Lift up the Lowly

The rich are arrogant
Trusting in their wealth
That they robbed from the poor
In a variety of most decent ways

Lord, make the poor resent
Resent very effectively
Until the rich go empty
And the poor filled with riches

Lord, make the poor impatient
With all kinds of aid
Including the live and sport aid
Until the poor aid themselves

The rich tell us
That the bounty they have
Is the bounty of the Lord
Never realizing that it is the bounty of the poor

Lord, make the poor reject
All the Holy Heresies
Always substantiated by the Holy Bible
No matter whether they come from the Ordained or the Lay

Lord, make the poor awake
To the raw realities of history and politics
Also to religion
That keeps the poor always asleep. Amen and Amen.

* I wrote this in 1986 and was first published in UK!

a shut exit

i am that wild cat
that attempts
acutely, or playfully
i know not
but creep through
or, at least, put his mitt
if walking is not possible
through the exit

the other side
that which is beyond
always is my goal
while, for me, a shut exit
never is a closed gate
or, a no is ever an answer

shut out

mother embraced me despite my errors
numerously that i committed so frequently
patiently seated with me on the ground
holding my untrained hands gently, but so firmly
she taught me numbers, also the alphabet
until my feeble being, transformed into a man of letters

power in church shut me out, fearing errors,
even before i could vocalize the inherent faith
impatiently, stamping boisterously on the ground
holding clenched fists above head
while the hierarchy was so reluctantly maneuvering
with it, they also shut out, all traces of truth

* Picture taken as soon as we drove into PEI through the Confederation Bridge in 2006. It was a beautiful day. Out Station Wagon is parked in the parking lot in front of the Information Centre at PEI.

you are my shepherd

you have been my guide
like a shepherd with his attendance
pasturing his humble sheep
making them to lie down on green pasture
and leading to waters still and clean

your guiding presence i have seen
every time i drive through dunstable
in the darkest hour of the night

you pump into my heart courage
as i drive through pitch darkness
and i fear deer diving down my path

you inspire wisdom and fill me with patience
when my car have to wade through the knee-deep snow
while, in my mind, you keep increasing
a sense of alertness as i coerce
my wagon during total whiteout

you cover me with your blanket
when my journey is done
in temperatures below minus forty

you hold me straight
when i drive through
roads that are winding and slippery

surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
and i shall cherish your presence
that increases my resilience
making me a good sheep
walking to the butcher’s blade to serve yours

* Photograph taken by Gitanjali Victor!At Great Falls in New Brunswick as we drove across Canada, that large country with variety, in May 2006.

psalm twenty-three

you with blatant disregard for certainty
have made me a sure slave of eternity
despite my constant and unsuccessful
revolts against your shepherding, control

you make me walk in your garden
with chaotic colours in which my eyes
see disorder with patches of randomly planted
vegetables and herbs unsuitable to my taste buds

you expect me to see life, life of victory
in demolitions, destructions and in exilic slavery
where opportunities one by one evaporates
like the quickly melting winter snow

but did i hear you whispering, in my ears, thanks
when i cursed you and confirmed yours as messy mess
with much disregard to your making meaning
in your own terms, your space and moment

my song

santa claus has walked into that closed box
with no opening from inside
he is trapped and suffers much with claustrophobia

who misled him
why to him, did this happen

i wake up at five
and roll in bed till seven
sip coffee till nine
my breakfast at ten
protesting against heaven
even beyond eleven
that my life is too short

jingle bells have gone too long
too much fun and no pain
though my garment is always red
with that i also wear my white beard
pretending to be very old and wise
repeating the same christmas song

my psalm forty-two

as the cacti on my window sill
keeps turning towards the sun
the very source of her growth
to grow with bentness and flowering

my soul too yearns
for your invisible presence
to be intoxicated
and also distorted

early morning i seek your face
in the ancient word
the lees and scum
my ancestors have left behind

and as i step out of my door
i feel your formless feature
in every neighbour i encounter
or consciously ignore

settling down in the evening
confidently i say, what matters
is not my seeing, but being seen
by that one who watches my night

meaning

those events, joys and pains
that you send on my way
are designs that you, the unseen artist
scratch, sketch and etch
that i may ponder in my heart
the secret intentions of that invisible artist
but never am i permitted
to publicly interpret
to proclaim
the meaning of artistic events
making me a mute
in the very presence of your absence

