Skin and seed

A seed’s sacrifice, letting the skin of a fruit shine

Spending its life hidden, under the pulp

Not every seed will turn into a tree

But the potential’s there, that’s all that matters

Always working in the dark, never allowed to see light

From a tiny shrub to the giant redwood

They cannot stand without a seed giving itself up

We’ve all come from a seed

It’s long forgotten, making way for skin’s different hues

Adding to the richness of humanity’s fabric

The essence of the seed is never lost, hidden under the skin

It may be found where it’s at home, in the silent dark

Prose and poetry

Life may be enjoyed, either in prose or poetry

Two distinct styles, bubbling from within

A predictable script, or a daily surprise

Both acceptable styles of living, reflecting inner urge

One from the mind, the other beyond

The story that is the mind, an epic in prose

Cannot be captured in brevity, of a poem

Just outside the grasp of the mind

Lurks not just another world, but an infinite number

They cannot be described with words, whether rich or miserly

Inner poetry spontaneously sings, the music of the soul

The staid prose of the mind, takes the wonder out of life

War and peace

Meandering through the corridors of history

Like a sinusoidal wave, there are crests and troughs

In the story so far, all together

An epic, like Tolstoy’s War and Peace

We are all actors playing parts, big or small

A visual spectacle, projected from the mind’s battlefield

We only know one or the other, war or peace

Not the neutral ground in between

Rising towards upheaval, yet another war may be in the works

Peace is left far behind, for some the story’s getting old

Many are tired, longing for respite

Our history needn’t be shaped through undulations of war and peace

Storm and calm

Caught in a perfect storm, there’s no escaping

Rise and fall of emotional waves

Some giant, others scarcely a ripple

Moments of calm aren’t rare

They come and go, hidden in every breath

If only one pauses to seek and experience

The storm may finally end

Restoring deep calm, a rarity in our times

Such an effort, keeping up with a storm fueled mind

Yet we persist, forgetting the hidden calm

There’s isn’t need to turn into a saint or a sage

Experiencing calm is free, but we end up choosing a storm

Fear and courage

Fear travels, into the past, and the far future

Courage stays rooted, loving the moment

The wheels of memory spin, turning tiny seeds of fear

Into gargantuan trees, it’s fruits become the future

The cycle repeats, as minutes and hours pass

Eventually coalescing into a lifetime, lost in fear

The courageous puncture the wheel of time

They appear to be going nowhere

But in every moment, they are everywhere

Fear creates a veil, the mind

It takes courage to pierce, for there will be pain

That’s just another face of fear, undeterred are the courageous

Action and reaction

Conscious, thoughtful work

The bedrock of action, easily ignored

By the mind, at times a suffocating smog

Poisonous fumes percolating to every cell

Weaken every shred of sinew

Reaction is swift but blind

Nature and innocent suffer

It’s hard to act, easy to react

Balanced is easily tipped

When clouds threaten to bury happiness alive

Thoughtless and reckless react

But the watchful and patient act

• N. Seshadri

A small step and a giant leap

Words heard by none, spoken on desolate moon

Reverberated in the minds of millions, thousands of miles away

Capturing the essence of the lunar mission

With spontaneity and force

That moment, all became starry eyed children

United, despite differences, if only it had lasted

Our world would be the envy of the cosmos

But minds have take giant leaps from one another

Forgetting the small steps that kept us together

Shedding the past wouldn’t be such a giant leap

If we take a small steps, with our thoughts

It need not be as monumental as those taken in solitude, on the moon

• N. Seshadri

Alphabets and books

Letters, all twenty six of them

Building blocks of a literary landscape

Similarly, each alphabet, shoulders great responsibility

When neatly arranged, they form the world of books

If the message is wrong, it isn’t the alphabets’ fault

Bearing the burden on every page

Whether a children’s book or an old man’s read

Many good books are imprisoned on a shelf

From where alphabets long to sing to the world

They need not be wasted on paper

The book of the mind is waiting to be written

If alphabets can be arranged to inspire, so can our thoughts

• N. Seshadri

Roots and shoots

Roots seek the core, shoots climb to the sky

When the seed of realization sprouts

Can one do both?

