Debendra Sahu (Voices Within)

Debendra Sahu after post superannuation from UCO Bank as Chief Manager floated into writing. His poems/short stories have been published in more than thirty national/International Anthologies including e-publications in StoryMirror, Best Poetry and SETU from Pittsburgh, USA etc., apart from being awarded Order of Shakespeare Medal by Motivational Strips, Gitesh-Biva Memorial Award for Short Story by Asian Literary Society, Prose & Pictures, OnFire Cultural Movement etc. and felicitated in various international poetry festivals. He is also a Literary Colonel of StoryMirror. His book of poems is scheduled to be launched at 2^nd ALS LitFest, New Delhi. At present, he is a fulltime writer.

Final Journey

I have just disembodied and begun to fly

But wonder, why me as I don’t wish to die.

Whoever up there, can I have one more morning

As I wish to live, can I have one more evening ?

Flowers are yet to bloom in my garden

Fruits in the trees are yet to be ripen,

I wish to sing and see the sun rising

I wish to smile and gaze the moon flourishing.

I have not yet loved the rains

And their random appearance,

I have not yet liked the stars

And their twinkling grandeurs,

Never, I have kept my windows open

For breeze to come in,

Never, I have fed the pigeons when they

Flock on my terrace often.

I am yet to see a boat floating clueless

Amidst the squally winds on the sea,

I am yet to win a game of dice

Pitching the right numbers as per my wish.

I am yet to stand alone on a snow-filled mountain top

Stretching both my arms as far as I can,

I am yet to experience the clouds

Caressing and kissing me loud

Then hopping away like a deer adolescent,

So can I have one more rising sun

Or even few moonlights.

That Evening

Evening was spreading the wings of darkness

While the solitary sun was setting outside to vanish

Behind the mountain until the next first blush

I didn’t care, whether the day was getting dark

Or the sun was tripping or hiding behind the horizon

I was at verge of being dissolved in the depths of her eyes.

Oh my god, that was such a hot and boiling wisdom

We were being endeared and coming close indolently,

As if, ocean was melting and crawling towards the shore.

How could the shore behold without being enticed

When love was inebriating without any plea,

How could we contain our hidden desires, those

Erupting from the depths of hearts to outer surface.

My heart like a frog thumping inside me thick and wild

Without a doubt, it could yawn out with a dull sound,

I was feeling as if someone was perforating a fork inside

To weed or twitch the heart out, no more it would pound.

We were moving closer, much closer to coalesce

My nose, embedded with sweat-drops was to touch

Her sizzling nose, as if centuries have passed

The tempests of breaths were squalling inside out.

An invisible yet infinite force was pushing my sultry lips

Towards those mildly quivering pink petals of her,

Both my hands creeping around her waist bringing deeper

There was no jerk, when I dragged her blazing body closer.

Something was positively boiling within me

Something was apparently stirring inside her

It was for sure, not lava or a flowing volcano either.

I didn’t know, how and when I perished on her tropical lips

There was a blast, which flung all my senses in the midair.

A hefty man in uniform and stick in hand was patting my back

“Sahab ji, Getting dark, Park-gate will be closed now.

Both of you have to go.” Thak thak….. Thak thak….

He thumped the wooden bench with his stick.

He was discourteous and rude, I thought

Both of us were rudely taken aback.

Solitary Bird

The lone bird has since flown far off

In search of a nest on a tree over a mountain top,

Although it has found the decrepit tree

The branches there are feeble and dry,

The sticks and hay gathered for the nest, couldn’t fix or hide

Hence the bird has alienated, floating far and wide.

Few decades back, they all say

This bird was young, not as rudderless as today.

He once fell in love in the garden of sandals near a bay

Wished to knit a family, remain happy and always gay.

But happiness was like writings on the sands near sea

Waves would come repeatedly to wash in tandems.

Take away everything inside for never-ending burials

The bird’s writings on happiness were buried in the sea.

For the solitary bird, age is not like wine

It doesn’t get better with passing of time.

No more sun rising in the eastern side of ocean tantalizes

No more the oldest myth called love fascinates.

The bird has turned off the thinking side of the brain

He doesn’t care whether it dusts or it rains.

The solitary bird still drifting in the sky

Under the non-existent tutelage and by the by.

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Voices Within-2020 :: Setu, February 2020