marathon

i now train my self
with more shorter snooze
for the marathon sleep
that some mistakenly call death

i practice also that perfect, infinite
silence of that granite
transforming my transient soul
the red rose into a perfect fossil

that at the closing stage
i fail not to easily merge
with that deathlessness
of my death, the dreamless sleep

not magic

not a magic that i expect
you to quickly act upon
but a miracle that i yearn
in my life, you to execute

i do not ask you to change
my water into red wine
but transform my taste buds
that colourless will hint as wine

i do not ask you to multiply
my loaves, but that me
and mine never go hungry
or ever disown the weary

i do not ask you for powers
to walk on the roaring sea
but that i will have the luxury
of a friend, my woes to see

not a magic that i expect
you to quickly act upon
but a miracle that i yearn
in my life, you to execute

chopping, clipping and cutting

i perceived the rumbling of paradise
calling me to the task of chopping
branches of bigger trees, permitting
not pampas grass to scarcely survive

i heard clearly the echoing in hell
calling me to the task of clipping
wings of hawk rising higher, soaring
faltering to feed hatchling in vale

i see plainly the perpetual voice
calling me to the task of cutting
arms of archdiocese, and for knocking
down that portal to produce her stance

blocking with pride

i exchange my money
for a pricey window curtain
thinking that it will provide
a window of opportunity

for my pride to be hoisted
higher like a flag
but the curtain blocks
those pretty clouds that you send

on my way through my glassy windows
these clouds, often come
with that silver line
if they end up dark and stormy

transforming my living room
into your school, teaching me to hope
chiselling, also, my extra conceit
and now, i do not yearn

for a curtain to crane my pride
enjoying what you consign
especially your sun that sits inside
my humble span

mortality confirmed

the twin mortality i am now impregnated with
since that day i, an immigrant from mars
became the sole caretaker occupant
of this space, the best earthy soil

and more than twenty-two hundred
square foot in size and greater volume
that earlier i gladly shared, comfortably
breathing with another alien from venus

who never returned home since dining
with another martian; i have sought
my companion, for days and night in vain
until i met this little spider harmlessly

exploring my bath tub while i unloaded
much wasted grub, that excess i had
to keep me going to resist, and battle
that thought of mortality and more

but my little friend taught me that i own
not my bathing spot, and i must, hence
let him also pass through, stamping not
on his tiny soul to relase my hatred

john the baptist

john the baptist grabbed no chair to sit
nor pleased any powers, or towers of his times
he was simply a voice from the desert
the strongest reed of the prairie land

john was the music of vales and hills
that cherished not the herds of cowards
he danced not to beats of country drums
nor cared for the civilized city thumbs

john was a sensitive stethoscope
listening to heart beats of the divine
dancing in the spirits of the poor
resizing, re-levelling hill with valley

imprisoned

i am inside the prison
with four tall walls around;
scarcely some sun light penetrate
into my house, encasing of my thought

in those thin beams of light
i read the writings on the wall;
is it a bulletin board
a media for the inmate,

or, are these graffiti,
an expression of revolt,
carelessly etched and scribbled
to the blind with open eyes

that imprisons the innocent;
that i, for sure, know not
but with my training in art
and science of hermeneutics,

i scribble notes in my mind
those invisible pages
sometimes pasted together
by that oozing of my tears

making the turning too hard;
pray, patience, and prosperity,
these codes i frequently sight
on wall preying on my soul

my night journey

since my journey is through night
and i grope in darkness
while death like vipers creep all around
i look up for light from your stars

that i may see my path
i ask, from you, not for wealth
nor a shelter for me to sleep tonight
for i must journey towards that dawn

i ask you to prevent that dark cloud
clouding my mind
that courage may prevail
on my onward march

and when the passage is over
i seek not a trophy
but that extinction of the rain drop
in that ocean of your memory

my today

lonely in the mall
no! i am ready to let go
all that noise, the crowds
all walking and dancing

i want to sit quiet inside
with all that laughter around
with all those chatting, playing
buying and busying outside

singing and music
i need nothing
nothing pushes me
nothing pulls me

nothing i look for inspiration
no one, i need today
no one i will need tomorrow
yesterday was a lie; it was never

what am i

am i looking for a woman
to make love; or,
am i looking for a man
for some open ended conversation