Health and lustre of the visible

Depends on the depths roots grow

Into the invisible, there may not be much to see

But guided by an unceasing urge

Roots will one day hit waters of gold

Matching the beauty of the golden sun

As it is being pulled into the bosom of the horizon

When deeply entangled with the roots of life

The tender shoots of love will remain forever green

• N. Seshadri

Trust and distrust

Waters of the sea of trust are shallow

Welcoming one and all to wade

There isn’t fear, as feet always tread sand

Heads may be held high, above water

Seeing eye to eye, love flows

The ocean of mistrust is deep

Unwelcoming, it’s choppy waters dangerous

Sharks lurk, they can’t teach us how to swim like them

With a ballast of suspicion, one precariously floats

When eyes don’t meet, opposing thoughts might clash

As life unfolds, the gulf widens, it needn’t be so

If a sturdy bridge of compassion is built early on

• N. Seshadri

Bitter sweet

Bitterness, an afterthought, a human invention

Like pachyderm hide, uncompromisingly thick

Trapping sweetness, it’s unnatural, but nature relents

Everything bends, not bitter ego

Perpendicular to every concern but one’s own

Poisoning life with a bitter pill

Rivers of blood are innocent, they cannot stop flowing

Whether one’s bitter or sweet

If sweetness came first, why did it make way?

Tough as desert sand, a bitter mind can change

For equanimity to bloom, bitterness must leave

The beyond, it’s neither bitter nor sweet

• N. Seshadri

Angels and demons

Never been seen

In the heavens above, or hell below

Angels and demons

Are our eyes too myopic to see,

Or the mind too rigid to realize?

They are within, holding hands

In every thought and motive

With wings and horns

Thoughts lift or hurt

Pray within, for that vision

Soaring above angelic or demonic costumes

Beyond them, is paradise

• N. Seshadri

Laws and outlaws

Laws, universal as time and space

Even for the unknown

Beyond reach, of the senses

In every corner, atoms bow down to laws

Last refuge for outlaws, is the mind

Overrun with chaos, cannot easily be cast aside

Without annihilating the good, amongst thoughts

With no respect for summons served

Outlawed thoughts, take the last stand

Weakening the will, until time drowns all

Salvation follows its own laws, to fit in

We have to face the outlaws, running wild, within

• N. Seshadri

Young and old

Embrace and adore, bookends of life

Young and old, both open a door

To the soul, unlocked by keys

Of innocence and experience

Completing the puzzle

Solving mind’s riddle

With energy and wisdom

Tattered or new

Every garment’s destined to see more wear

Young and old, both beware

Of fleeting moments, they’re never lost again

When the ageless soul is found

• N. Seshadri

Singularity and multiplicity

Three letters, an equation

Of Einsteinian beauty and brilliance

Until the cosmos comes to singularity

Questions, are we united by nothingness?

Lost in multiplicity, new worlds emerge

Threaded by thought, matter and consciousness

Is there singularity of the mind?

A beautiful one, that explains all

Converging or diverging

From no specific point, from nothing

To every corner imaginable

Singularity and multiplicity, found in the same breath

• N. Seshadri

A new beginning

In the beginning it may appear dark

The wise say, fear not

As the witness within isn’t blind

Who sees by light of another kind

And is patience personified

Whose existence is sadly denied

There’s no getting around this gatekeeper

Who outlives even the grim reaper

The knot hardens, as if tendered by hot glue

As we relentlessly pass through

Stations of existence

With growing ignorance

Fool's gold

Everyone carries a heavy bag

Whether it’s made of silk, or a dusty old rag

Led to believe there are valuables inside

By the silent voice of inner pride

That beckons to the door of an inexhaustible mine

At the entrance, a clearly marked sign

A cautionary one, easily missed

When it’s not on the checklist

The sign warns, avoid

The lust for gold, instead seek a void

Where there is neither a ripple, nor a storm

It is only there one can truly transform

Le Bataclan

The horrors at the Bataclan

May finally wake up the human clan

There is no middle ground

For this type of evil to sound

The heavy hammer of humanity

Must be forged in the fire of unity

There’s ever present danger of further calamity

Seven continents must hold hands, in amity

To prevent further catastrophe

Whose pain cannot be lightened by any philosophy

How much more pain can we bear?

Our hearts are already bleeding and bare

Thrice

Nights and days pass in a trice

Chances come not once or twice, but thrice

They are visible through different windows

One lets in light, the other two only shadows

Nature leans on humankind, to act as a bridge

Every individual’s mind is a stitch

Holding together the cloth of consciousness

The matter we love, is not the cause but the consequence

The eyes see a lesser light

When the mind is closed for the night

Not even thieves can enter

But only to a dissenter

Who isn’t enslaved by instinct

Or living within the intellect’s precinct

The eye of intuition

Offers an admission