Aug 29, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Jeu Parti
©August 29th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
I want an even chance,
Says Man to the Fates
They cluster close, white and black,
They laugh in his face,
As they rattle his bones.
The dice are loaded against you.
No matter what you choose,
You will face us someday.
But go ahead,
Hedge your bets.
You will lose.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #Fate, #Jeopardy, #Loaded, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 18, 2016 Free Verse, The Daily Post
Moon-Walk
©August 18th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
The moon comes down to me at full-tide time
And says, “Come outside, take a walk with me.”
I put on my shoes, and walk in the shadows
Emerging in the light, along the silvery paths she makes,
And when I go down towards the Church of St. Francis,
I see the white statue of that kindly Saint on a hilly rise.
The moonlight glows on him, and on the kneeling Nun
In her white-shadowed moon-grotto, and they are beatific.
How beautiful, these eerie shadows of trees
Hurling themselves against the eternal stone of the spire!
And silent the buildings stand, while the moon
Pours down her milk into my upraised throat!
I walk alone along the moon-paths and the dark,
And as I walk, moonlight pours into my eyes, blurring
Car-lights, brash and gold, which compete with the night,
While street lamps clash, unreal colors against silvery-blue skies.
The moon sails on between waves of clouds scudding by,
And we smile at each other, earth-bound and orbit-bound.
So simple a thing makes my body relax its vigil on ache.
There might be suffering ahead for me, or not.
There will be losses, because to live is to lose to death,
But the moon will shine behind my dark irises, in memory.
When I die, turn me moon-ward, to her shining silver face.
Enfold me in night, and I will heed her mystery as I move on.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #Moon, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 17, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, Uncategorized
Ghost
©August 17th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
Every day, a ghost visits me
Formless and opaque, she fools me;
I see her as a wisp of air,
A shade of light,
A spectre of cloud-moisture.
She follows me and needles me
And pokes and prods and pushes me
And mocks me, and jeers and gibes at me,
And asks me in a susurration of curiosity:
So, how did you spend your time today?
And I turn and see her face
And know that I can never escape.
My ghost is mine alone,
And I can never run from her.
My ghost holds a mirror up to me
And asks me over and over again:
How did you spend your time today?
And I stammer and reply:
I did this and I did that,
I took care of an urgent matter,
And strove against time
To complete my tasks.
And my ghost asks, quietly:
Did you sing today?
And did you dream?
Did you weave tales
From light and air,
And did you feel free?
Did you help someone?
Did you feed the hungry?
Were you of use?
Did you speak words of love,
Words of praise,
Words of thanks,
And words of hope?
And my answer to these
Is in the face of my ghost.
And my ghost asks, quietly:
And did you feel happy?
And my answer to that
Is in the face of my ghost.
My ghost is satisfied,
And walks away into the night.
I know she will return tomorrow,
And I brace myself.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #Ghost, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 16, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Things I Carried
©August 16th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
Sitar and a suitcase, and a carry-on;
The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde;
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare;
Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali and other poems,
T.S. Eliot’s poetry and William Wordsworth’s poetry
A slim volume of French poetry and my poetry,
And Jane Eyre, the heroine who overcame all odds;
A past life in a little pocket of memory;
A history of an ancient people, my people;
The home left behind, alive in my mind
Dreams of a new life waiting quietly for me;
And vibrant rhythm within, and so much music!
Absolute certainty in a life that lay beyond.
Oh, and no money at all –
Just youthfulness, and a sense of adventure,
And faith in a Benign Fate, and always, always
Love, love, love, love, crazy love.
And all this carried me here,
Twenty-eight years ago,
Where you waited for me
And welcomed me home.
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Tags: #Autobiographical, #Carry, #DailyPrompt, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 15, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Tanglements
©August 15th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
When the string comes unraveled,
It’s time to die.
It’s when it gets entangled
That life struggles forth.
And if it’s not complicated,
Is it worth it?
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Tags: #Complicated, #DailyPrompt, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 12, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Surface-Tension
©August 12th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
©August 12th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
Dreaming of depths unseen,
We float on wave after wave,
Tossed along by storm after storm.
We imagine the haunting sounds
Echoes of another world,
Reverberating, linking us,
Strand by strand to our past,
Our future, full of promises,
Full of consolation (Yes, we’ll
See each other again, someplace
Some time, if not now, in
Another form, another shape).
We long to know that there’s more –
More to make us feel
Other than merely mortal.
We call this The Veil,
The Dream, Maya.
Convinced
There’s more to Life,
We search for the elusive,
The Unattainable, envisioning
Untraversed spaces,
Unplumbed deeps that await.