that’s explorative
and enhance my self-importance;
(music has begun again!)
i like this spot,

comfortable seat to observe,
to note down,
that i may, later transfer
into my computer to name as poem

continuing struggle

those whom i left behind
those who deserted me
those who want to sympathise
but from a safe, good distance

they, now, try to intrude
my private space
when i secretly long
for their company

i struggle
even when i have fled
away
from all struggle

forgotten souls

the old man was reading

Alistair Urquhart’s hard cover
Forgotten Highlander
but did he sit in front of me

in the mall lounge for same reason

as my own sense of lost-ness
with that loss of love
that i will never know

only for a short time

he read and soon he is tired
shutting his book
but he opens it again

with his mouth always open

wearing two different shoes
white on one leg
but brown on the other

reminding me of my brown spouse

walking with her white lover
and if they were to sit on a couch
but not in front of me, confirming

all is not well revealed, but one
not laced to accommodate the swelling
revealing all is not well and his walker
beside confirms the un-even ground

poet’s don’t panic

grand parents, the couples together
pushing strollers
with their grandchildren on them
push my jealousy instantly higher

like uncontrolled sprinkling
of the sweet white crystals
push my blood sugar higher;
but i, a poet, don’t panic

breaking away from crowd

the young lass
perhaps, she is a teen
part of a team of half a dozen
young persons, five ladies

and a young man
slightly older than the girls
she broke away
from the crowd

and sat in front of me
with a smile on her face
prompting me, instantly healed
to smile in return

after a few minutes
she turned again towards me
when I was not noticing
(and the music stopped!)

west edmonton mall

for that eritrean huddled
with his love
nodded at me;
in response, I said:

hello, in that mall
(boasting to be the largest
in the world –
has to be in the universe!)

announcing a happy
summer sale to that shoal
that has already swallowed
the bait

dance but touch not

in a wild brook i saw those awesome fish
that i see normally only in an aquarium
as greed kicked my mind i stooped down
to net some to make my home cheaply colourful

but my quick conscience
battled with self, and battled hard
to make me enjoy that beauty
with lust less eyes
and i returned to my abode
dancing with heart full of swimming fish

crowned to witness

my gorgeous kite
that once floated above
(right on top of other kites
less colourful
and much smaller)
is stuck on the crown
of that coconut palm
with string now broken
and entertaining none
but yet witnessing in eternity
to that fragile, frail beauty
of success, short lived

taurian and capricornian

as a taurian you too make mistakes
but unlike some people
you are not afraid to admit
while others spend their energy
trying to deny they made a wrong turn

turning today, as always
you will be retracing your steps
and then getting it right

while your capricornian partner
has allowed certain issues to slide
and if she doesn’t get on top of them
that too quickly, they may become
out of control for good

unfortunately your capricornian spouse
has relied heavily on others
first, the father, then a taurian, and now
secretly, on others receiving cash and kind
to make decisions for the goat-head

* A found poem from the horoscope section of Edmonton Metro, July 15, 2010. Page 23.

three requests

grant me
the humility
that was in jesus
our ancestor
the strength to love
in all circumstances
and the wisdom
from above
to know myself

living now

before that extinction, the blowing out
nay, that final merging into that ocean
of eternal life, with that unvarying
gazing of the un-setting sun

i refuse, now, to live with lies
and too simplistic issues
choosing rather to live
with unanswered questions

refusing, vehemently, to live in the cave
of my own prejudices, or a life imposed
on me, dreaming not dreams not mine
living not codes of my ancient ancestors

resigning to grace

i am learning, so late
to resign to grace
after, with much strength
i struggled to carve my life

in pattern i thought was right
now i take, that it is safe
to let you guide both in chart
and its implant

sailing smoothly
with your winds
until at end
i reach my port

* Photograph by Gitanjali Victor.

moonbeam, a cento

moonbeams tease my soul to sing a muse
beauty from above summons my spirit to dance
i watch a bird, and pet a dog wagging his tail
soft sea’s silence, in my being, echoes a yell

against the caravan of untruth and fraud
wit in me frees self from the prison of head
there the bard sat alone in a daydream
with a future sketched in pencil of cream

many things in life that wound and hurt
but mercy, today, opened a pane for that poet
while only well burned ashes was left behind
allowing him, now, the sleep, to defend

