Establishment of World Order

Just before the big fight
Butterflies swarm
In Arjuna’s stomach
And Krishna comes to his rescue
Providing the essence of all knowledge to him
So that he can kill his relatives, teacher and all
Because it is his Dharma
His duty as a warrior prince
“Death is assured when we are born.
So, why worry?”

He continues
“Whenever the virtue is in trouble
Whenever bad guys torture the good guys
I, the omnipotent God, take birth as a human being
To protect the good guys
By killing the bad guys.”

Sounds very interesting
As if the solution to a problem
Is the elimination of the troublemaker
No transformation
No metamorphosis needed
Just getting rid of him, physically
Cutting off his head by an arrow
Or vaporizing him by a laser beam
Or even nuclear bombing the city he lives in.

This view resonates
In our cultures
In our history
And in our thoughts
As expounded in myths, in stories, in science fictions
And in TV shows
Superman, Bionic Woman, Spiderman
And the star wars
Return of the Jedi


I wonder
Why there is no
Alternative to shock and awe
Establishing the world order by carpet bombing
I guess
Not every one can be Valmiki after all
Or
It is easier to eliminate than to transform.

Eat and be merry

There was a big feast
After my father’ death
I think the largest, I have seen
Hundreds of people from the villages
Came to feast
Many I did not know.

We also had a feast after my marriage
But smaller in scale
Only family members and relatives
from both sides of the aisle came.

Still smaller was the feast
When my daughter was born in US
Only close friends came with small gifts

Birth and death
Intervened by the ceremony of
Legalizing the process of procreation
Are the land marks of our existence
Each one celebrated
The coming into life
As well the good bye

Each time
It is a feast
As if the road to the heart
Is through our mouths

Of course, that is the fact
No wonder
My wife toils for hours, even days
Cutting
Cooking vegetables, fishes and chicken
And I clean dishes
Before invitees come for dinner
Usually at Indian standard time

They come
They eat and eat
Snacks, main meal and deserts
And praise her profusely
You are such a good cook
No one said to me
You wash dishes so well

All her efforts
Disappear in few minutes
To be purged on the other side of the tube next day.

And I ask like a fool
Why are we so food centric?
She thinks I am a real nut
What kind of question is this?

We are not alone
Wherever I went in the world
People are celebrating life by eating
We eat and eat
Until we can not eat any more
And let others celebrate our departure
By eating.

Living in Heaven

I wake up to the melodies of the world
To the soft music on the air
To the giggles of a small girl
To the songs of the cuckoos
To the soft sound of the sitar and violin

I wake up to the magic of the sights
To amaze at the daring display on the eastern sky
To see me in my lover’s eyes
To sip the vibrant color of the murals and frescos
To marvel at the tulips with so much to show
To feel the loftiness of each word in a poem

I wake up to the magic of the smell
Of the evening roses, of primroses
Of the hot spicy dishes
To her enticing aroma near by
To the scented fresh air of the burning incense

I wake up to the magic of her touch
To the warmth of the monsoon rain drops
To the closeness of the melting snow flakes on me
To the snuggle of my baby girl
To the kiss of the spring breeze

Alas
Great men and birds are known
Only after they are gone.

Cluster bombing

You are wrong
If you think that
Only America and Israel
Use cluster bombs

They have been used
For thousands of years
And being used every day all over the world
But actually for creating things
Making sure that the future survives
The uncertainty of chance

Every year
Pine trees lash out cloud of spores
Sunflowers smear the bees with millions of pollens
Fish and turtles lay out thousands of eggs
Males flood the love passage with millions of sperms
And mushrooms go ballistic

Out of these millions
With the chance worse than once in a blue moon
The progeny strolls
To bear the burden of the selfish genes

After work
I open my mailbox
And get bombarded with solicitation and coupons
Lots of mails I did not ask for
Telling me
The more I buy
The more I save
And I am not alone
Every mail box is filled with them too
And lately
My email inbox with one GB space
The favorite arena for cluster bombing

In the land of possibilities

Long long time ago
When Vietnam in America meant Vietnam
I landed in the cradle of possibilities

I came from a land
Where every thing was defined
Which hand to use for writing
Which hand to use to eat
And who is senior and
Who can have a future and
Who will be servant for ever.
Every thing decided by birth and Karma

Every thing was already defined
The pencil was brown
The chalk was white
The car was Ambassador
Dinner and lunch were rice and curry
And the newspaper was Samaj
And dance was Odissi.

Every thing in life was already defined
I go to school, then to college
Then get a safe government job with extras,
Get married to one I don’t know
And have kids immediately
Raise the kids and then retire
Read Geeta for my salvation

Now
In the land of possibilities.
Any thing was possible
With no particular sequence bracketing what I can do
I can have kids before marriage
Have no kid after marriage
I can go to school after retiring
And I can dive into myriads of possibilities
What to do in life to actualize

In the land of possibilities
The limit is my imagination
What to do in life
Where to shop and what camera to buy
What to eat for lunch and dinner.
To whom to be friend with
and what to do for pleasure.

The world inside me shudders
At the chance of exposing myself
To myriad chances
To be some one great in life
Or lose it all and be a homeless
In the land of possibilities.

With a grain of salt

My Princeton professor said
Take it with a grain of salt
Of what you read or hear

This iconoclastic statement
Amazed me
Destroyed my inner assurance
Of the facts,
Of the truths
Of Gods
Of science
Of the concept of heaven and hell
Suddenly every thing was amorphous


For me
Philosophers
Scientists
Poets
Were living gods
What they say was the truth
To be believed and revered
Not questioned

Now
As l listened to him
As I followed him
As I read the methods they used
And analyzed their’s data myself
Before reading what they think it means
My perception of me and my world
About the inner working of the cells and mind
All got struck by a fly swatter
So many theories of creation after all.

My professor was right
Every one’s inference might be the fact
But check it out yourself.
Trust but verify.


********************
imagene
January 11, 2007

War of Worlds

In the heart of Sahara
I was wishing for the rain storm

There was no forecast for it
There has been none for many years
But I desired it any way

With all my believes
I kneeled down in front of my icons
My rain gods,
Indra, Chaac, Tlaloc and Zeus
With all their power
They can make it happen
Wherever they want
Whenever they want

With the gentle kiss of the incense
I woke up in a different world
Where clapping of thunder
Welcome the monsoon goddess
In snow white outfit
On her cat walk from the head of Shiva
To appease the amorous frogs

My trance was broken
By the sand storm blowing onto my face
But I did not want to open my eyes
And be away from my saviors
My believes and my imagination.