way forward easy

the road to Golgotha

is rutted and bumpy

but once there

i find the skulls flattened

and the way forward

easy

i had seen this again, and again

both in that primordial crucifixion

of Jesus, the Nazarene

and later in the fate

of his followers

help me, i pray

pain in its precise dimension

i see

and the wellness

that it brings to self

particularly

the weight loss

it leads to

the pricking

that happens

to my bloated ego

keep my soul

away from that sickness

of inflating my self-importance

prior to the wellbeing

and the authentic need

of my flock

i am shepherding

help me

courageously prevent

that fatted sheep

pushing around

or preventing the lean

to enjoy freely

that food in plenty

your providence

henry victor           22.03.2008

surrendering to defeat

hundred thoughts

through my head flow

like a fast flowing flood

one banging the other

with a hard negation

others modifying another

and none static

as an unmovable boulder

my anchors float

and the deck is scattered

shifting with speed

i drift directionless

searching

for strength deep within

questing

for help from far beyond

silently

i wail, whine

and weep

aloud

but nothing happens

except my drowning

deep

in the deepest waters

dragged into the mire

and unable to put my foot

on solid ground

i yell, i fight

and i fear

accepting my defeat

surrendering

to shame and blame

that wounds

henry victor    12.06.2010

a colony of bats

masses, very quickly, surrounded me

to see what i would declare

now that i have a legal dispensation

a privilege

bestowed only on a foreigner

they nearly pushed me

though unintentionally

they made me drop

one by one

the big and small item

i carefully carried

into that pit

and as i bend down

to reach the bottom

picking cautiously my scattered stuff

the masses

almost buried me

standing up-side down

like a colony of bats in a cave

henry victor      03.02.2007

today

i am not posting a poem

i need to revise, myself

today, eliminating

much i wrote in the past

i chose wrong words, theme

and faulty rhyme, forcing

in too many alliterations

strengthening suppositions

seldom i let go, but with care

and un-forgetfulness, hoarding

my hurts, instead walking away

from the folly of yesterday

  

henry victor         17.01.2019

i build my today

divorcing the lunatic asylum

of yesterday that gave my roof

bed, food, and park to roam

around as my best comfort

i build my today in the thin air

on nothing, hoping my heart

will soar into tomorrow, better

than my many yesteryear

in the name of good human

husbanding, fathering, later

in a grandiose lunacy of owning

my name i helplessly stole earlier

henry victor          17.01.2019

i write a poem

sometimes i quickly write a poem

when a dagger has pierced my heart

or a mercy has reached my soul

making it dance to rhythmic refrain

other times i struggle to pen a verse

when desire to discipline is high

or to my daughter exhibit my brain

making her evolve into a genius

on occasion i compose rhyming lines

when my ego is bloated too big

to remain small, humble and modest

making easy an empty expedition

henry victor     23.03.2003

last request

since i have had my share

of pain, painful, and pleasing pleasure

i plead with you to take me

home now to be with you

like me wrapping my mat

after napping a whole night

in case you decide to delay

i do not ask for a relay

of pleasure and pain

but a quiet desk, and a pen

for the flow of my fable, my gory

to transform into a soothing story

henry victor     27.12.2003

stop to breathe

‘creative writing’ has become my breath

while relating to people to find something

common like the ‘Good Samaritan’ sympathetic

to man stuck on road from Jerusalem to Jericho

speaking hence to Amber, Ashley, Arsha

Brian, Brenda, Bethusha, Beeby, Benji

and other children screaming and shouting

as they run to the ice cream vendor

and i stop not so much to fix the jammed

ice cream car, knowing well my ignorance

of motor mechanics, but to feel the pain

of man stuck on roads

and admire his patience and persistence

to make the machine work

though he carries not the tools

but a heart for children of rich shy folks

drowning in self-sufficiency

considering themselves more important

than a bard who stops to record

the pulsating heart; nay, to breathe!

henry victor    02.09.2002

spicing my creativity

pain, fire that purifies gold, my soul

and patience, cooling time

for the settling of my mind

are spices for my creativity

constructing my poem, my life

making my song from deep

within my heart prompting a dance

for my body to increase flexibility

for the river within to flow freely

into the wider ocean, eternal cosmos

with neither birth to celebrate

nor death to mourn

henry victor          04.05.2010

dreaming the destiny

from wilderness i returned home

journeying by shallow but longer channels

creeping also through constricting tunnels!

i did move fast on a flat road

by a motorized vehicle

continuously getting wet

and traveling with the threat

of being run over by trains

coming from the opposite direction

with no space to step out

of the narrow burrows

making longer waiting a necessity!

