Poetry

Mandira Ghosh

Who wins in any war?

From the time immemorial Kings have fought

No dynasty is left to see their fruits!

Generals from South west

Halt!

Russian Army Halt.

Spread music over Kyiv

Not missiles

Halt!

Killing innocents in Crimea?

Kyiv falls

Chernikiv is bombarded

Colossal attack

on children and women

Mariupal falls

Refugees flee to Berlin

Poland

where 

fresh life may begin

Forces from all sides

as enemy troops advance

Russia had annexed Crimea earlier

Now Odessa

Cut the destiny to approach the Black Sea.

Now Redcross arrives in buses to Mykolaiv

Will combat weapons with music and songs

Nightmare will pass

The sun will shine.

Nightmares should pass

The sun must shine.

***

 

And then the Bell rang

 From the time of Buddha was born

to the time of Jesus birth 

Till the time of when the zamindar from Bengal left the bell ringing

Mistakenly,

 till it rang forever

 went on ringing till my classes got over.

 

Years have passed

Bells are still ringing

I grew old

Like every woman, I now have wrinkles.

which no one likes

In Ukraine and in Syria innocent girls die

And death comes to the extraordinary people

Yes. And The bells are still ringing 

And may ring forever.

***

 

A Promise Made Today

 I am not the one

Who will mourn

For unable to laugh again 

At the lazy summer sun

Near the India Gate

With Black Berry trees uprooted 

Shadows raging, where

Palace coming up

Defining death 

Moth eaten ozone layer 

Light through opaque lenses

Blurred vision

Can't participate in upcoming harvest or

Celebration of

 New Normal dream.

 

Statistics of death

Turned lives as numbers

Deaths as half burnt flesh

Thrown in the holy Ganges

Bodies decomposed

Buried on the banks 

Child suckles dry breasts to death. 

 

This is the age of super men

With fast forwarding to the next century 

Statistics of lust and hate evaluated

The price of flesh.

Supraminds ceased to evaluate

Degraded all to virus and bacteria.

 

But voices that can't be heard

Today should speak 

Pharynx may vibrate

Let death don't calm

The voices mummified 

Of women, poor, dying and downtrodden 

Feeble; not counted by the sarkar's statistics.

 

Will speak

Will speak

Again they will speak.

***

Profile: Mandira Ghosh is an eminent author, poet, educator and researcher. She is an outstanding and hard worker who has educated and groomed hundreds of children and received a Senior Fellowship from the Ministry of Culture, Government of India. She is a recipient of Bharat Nirman Award 2020, Dr. Radhakrishnan Award from Asian Academy of Arts and Marwah studios. Plaque of distinction from DELNET, Asian Literary Societies two consequent awards, Indian women achiever 2020 and Author of the Year Award 2022. She has remained the Guest Editor of the Special Indian Edition of the Seventh Quarry, Swansea Magazine from Wales and also a featured poet in the same magazine. Also being awarded with Dr. Sarojini Naidu International Award for working women.

Her poems, stories, translations, and reviews have been published in several magazines and journals in India and abroad. A multifaceted personality apart from education of students, she organized poetry workshops in India Habitat centre, DELNET, Shilagram, Guwahati, IIT Bombay, OP Jindal and other places in Delhi and beyond. With an early science background, she has used scientific terms in her poetry. Other issues of life are portrayed in her writings and research which portrays the musings of a very sensitive heart. She is an MA in English, diploma holder in Journalism and B Ed with English and Special English. Though expresses herself in English, Indian thought and philosophy are her favourite subjects. She is shortlisted from Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla and received Editors Choice award twice with her first poem Monalisa and is 8 times the poet of the year award from International Society of poets, Maryland. USA. She is the Governing Board Member and Editor of The Poetry Society (India) and the Treasurer from the past 20 years. She is a member of India International Centre, India Habitat Centre, Indian Society of Poets, and International Society Of History of Religions who was invited to speak but was unable to.

