In a Storm
A turbulent thundering storm gathers pace, it is scorching inside and outside in the afternoon it's getting dark.
I am a tree....I carry notions of hope in my wide open arms.
I am the dancing breeze on the still waters of a mountain lake,
and the deep blue surging waves of an ocean; I wait for miracles to unfold around me !
Fervent as hope, indelible as memory,
I have lighted my pain in a lamp and it glows.
This is the story of friends, strangers a few moons ago
On different tracks running parallel, yet coming closer each day
To suddenly meet at a beautiful junction of verse, such is poetry!
Fervent as hope, indelible as memory
I have lighted my pain in a lamp and it glows!
Hello friend. Hello hello hello.. Echoes boom, in a garden of words,
It could be us, it could be you.
This is the story of friends, old as the universe.
One fine morning, when birds sang & flowers bloomed,
A breeze shook our curtain of reality,
& into truth we zoomed;
We saw intricate patterns on the ground, still as statues
Carved in shadows & light of the real world but shorn of its vice.
Minarets, mandirs, steeples, mindful people of all persuasions
Together yet separate, moving along enchanted trails...
Where are the ropes, where the fetters, that chain our minds
and keep us in tethers? We looked on in wonder, & amazement at the beauty that exists, freed of shackles running unconfined.
Unconfined at last of inherited customs and handed down heirlooms
Like gifts of heavy woollens in sweltering summers afternoons!
For what we saw was a new tapestry emerging out of the dull
old real one;
You needed new eyes, new ways of seeing to see it & feel.
You see it ? Ya.... isn't it very clear ?
The road ahead holds bugles on both sides, 'silence no more' the signs read, big bold red letters that smash old ones, challenging
their very existence, their intent, the sanity of their archaic minds.
Grace, good behaviour, just got redefined, no longer clothed in silence, or bent over to please; but speaking up for what is right, condemning injustice, standing up for truth with all their might.
The truth. That we are equal persons of equal merit, of equal abilities and more than equal to the world we inherit. This has been kept from us for too long, this truth, this undeniable reality of being. At last, the moment has arrived to embrace all that it offers in a beautiful song.
Fervent as hope, indelible as memory .
I have lighted my pain in a lamp and it glows.
This is the story of friends, strangers a few moons ago,
on different tracks running parallel, yet coming closer each day
to suddenly meet at a beautiful junction of truth, such is poetry!
Fervent as hope, indelible as memory. Indelible as memory,
Keep flowing as a river into the waiting ocean of vastness, of equality.
You are a tree....You carry notions of hope in your wide open arms
You are also the dancing breeze on the still waters of a mountain lake, and the deep blue surging waves of an ocean. You wait for miracles to unfold around you.
And me
![Smeetha Bhoumik Smeetha Bhoumik](https://www.unlikelystories.org/sites/default/files/smeetha%20bhoumik.jpg)
Smeetha Bhoumik, winner of the 2023 Reuel International Award for Poetry, is a poet, artist and editor. She is founding editor -Yugen Quest Review (2021) and founder –WE Literary Community (2016). Her poems feature in national and international journals and anthologies. Her poetry has flown to the moon as part of the Polaris Trilogy in the Lunar Codex; thus aligning her early Universe Series artwork with her poetry in beauteous synchronicity! Her work featured at the Panorama International Literature Festival, 2024. Her sestina 'Tiara of Gleaming Peaks, Our Talisman', features in The Mountain Was Abuzz, an anthology edited by the exceptional mountaineer, author, former air force officer Toolika Rani.