Pramila Khadun writes

The school within us

O man! Forgetting that there is a school within you,

You went to the school made of bricks and blocks. 
It sounds like leaving the roses in your garden, 
You went to buy roses in the market, 
All exposed to heat and dust of Summer.

Much of what we need to grasp 
Or at least track down is palpable, intuitive, 
So are our everyday needs. 
Humanity was not meant to race frenetically 
At the cost of devastating, killing, bombing. 
Is this what we are deducing from education – 
The fittest  survive and the weak perish? 
Show the world that we can reach the moon 
When millions of children are starving? 
Just think for a while…… 
What are we trying to prove? 
To whom and why?

What is the point when education 
Is now producing engineers, doctors, nurses, 
Teachers, scientists, architects, to mention but a few, 
And as a result, we have inequalities 
In opportunities, job satisfaction, unequal pay, 
A spaghetti-like tangle of frustration, 
Where all are confused and lost 
In the tides of time.

Arts are fading, 
The fading of arts is sad. 
Values are vanishing. 
This is dangerous. 
Nations are fighting, there is social unrest. 
There is neck to neck competition, 
Horns locked, bereft of emotions, 
Half the people across the globe are underfed, 
The other half depressed 
And the rest know not whether 
Living is better or dying is better.

I say, close down those schools for a while 
Until it is clear in our minds 
What our children should be taught 
And what we expect them to be. 
It is my concern as much as yours 
For we are interconnected. 
If we rise, we rise together, 
If we sink, together we will sink

Call to Arms, See the Confused Existences Fading -- Lazaro Hurtado Atienza


Figure Fading in a Landscape 4 -- Durgaprasad Bandi