An author 23 books and her books include

Krishna In Indian Thought literature and Music.

The Cosmic Dance of Shiva

Mahatma Gandhi:Tryst with Satyagraha

Shiva and Shakti

Folk Music of the Himalayas

Poetry and Science Opposites meet

Aroma

New Sun, Cosmic Tour, Song in a City and others.

She has been working relentlessly to promote Indian Culture and Heritage in the society and also scientific thoughts. She is fluent in English, Hindi and Bengali and poems are translated into Hindi, Bengali, Odia, Romanian and also getting translated into other European Languages.

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Setu, November 2024

Special Edition: The Dying City :: Setu, November 2024

Mandira Ghosh (Voices Within 2023)

Mandira Ghosh is a poet and author of eminence. She is the recipient of Bharat Nirman award and also Women Achiever Award 2020, Author of the year Award In the field of literature by Asian Literary Society. She has published and edited 21 books, and is the Guest Editor of the Poets of India, Special Issue of The Seventh Quarry, The Swansea Magazine from Wales, also, Featured poet this year in April issue. by them. Awarded with a Senior Fellowship of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India. Has received the Editor's Choice Award, twice by the International Society of Poets, and has been elected to the International Poetry Hall of Fame. She is currently Treasurer of The Poetry Society (India) and also a member, the Governing Board and member, TPS Editorial team. Selected poems are to be translated into major European languages by Timisoara University, Romania. 

 

 

 Sunlight on my Courtyard 

 

Through my window 

For centuries the moon smiled

Now in the hands of man 

Disaster defined.

As the nations compete

With one another 

To become superpowers

My country too gets on race and speeds up her arms

 

As the beggar boy searches for alms

His little sister

Lies in tattered clothes 

On streets 

Mother in borrowed long dress with

 visible holes

Father on drugs 

Begs by knocking 

Car's window panes.

 

In my backyard

Nuclear waste is piled

Nukes can blow away 

The beggar and me.

Anytime

 

Still I read stories 

of bravery and murders

Memorise World history

Till the bulb diffuses...

 

Tomorrow is my exam

I get up and move towards the courtyard 

With a smile, I watch

Sunlight on my courtyard.

 

Nectar

 

Behind the river 

Behind the house, lies 

Water elixir.

 

Behind the body

Behind all rituals, lies

Soul immortal. 

 

Beyond the books.

Behind the library, lies 

Unextinguished knowledge. 

 

They tried to fire

They will try to destroy

But knowledge as power

Soul as immortal and

Water as elixir

will always remain as nectar. 

 

Always. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rain

 

Until and unless it doesn't rain

There is no advantage of being alone..

 

 

Until then the story stays incomplete

Till the tears of two eyes together may glaze

Towards

 

my diary that took wet water

from the atmosphere

to smudge in blue

 

The leaves shook

Inside the pages

trembled with pain galore.

---

Setu, November 2023 :: Voices Within 2023

Mandira Ghosh (Children's World)

Mandira Ghosh

Cricket Goes to Mars

Mangalyaan Infinity reached the Mars. There was not much traffic on the way and so without any hassles it reached the Mars. Martians were jubilant and welcomed the people from the earth.

Maritians are friendly people and they are fond of cloting hanbels.

Cloting is something like playing.

Hanbels are something like cricket.

Cloting hanbels is something like playing cricket. Maritians speak in a unique language Iotagamtra and are very fond of Geometry err. pluanks

They also liked the astronaut's and our cricketer's  dresses and asked for the designer.

Er Who designs your Jersies..? asked a Martian,

After introduction, the Maritians were told of a tailor of Chandi Chowk, manufacturer of Pantaloon Plaza who made bats errr. quaskas for the Martian.

"We will pay annual visit and purchase the jersy err. komosky and quaskas for our  players err... bandolooms from your planet.