* Photograph by Gitanjali Victor.

woman in my life

just nearer to my grave i pause
to raise the issue and to reflect
on answers registered
carefully in my mind

the question, then, is this:
do i now need a woman
in my life, that last lap to run
to sleep well before i sleep in peace

this matter my heart
has never before quested
not, at least, very consciously, granting
freely, that space for a woman in my life

* Photograph by Kendra Lee.

calming my mind

calming my mind is taming my cat
that i never had any success
every time i expect her to sit
she walks away with her meow

my mind too with peace as i shut
let’s the flood-door open
for million thoughts to flow
with mice to nibble my house

until my soul drops dead
like that tree beside the river
fell by that not so big beaver
effortlessly gnawing around

taking stock

when pain pinches

my feeble heart
that struggles to pump blood
to keep my other organs well

as my tamil mother
continuously cooked to feed
the many members in my home

i prefer to stop my walking

as she stopped, but only
for a moment, that i may take stock
and replenish my stockpile
to continue my journey

that may continue, or end
not with my counsel
but entirely at his will

silently walking with, or sitting
beside me, struggling

to recollect his absent presence

skyscrapers & bigger mosques

depression in small children
and obsession with paediatric drugs
embarrass health services
that keep busy world-wide
where people are extremely
self-centred with no time
even for leisure and push
the spousal relationships
to the backseat
making loyalty evaporate
but building, steadily, buildings
including skyscrapers
and bigger mosques
while i see and sense
with that third eye
an increasing impatience of people

newer journeys

my body, that machine
circulates fuel not so well
threatening, frequently, to stop
or, permanently shut down
certain sections
to slow down my soul
or, to suggest, with force, a path
my spirit never planned

this prompted me
to turn to a mechanic
for whom my soul is irrelevant
and who considers not the dream
that my sprit secretly dreams

adding tubes to that machine
but from within
the mechanic who touches not
any grease, nor the lubricating oil
made my soul soar higher
and higher to spaces my spirit
has never journeyed

erasing my soul

she exposed my bone and my flesh,
with muscles and fibre
and my blood and my spit
that she licked from my lips

revealing that which matters most
is not that silly little soul,
that indelible, invisible substance
that gets transposed

to that unknown place and person
from which it came
but my cock in erection and nipples,
both without bone

but in that state of arousal
that she sucked and squeezed
while she pushed mine into her depth
and her flesh into my mouth

proclaiming the new purpose
and establishing an inner peace,
though perfectly momentary
but demanding that frequently

a process by which the spirit
in her, and me fully evaporated
as worthy ancient manuscripts
now erased for new writing to emerge

lay me to rest

do i envy those who pass
from life to death
with that certainty of eternity
a greater mansion to occupy

do i carry sympathy for those
who lack in life that faith
that alleged passport to the beyond
with a send off from a chapel here

many questions my mind may probe
but, for sure, i have informed my wife
and our daughter: that none
from holy club sprinkle phoney poetry

instead my simple frame
be laid to rest naked in a quick flame
with no words that my mind
shall be burdened to interpret

long and longer sleep

after lying on that bed for over three decades
suddenly i woke up to a shocking awareness
that my snug sleep for such an extended period
was actually on a rock in the wasteland

whose geological origin, or chemical composition
little i had known; sleep for so long attracted not
my eagerness to explore, while many eerie snakes
and slothful insects visited this space in my absence

but now in my abrupt wakefulness, will i
turn, then, to another couch, or curse the old
before i continue sleeping into a longer sleep
that perfect merging within the womb

with gratitude

my body, like that reconditioned
japanese liteace, earlier, i owned
works beautifully well
pumping blood, poetically

as if crafting a Shakespearean sonnet
though the scars of the surgeon’s scalpel
on my left fore arm, left leg, and chest
could not be covered, unlike in my van

with white paint, a colour i cherish with black
to contrast my present moments of orientation
from that earlier instances of disorientations
that tore my soul with betrayals

painted and etched in my heart, as a Blakean art
while i was still in the intensive care
of the men and women dedicated
to establish that rhythmic beat

transcending the wrinkles
those character lines of my skin
suggesting a panoramic view of my life
dotted and sheltered with love

crab without claws

outside, she is slim and pretty
as a black labrador
with shorts and shaved legs
attracting onlooker’s stroking

at least, in the secret cave
of his mind and soul
craving for that illicit sleeping
when his wife is out of town

but constantly she runs
into her hiding as a crab
running into the crab-hole
unaware of her missing claws

taking cover under a law
that is tilted towards lies woven
and spiced with that sacred
sympathy for the she species

killing

stomping, hard, on it
i killed the silver fish
innocent
that didn’t come to hurt

but my superior weight
on my boot
just squashed it
for no apparent reason

except, that i am a human
with superior right
to decide on life and death
in this anthropocentric universe

where i have, already, murdered
the creator
of the silver fish
to create him in my own image

