Thursday, September 3, 2015

Reena Prasad writes



Fall Scenarios




(1)The balconies




Children barely two years old


fall all the time and are never blamed


nor forgotten  




So do young wives with new babies but they leave  


clutching a tag of deliberate cruelty 


(as if a tiny baby can defeat  


mites of lovelessness crawling through blood streams)




'bachelors' earning loneliness


and far too little money fall on their loved ones  


from unfinished buildings


Their families fall in tandem 




Anyone can


on a convenient day,


fall


if pushed




which is why we have balconies





(2)Possibilities on a cloud-less day




I fall from the balcony


on to the roof of the parking lot


A pigeon cloud rises




I fall onto the balcony of the man


who rings his wife daily and throws glowing stubs


into the darkness; his phone bills shatter the night




I fall on the old, green Pilot


abandoned in the no-parking lot


our bodies create art in public  


Dust on dust we lie




I fall on the quiet road, halting a few footsteps


bones race out of skin 


energy dissipates, ether waits 





I fall on the clean grounds of the big white mosque


Waiting footwear scatters 


The crowd inside prays unanimously for a way to heaven 


I get there first 


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4 comments:

  1. One would think that a suicide poem would have to be morbid, not wickedly funny like this one. For example, "Richard Cory" by Edwin Arlington Robinson:

    Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
    We people on the pavement looked at him:
    He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
    Clean favored, and imperially slim.

    And he was always quietly arrayed,
    And he was always human when he talked;
    But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
    'Good-morning,' and he glittered when he walked.

    And he was rich - yes, richer than a king -
    And admirably schooled in every grace:
    In fine, we thought that he was everything
    To make us wish that we were in his place.

    So on we worked, and waited for the light,
    And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
    And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
    Went home and put a bullet through his head.

    But, perhaps because the subject matter is so grim, a lot of poets find a bit of fun in the theme. "A Ballade Of Suicide" G. K. Chesterton:

    The gallows in my garden, people say,
    Is new and neat and adequately tall;
    I tie the noose on in a knowing way
    As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
    But just as all the neighbours--on the wall--
    Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!"
    The strangest whim has seized me. . . . After all
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    To-morrow is the time I get my pay--
    My uncle's sword is hanging in the hall--
    I see a little cloud all pink and grey--
    Perhaps the rector's mother will not call-- I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
    That mushrooms could be cooked another way--
    I never read the works of Juvenal--
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    The world will have another washing-day;
    The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
    And H.G. Wells has found that children play,
    And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall,
    Rationalists are growing rational--
    And through thick woods one finds a stream astray
    So secret that the very sky seems small--
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    Envoi

    Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal,
    The tumbrils toiling up the terrible way;
    Even to-day your royal head may fall,
    I think I will not hang myself to-day.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Haha.. loved them both Duane! Who ever decreed that death has to be solemn? To die laughing is to have died well. Thank you!

    ReplyDelete

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