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

my psalm fifteen

an authentic spirituality, a true worship

and a bona fide love for God

that will provide me firmer security

is not my belief but my doing

doing the right, speaking the truth

slandering not and doing no wrong

to friends or foes, spreading no rumours

but keeping my word despite the cost

expecting no returns

for rendered kindness

refusing to be manipulated

and to refrain from manipulating

henry victor     21.11.2003

living without a title

do i call this a loss

of fund

faith

and face

or an opportune moment

for a new construction

to live

not as a living dead

but to walk swift

altered neither by praises

nor curses

moving to reign the moon

expecting not

an angelic intervention

when i fail

or, to name that my fate

cherishing not the first place

but stay human watering

a sun scorched plant

in this parched land 

henry victor     01.09.2002

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

finding my true soul

perceptions leading to plenty

in my purse is to be worldly wise

and practical like the tractable

triumph i first sought much

while sacrificing my sympathy

to small, a single sheep that compels

a sacrifice of success, a  prosperity

for ninety-nine in the fold of safety

but that Nazarene seeking me

taught the folly of not tracking

the lost in whom is my true soul

also lost, waiting to be found

© henry victor     02.01.2004

present and future

i was schooled to think it is my inalienable right

to plan my life, both private and professional
in advance; but now i learn a tune very different:
this planning is a privilege of only the privileged

sequence of events yesterday

forced me to forsake today
my dreaming and working
to the end of tomorrow

today i’m left with that narrow way

a road with road less ahead found among
living every day as it is my last
walking in faith with a sense of duty

plodding as though a great future

still lay before me
now i think and act not for my sake
but for the new generation

my daughter’s, taking each day as

it comes without fear or any anxiety
that is the spirit in which i now subsist
persuaded to live in my daily practice

but those who hold the key

do not make it easy for me
to stay brave and move forward
yet i do since i’m already schooled

© henry victor     03.07.2003

temples, cults and faiths

many are the temples erected on graves

where, human intelligence is covered

and humane values receive lip services

with no concern for those subjugated

many are cults that hurt the wretched poor

removing the very livelihood of the small

like that cancerous cell eating up all

with no dirt left at the corridor

many are faiths that eludes reality well

providing vision to exploit that little

appeasing conscience, the divine within

fooling own self until that reckoning

© henry victor     11.04.2003

living styles

living is, from others, much stealing

continuously, freely, gulping

as a mosquito sucking the blood

from a self that has labored so hard

greater living is also stealing

constantly, on beautiful, buzzing

as the bee sucking the sweet honey

while, also carrying the pollen to serve

greatest living is letting to steal

continually giving all to all

like the mother earth holding not back

for self, or looking for some return

© henry victor     03.07.2003

human genius

gigantic mountains, hills

boulders and rocks

rock-solid and impenetrable!

yet, the human genius, the soft

diamond cuts through to create

a path to eternity

© henry victor        01.06.2017

my roads

i have traveled many roads

highways and byways of varied size

and countless length

i have often journeyed with much load

and at times with none

hardly an extra change of clothes

many nights i have slept on roads

counting the uncountable stars

while being stung by beastly bugs

and malicious mosquitoes

in my sojourns i have met numerous spirits

including Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad

frequently in perfect harmony

and at times at squabbles and war

in these wanderings

roads that were not closed i cherished much

that i may reach home like a mother bird

to feed the nestlings

but now a road that is closed is what i desire

that i may never leave home

© henry victor     09.09.2003

my will

am i overly stubborn in imposing my will

rejecting your will, in my failing to see grace
in freight unloaded, regularly, at my feet
or, am i lively, very vibrantly, otherwise

adding life to a decaying soul like the mountain

lion, the cougar, pouncing dissolutely at the hunter
with his gun like will hounding the creature
who as a hermit already withdrawn to a cavern

my quest, however, is for wisdom, that light

from the abundance of your mercy to isolate
the black thread in the dusk of my life, and yield
to your will even in my defeat suspending mine
 
15.07.2014

oldest man!

 

to become the oldest man

ever to have lived in this world
is not what i aspire for
but a tranquil and a hard-working
life that i keep yearning for!

let me remain close to those

whose life i can make it brighter
and when i have to leave this world
let my going be swift and painless
to me and those whom i lived for!

while living let my life

be simple as well as my food
including more gorgeous greens
with less of manifold muscular meat
consumed with ceaseless cheer!

in my short life let me not campaign

against the wine that tickle
my soul but never going after
for me and mine, that very same
to sustain their, or my, laughter!

let my mind never settle down

with those who settle self-confidently
with easy answers that repudiate further
probing the well-traveled path
of life’s more complex questions!

04.01.2002