and more were temptations to pick

unwanted luggage strewn and scattered

by an earlier trekker like me

helplessly lost control of his walk

henry victor     03.01.2007

two little goslings

as the sun went down to settle

in his home before the nightfall 

i went for a stroll

along a man-made canal

and in the twilight my eyes fell

now on a gosling stuck

on a cement crack

making her un-swim able

to run to her company

and she pulled and pulled until

a piece of skin too was floating

so i bent down to pick

to hold and to heal

the injured gosling

but trusting not my stance

that was nothing but pastoral

she swam as fast as she could

with one hand holding the hanging piece

i walked further and much farther

with a helpless thought

and a new pain in my heart

only to encounter yet another

gosling lost and lonely

and again i stretched my hand

picking her from waters cold

to hold her closer to my warm chest

while she trustingly

settled in my palm

henry victor       28.03.2007

 

the blue jay

let me be swift as the blue jay

flying into my bird feeder

not to fill her mouth full with greed

or sit there to own

to persist on living in free food

as if it is her right;

let me, then, move swiftly

taking into heart

life here is but a momentary breath

bringing here nothing

and take home nothing

knowing well in mind

the swiftness of my flight

much, is dependent on my disowning

this bird feeder

my present status!

henry victor      27.05.2007

Note: In photograph is, (perhaps!), a Brewer’s Blackbird (male), a temporary replacement for my Blue Jay in the poem!

a revisit

i revisited my school that made me

a man of some worth

there i went to see my old two-room

little quarter above that abandoned store

that housed me for five thick years

of life that made my mind fat

and very productive too

and as i climbed the stair

that now ended just in air

and fear engulfed my heart

that i may fall; so i stepped out

of bed and eased my self

henry victor      26.05.2007

costly play!

i do not claim to discern Him well

but i’m certain too many will yell

if, with confidence, i dared to tell

for His play this world and my kind

He did fashion placing folks like me in a stable hell

He always does bring me a copper

when i beseech Him for a dollar

part of that He also expects me to offer

in His temple as the plate is passed for offering

kicking me hard as if i’m not His toddler

i quickly run to Him for rain for my lawn

desiring in sight and in heart much green

He does give me much rain for my lawn

drowning also the earthworms, the jugular vain

maintaining my green, impoverishing my lawn

i do not claim to discern Him well

but i’m certain too many will yell

if, with confidence, i dared to tell

for His play this world and my kind

He did fashion placing folks like me in a stable hell

henry victor      05.05.2007

flooding of the Blue Nile

an emptiness clouds around

a feeling of losing battle

not just in one front

but in many fronts simultaneously

continuing coughing also causes pain

to flow like Blue Nile

from throat to other limbs

not for nourishing

but for destroying life

above all controlling

the freer expression of words

like a poem refusing the making

making me a poet unpublished

walking into the pit prematurely

i have cried many times to Heaven

above, and deep within

to release me, my little self from chain

preventing my flight into freedom

where i am no longer enslaved

by the little that thinks big

henry victor      01.06.2007

escapee

 

you were just a few months old

when we bought a dozen of budgies

to keep the house noisy and colorful

it was then that one of these birds

got out of our aviary

that tore my heart and caused me pain

not because of the loss of my funds

or the decrease in the sound

but the escapee knew not

to survive in the outside world

marked by too many predators

now with three months more

for you to be eighteen

and with your flight

away from my sight

the same concern surfaced in my heart

leaving me with a sleepless night

henry victor      26.09.2007

town is empty!

death is in the home, inside

or is it out on the road

i am, right now, confused

Wednesday cannot be so quiet

that too at 8.00 A.M!

i have this ghostly feeling

being unkind to my little girl

making her walk the ghost town

she detested so much

before picking enough courage

to finally fly away from my cage!

i myself would not linger

around a cemetery for so long

if i am not an undertaker

busying with burying pain

and counseling the grieving town

henry victor     26.09.2007

not bored

i am not bored but broken

shattered completely, like that bus-shed

in service, now vandalized by a teenager

un-named, an incarnation of indiscipline

i am not bored but empty

with my purpose, from me, stripped

and my use made naked

un-public, souls from me fleeing

i am not bored but dead

living lifeless, walking around

like those zombie in a video game

un-dead, but soon to be buried    

© henry victor        10.07.2015

glory of nothingness

 

silly thoughts and worthless dreams flooded my mind

yesterday, and this morning too, like pounding waves

leaving me to lick my lips to taste its saltiness;

vain glory of poetry is that which i am seeking

in this world, walking on roads paved with eggshells

and leading to nowhere, an absent heaven!

poised moments do surface in that ocean, but to dive

leaving the shore and light into the darkness of depth

a Dutch courage i lack; for what if the road does not continue

to that peace and nothingness i crave with great intensity;

hell if i end up without Sylvia Plath being there!

© henry victor     24.02.2006

my ashes

deep inside my heart is a dark cave

where my locker is locked with the key

the digits of this number-lock buried

deep below in the depths of my mind

unknown to the wide world around

are these poems, ashes of my pain

and poise, a secret content that converse

silently while sitting in the unlit space

these hitherto unpublished prosaic

thoughts, will they be read in public

later, or further interred with my bone

will forever, for me, remain unknown

© henry victor                  29.05.2016