Note: Gitanjali Victor's art at the age of 13 in Summer 2002.

lust for space kills

little less than eleven
hundred square feet
housed comfortably
the three of us

and after the one
who took the most space
in that cozy house
decided to fly away

the remaining found
lust too cramped
in that tiny heart

hence they set up
that more than twenty-two
hundred square feet

ending with, that strain
to pump blood
threatening to stop
to prematurely kill

road less traveled

assist me to float
on the waves of your ocean
rather than swim
in my own direction

guide me to glide
on the wings of your angel
instead of choosing to fly
in heights not so detrimental

direct me in your route
even if it is hilly and snaky
lest i choose my lane
of ease beyond risk

emptiness

a million dollar diamond
and a priceless pearl
these were my possessions
as i continued my journey
to that well lit city beyond
with deathless life

i guarded my wealth
even as i passed through hills
and vales to enter the region
with chasmic ravines
crossing breaking ice bridges
often falling and then crawling
and creeping again
to ground that was harder
but only to throw at the end
the two, and myself
jump into that emptiness
never to be heard
never to be reported

refusal to merge

my smaller, marginal ‘i’ refuses that merging
with that larger ‘we’ that is part of the still larger
and unlimited, ever expanding elastic cosmos embracing
the little ‘i’ as the ocean readily cuddles the rain drop

and my little revolts, then, are speedily stated
in my careful scrubbing of the tiny oil drop
on my driveway, left behind by my daughter’s car
that has just pulled out from my parking spot

and also on my spraying lysol, on my toilet seat
every time my friend pays a social visit to my abode
as if he has left a graffiti on the wall like a restless teen
protesting that we grow

reaping not the return

is it my tightfistedness
that you punish
by taking away from me
that which fills my heart

i had many other things
to fight for to safe guard self
when you broke open
my home, my soul to steal

today I have no more
energy to battle
my destiny that brings
me, hardly any delight

i ploughed the field
and with my own hands removed rocks
to plant seed, and watered it with sweat
but to harvest, someone else you sent

life enhancing energy

i see that life enhancing energy
passing through my fingers, feet
arms that embrace, and lips that speaks
courageous kindness to act,
continuously re-filling and re-fuelling my soul
through my eyes, ears, nostrils and the skin
that osmotic membrane
when my mind sets the sail
on the winds of the right perspective
while the heart let goes greed
to gather not more than the food
for a single day, that manna heaven drops

a journey

i found a little self alone

in desert mountains

with no foot path

suggesting a tried road

but with plenty of sandy soil

and in heart

a need to move forward

to town

to re-connect his soul

by connecting to the highway

that lead to a land not bad

so he kept his plod

through trial and error

trusting his vision

and wits of his mind

letting, also, his intuition

guide

to his utter surprise

soon he found himself

walking

in a homeland with no trees

but a home

where his father, mother

and daughter

bathing

in separate wells

with only that of mother’s

had some comfort for anchoring

to overcome fear

lest they fell over the cliff

or tumbled into the well

while the highway to town

hardly a distant to walk

henry victor     06.06.2010

protection provided

for every feathery bird in this earth
you provide a perch, a branch to rest
and to protect, a height, with a flight
escaping the crawling enemy that prowls

every feeble fawn visiting the earth
is born with a dappled coat to hide
from predators prying for easy prey
to deny your positive absent presence

every sprouting seed on this earth
is encased in a protective pod
that you expect to cast to grow
to mature and multiply her kind

even the creeping chameleon change
colours, to blend with her surrounding
to prolong the provided life in abundance
before giving her to another freely to feed

garbage

two separate loads of garbage
i carry to tip at the dump
one in black to rot
the other in blue with a potential
to rotate before i, myself, perish