Poetry: Indunil Madhusankha

Indunil Madhusankha

Autobiography of the Poet

 I am the poet
 carrying a luggage of roles
 all of which I play with equal interest

 I am the talkative lover
 who knocks on the door of your heart
 and having entered,
 bursts into a torrid tete-a-tete
 with your inner self
 and sings fantastic flirtations

 I am the justice in the court
 betokening perfect impartiality
 and never guilty of distorting the truth
 None receives the least pardon from me
 for any offence

 I am the policeman
 following the thugs
 with a baton
 and filing a case against them

 I am the overpowering magician
 My virility, more ebullient
 than that of a gunman or a swordsman
 In case they can only kill a person
 Yet I influence the latter
 and charge the battery of his heart

 I am the labourer
 digging out moth eaten rubbish mounds
 and recycling them


A Worker Repeats History

His life had ever
been far from easy
The bulk of the bricks
in the cart
always used to
be a companion
though it remained
hard – hearted
The rumpled dirty rag
with no less than
a dozen of patches
barely saved him
from the fierce sunbeams
It is only the tiny
rivulets of salty sweat
pouring down his cheeks
that knew how
wrinkled he was

On that day,
the scorching sun,
its blinding rays,
and even the burning
sands in the site
They all witnessed it
And yet stood still,
as if they did not
Oh, the poor man
He could not endure it,
the pile of boulders
that thrashed
him abruptly
while hiding him
amidst itself
And, then
he disappeared
as he breathed his last

The next day
I saw another man
sweating out to hold
the craggy blocks of rock
Thus he fills the lacuna
and he repeats history.


Ignorance is Bliss

She lives under the bridge
in a shanty made of plastic bags
and that is her sole shelter
She has never seen the inside
of those classy restaurants
which glisten like castles,
castles of the caliber
she has never even imagined
but heard of  in
“once upon a time” fairytales

She has never tasted
a chocolate milkshake
or a blackcurrant tea
But, perhaps a little sip of juice
left in the depth
of a plastic bottle
that she scavenged
from the trash
Nor has she ever even
seen a beef burger
or a tuna or shrimp submarine
She only knows
the hem of a hopper
or the rotting lump of cheese
that appeases her hunger

After all, it seems good
that she is unaware
of the existence of
such heavenly dishes
And now only I understand
why they say,
Ignorance is bliss