But what if it were all surface?
What, then?
We shall have to build
A layer beneath,
And beneath that,
And more below those.
And layers above,
And more above those.
Then, with intake of breath
And clarity of mind,
We shall move between them,
In order to surface,
And draw a breath,
And heave ourselves ashore.
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We float on wave after wave,
Tossed along by storm after storm.
We imagine the haunting sounds
Echoes of another world,
Reverberating, linking us,
Strand by strand to our past,
Our future, full of promises,
Full of consolation (Yes, we’ll
See each other again, someplace
Some time, if not now, in
Another form, another shape).
We long to know that there’s more –
More to make us feel
Other than merely mortal.
We call this The Veil,
The Dream, Maya.
Convinced
There’s more to Life,
We search for the elusive,
The Unattainable, envisioning
Untraversed spaces,
Unplumbed deeps that await.
But what if it were all surface?
What, then?
We shall have to build
A layer beneath,
And beneath that,
And more below those.
And layers above,
And more above those.
Then, with intake of breath
And clarity of mind,
We shall move between them,
In order to surface,
And draw a breath,
And heave ourselves ashore.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #Surface, #TheDailyPost
Aug 10, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
This, Maybe
©August 10th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
You walk along the path together,
Cocooned in yourselves, and growing,
Looking out at the reservoir nearby
Flashing silver amongst tall trees.
The birds are muted, lonely,
The trees noisy, conferring.
The underbrush hints of hidden
Creatures, crawling or hopping.
Legs flash by, all in a hurry
To get somewhere, do something.
People running, dogs alongside.
The sky bends tightly over them.
You talk of life, politics, books,
You don’t talk of love, longing.
You swim in the silence of possibility
Wondering of a future life together.
This is the time of learning
This is the magic time before
Understanding blooms in your heart,
And you think, This is it, maybe.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #Maybe, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Possibility, #Postaday, #Romance, #TheDailyPost
Aug 9, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Joke No More
©August 9th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
Why don’t you do us a favor
And jump off a bridge?
No one likes you, they said.
She made her heart a stone
And wrote a note
And shed no tears
As she walked to the bridge
Fragile and pale
A wraith in the dusk.
And she did what
They had told her to do.
Her life was a mistake,
She said to herself,
A joke, and she was just
Composing its punchline.
A bird soaring into a sky
With wings of lead,
And leg-irons, she sailed
Off the bridge,
The waiting river received her
With more welcome in death
Than any she had seen in life.
And when they were questioned
And prodded in court,
They said, puzzled and innocent,
It was only a joke.
Who knew she’d take
Everything so seriously?
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Tags: #bullies, #bullying, #DailyPrompt, #Joke, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 7, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Painted World
©August 7th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
If I took a broad brush,
Dipped it in no colour,
Whispered a prayer to the moon,
Bent my head to the sun,
And slashed the air around me,
Would I erase all ugliness
All pain, all horror from the world?
What of all its beauty,
All that pouring light,
All that blinding blue,
All its music and movement,
All of its innocence and joy?
Would I filter its discoveries
Back into my paint-pots
And guard them jealously
So, I could start over?
And what of its ambiguities?
What of its doubts?
What of its struggles?
What of its dreams?
Would I siphon those into tubes
Ready to squeeze out
When things get old
Or tired, or tedious?
And would I be able to paint
A whole new world
From scratch?
And what would I paint?
And what if I were
A terrible painter?
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Paint, #Postaday, #TheDailyPost
Aug 5, 2016 Free Verse, Original Poetry, The Daily Post
Crossing
©August5th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
Come, lift your hands in praise.
Praise the woman who stands
Smiling, calm, unbent in the gale,
Maligned and slandered.
Praise the steely strength
The resolve that could move mountains
The centre of peace that allows
Her boat to bob on the waves
As she rows, tirelessly
To unknown terrain, but which exist,
For she mapped them out.
Praise the larger purpose
Which is her rudder, and her guide
The larger purpose and the greater good.
Beyond her own needs, the needs of her kin,
Lies the greater good of all,
And she will not be satisfied until
She works till the end of her life for it.
Praise her, and help her.
Guide her, too, for she is not infallible,
And she sometimes mistakes the way.
Praise her, and help her.
But while she has no need of praise,
She has deep need of help.
And while the other side is mapped
There’s still the Crossing ahead,
And there are Scylla and Charybdis
Waiting to devour her and her boat.
Slay them.
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Tags: #DailyPrompt, #GreaterGood, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #Postaday, #Praise, #Rudder, #Strength, #TheDailyPost, #Women