POEMS GROUP 26: NIRVANA

निर्वाण (NIRVANA) - SALVATIONS I:

HOW CAN MY MIND BE EMPTY NOW

How can my mind be empty now
When all I see is everything
And though my soul would like to sing
I fear it has forgotten how

Thus stare I into an abyss
As know I not how long I have:
As time flows by awaiting death
All goals I had now seem amiss

And yet, still here I am, it seems,
Though lacking in what easy came,
Surrender'd be the only shame

Thus till we see the sun's last beams,
To fight we have just all the same
Till once forgotten be our name.

November 24th/27th, 2024

निर्वाण (NIRVANA) - SALVATIONS II:

THE ACCUMULATION OF THINGS

here I am
standing
in front of my bookcase
(just one out of many):
not remembering
how this all
got to be
here
with me

I am quite sure
there was a reason
for each and every item
back then

and yet
all these carefully selected objects
are now
just things
I am
surrounded by

this accumulation of things
gets even stranger
approaching
the end

February 9th/17th, 2025

निर्वाण (NIRVANA) - SALVATIONS III:

SIT IN JUDGEMENT WE

how we are so easily
consumed
with opinion
with judgement,
conviction:

and how it makes us feel
in the moment:
so righteous
so noble
so good:

fascinating, this,
for when the wheel has turned
and we might be the addressee
of so much scorn and damnation:

ask we not then
for grace, humility, forgiveness, perspective?

don't we know that already
about us?

then why
the audacity
of our judgementality
when comes it to others?

sit in judgement we
to evade but our own?

February 9th/17th, 2025

निर्वाण (NIRVANA) - SALVATIONS IV:

AN INTIMATE MOMENT OF KILLING

behold: a moth
flew in my face
tonight;
attracted
by the bright screen
of my phone

live and let live,
I thought,
though annoyed

she came back
(I'm assuming she was a she)
overwintering
inside?

or was it a food moth,
a clothes moth,
even worse?

an indoor insect?
build houses we not
to keep those
outside?

exasperated,
my patience wore thin:
was this now
an intruder, or worse,
a pest maybe even?

would she even
be a mother
of many, many more
who'd hatch just in time
to multiply?

would this make her
more of a target
or less?
(I shuddered
at the thought
either way)

my plan now hatched,
I was determined,
my leniency broken,
my screen filled with moth wing dust already

she clung to me,
I must have hurt her
accidentally

she looked so fragile:
a tiny life,
yet unwanted in this space.

she looked at me
awaiting
my decision:

I have a hierarchy
of saving animals:
most will be lucky with me

mosquitoes won't be, nor suckers like them,
neither will ticks,
nor, forbid the thought, bedbugs,
and sadly, this type of moth
is on this list.
the bad list.
the bug list.
the kill list:

the action is quick,
to limit suffering.
what grace. dead is dead.

what disturbs me,
is the intimate moment
we shared:
a slight pause
between us:
she knew.

and just like that,
she's gone.

will I now,
if someone decides
I do not belong,
accede to the task
aimed at me?

would I have had the strength
(or will I - who knows!),
to walk
into the chamber,
waiting
for the gas to come,
having nodded
to my lord, high executioner?

February 16th/17th, 2025