Mangalyaan Infinity also looked for methane on Mars' surface. A sensor attached to the Infinity looked for the gas on Mars. It confirmed that life existed on Mars in the past. The spaceship also carried another instrument called Lyman Alpha Photometer to study the components on the planet's atmosphere. Two more instruments measured the surface components that made up Mars' land mass once upon a time and a camera took pictures. 

The Mars Orbiter went on orbiting the planet. They discovered they were fond of ethaning something similar to gardening. Cute something like plants err. jouba were seen in the planet. Women err. Female Martians cooked or guilated the joubas happily. Animals or arussaz adorned the planet.

There were indeed love between men and Martians, females and joubas, joubas and herarins and herians and men. Thank God, they found the CD like thing that had printed a planet somewhere in the infinite past .It is a story of about 300,000, millions ago. 

Mangalyaan infinity is returning with samples and orders of the  jersy err. komosky and quaskas for their  players err... bandolooms from Mars planet to the one and the only our dear EARTH.

 

Bio Note: Mandira Ghosh 

Mandira Ghosh is an eminent poet, author, researcher and educator. She is awarded with Author of the year Award 2022, by Asian Literary Society, Bharat Nirman Award and several other awards and honours. She is the Guest Editor of Special Indian Edition of the Seventh Quarry Swansea Magazine from Wales and a recipient of Senior Fellowship from Ministry of Culture, Government of India. She is the treasurer of The Poetry Society India and also in their Editorial Board

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Setu, December 2022 :: Children's World 2023

Voices Within: Mandira Ghosh

Mandira Ghosh is a poet and author of eminence. She is the recipient of Bharat Nirman award and also Women Achiever Award 2020 in the field of literature by Asian Literary Society. She has published and edited eighteen books. She is the Guest Editor of the Poets of India, Special Issue of The Seventh Quarry, The Swansea Magazine from Wales and is awarded with a Senior Fellowship of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India. Has received the Editor’s Choice Award, twice by the International Society of Poets, and has been elected to the International Poetry Hall of Fame. She is presently Treasurer of The Poetry Society (India) and also a member, the Governing Board and member, TPS Editorial team. 

Eastwards

Here lies near the setting sun

over my jasmine creepers,

over faded chalk marks of my old tennis court

A shadow of the sun's movements.

At six-thirty, the flight that comes from the western sky

Won't land at the Palam

Will fly eastwards, 

over to Dacca, over Myanmar, Singapore, Bangkok, or Manilla,

Over my broken blue bangles

scattered over the limitless ocean

that scattered over water endless

Time floats in time

Aroma spreads on space

Proof of my existence in my blue bangles,

Floats today over the ocean. infinite.

***

At, Mall, Shimla

She came down 

From Darchen, Tibet

A lonely village 

On the foothills of Mount Kailash.

Completing her Kora 

She was happy

Purchased wool

To give warmth to the world

To survive, from snow and cool.

She took the Silk- Route 

Somehow reached Shimla

 I met her near the mall.

Her face wrinkled with the weight of time,

She stood erect and defied gravity.

Tourists came to enjoy and play, 

while

She held the needles firmly

To knit for, 

our soldiers,

For newborns of the frozen hills

For the young, the old, and the infirm 

but bold.

knit socks, mufflers and sweaters for all.

She went on knitting 

Till the needles fell on the ground

Picked up to resume again to knit the mufflers using remaining wool

But before that she

gave me a toothless smile. 

And informed the cruel world 

To be kind, compassionate,

To remain bold

though she might be poor, homeless, battered and old.

***

A Piece of Paper

A piece of paper

ensuring my happiness of

empowering women,

fell on the river water,

darker than darkness.

Rain showers then

on deep, dark waters,

to drown the paper

that could not be drowned.

How significant can be the communication

that reaches on time

to the needy,

to the infirm,

to the aged

to the shattered

to women changing society's norm!

The piece of paper carried all

Communicated and

reached all

soaked, battered, washed

But it reached on time.

Intact, comprehensible.

Beyond dying and death.

To the world

That needed new vision and change.

***

---

Setu, February 2022