time is simply not available
Yet time is what you desperately need
To be able to appreciate beauty
Before you go to seed

To be able to drink with your eyes
And see with your heart
To enjoy the earthly treasures
And to set you apart

Subir Chakraborty / 17th May 2018

The curfew outside
Brings me to the curfew within
At the locked gate of my heart
Self closed, wilfully quarantined

Over decades of neglect
Mired with cobwebs of mistrust
Over fellow humans and other harmless species
Over the earth that is our home and hearth

Leaving the living gasping for breath
Throttled by relentless devastation
Choking in venomous, malicious air
Sacrificed at the altar of human greed

We believe this earth belongs to us
Total ownership, complete dominance
Over all resources, all of nature
Over all that the earth has to offer

We spend our time relentlessly
Creating rules, groups, biases
Dividing one species from another
Estranging one human from another

Do we ever pause to ponder
That what if the reverse were true
That perhaps, we belonged to the earth
Along with all others to savour and to share

It is high time to deeply introspect
And unlock the locked gate
With long lost tears and feelings
With empathy and with compassion

So that we can leave this earth intact
For our children and for our children’s children
So that our home can be nurtured
Back to its state of health and cheer

Subir Chakraborty
22nd March 2020

The Bodhi tree is growing within me
Spreading its roots, branches, stems
Each leaf representing the unbundling, and
The disentangling of my hidden fears

Can I transfer my being to the tree
Embracing nothingness in my stride
Thereby surrendering myself
To a process of total transformation

The only obstacle that lies in the path
Is my ego which stands guard
Reluctant, recalcitrant, obstinate
Refusing to lose its identity

What must I do, who must I seek
How should I engage, within or without
The holy books, a messiah, a guru
Or penance, chants, pilgrimage, ablutions

I shall do none of these
And merely sit back and watch
While nudging my ego to diffuse through the leaves
And evaporate into the ether with gentle ease

Allowing the Bodhi tree to flower and flourish
And spread its presence in my consciousness
Enabling it to grow to fruition
For in this lies my ultimate salvation

Subir Chakraborty / 6th March 2018