Santosh Bakaya |
Award winning poet, novelist, biographer, TEDx
Speaker, acclaimed for her poetic biography of Mahatma Gandhi, Ballad of Bapu, Dr.
Santosh Bakaya’s twenty three books encompass multiple genres. Reuel
International Awardee [Poetry, 2014], Setu International Awardee for ‘stellar
contribution to world literature’, 2018 [Pittsburgh, USA], WE EUNICE DE SOUZA
[WE Literary Community, 2023], for ‘rich and diverse contribution to Poetry,
literature and Learning’, she runs a very popular column, Morning Meanderings
[Learning and Creativity. Com.]
Her collaborative e- books [Blue Pencil] Vodka by the Volga [With Dr. Ampat Koshy, 2020, From Princep Ghat to Peer Panjal [With Gopal Lahiri, 2021] are # 1 Amazon bestsellers.
Recently published: What is the Meter of the
Dictionary? [AuthorsPress. 2022] The Catnama [With Dr. Sunil Sharma,
AuthorsPress, 2023]
For Better or Verse [With Ramendra Kumar and
Dr. Ampat Koshy, AuthorsPress, 2023]
Ecstasy
Through my meshed window, I see a host of yellow flowers.
Wild. Free. Lissome. Graceful.
A wholeness seeps into me as I feel their joyous vibrations.
The dew- drenched flowers sway
in sun -swathed, limpid ecstasy.
The leaves of the nearby tree, beckon me in joy.
Oh boy! I fling my window open and lo!
I see a bird looking right at me.
Merrily perched atop a blooming palash tree.
A chunk of the aquamarine sky creeps into the room.
For a few minutes, it sits on the edge of the window,
and hastens back.
An amber morning light fills the room.
With one glance of the sun, I am entranced.
Joy in the morning, joy at noon.
Joy at dusk, joy at night. A boon!
Nature morphs my heart into a helium balloon,
swooning to a loony tune.
The Cottage near the Lidder River
One morning, as I stood near the windowed nook,
of the cottage, overlooking the Lidder
River,
I glimpsed a fedora hat and a glass of ginger beer on a table.
My love-besotted quill yearned to pen a love duet
sung by the fedora hat and that glass of beer.
Long forgotten cornfields flashed in memory.
I saw a scarecrow standing upright,
donning a fedora hat in that cornfield.
A tiny wren hopping on to the hat,
clutching the notes of an unsung song in its beak.
At night, a shivery draft slithered in
from the casement window.
The cold air blew right in.
I needed no ginger beer or any other libation
to ward off the cold.
Life for me has always been a massive
keg,
meant for celebration.
Not for me the ‘still hearth,’
or the insane rat race,
hoarding, sleeping and greedily feeding.
Dashing- Clashing- bashing- slashing.
But, still, I plod forth.
“I cannot rest from travel: I
will drink
Life to the lees:”* as the poet said,
leaving not a dreg in the keg,
inhaling the fragrance of a thousand
flowers,
and elegant dreams hanging from bowers.
I know I will always be ‘roaming with
a hungry heart’*
through “scudding drifts” and drunken delight,
till something upsets my apple cart.
On an eternal quest, ‘to strive, to seek, to find and not to yield’.*
Beholden to bounteous nature and its edifying signature.
*Italicized words from Tennyson’s poem, Ulysses written in 1833
and published in 1842.
The Glint of Gratitude
I saw myself perched on a boulder, on
the seashore
and there was sudden magic,
before my very eyes.
I had morphed into a mermaid
swirling, twirling on a cresting wave.
Real, surreal and fantasy merged.
I broke into a jig.
Dancing
prancing.
Dancing
Prancing
The gulls overhead broke into a crescendo,
in avian glee. Did they like my dance?
But in their squawks, I read,
Save her
save her
Save her
save her
I watched, aghast.
In the distance, a mother Golden Oriole
was hovering around a pine tree,
letting out anguished chirps.
I jumped down from the boulder,
and swam to the shore, racing toward the pine tree.
A Golden Oriole chick had fallen from its nest.
I bent down and peered closer. It was still breathing.
Tenderly picking that fistful of gold, I slithered up the tree,
like those days of yore.
I put it back in the nest, and broke
into a jig.
Dancing
prancing.
Dancing
Prancing
Dancing
prancing.
Dancing
Prancing
And the Golden Oriole danced too.
With some brilliant new steps.
A drop of golden sun? Or a hint of gratitude?
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