I need to walk...

I need to walk that thin ledge;
Even as fear runs deep as that canyon;
I know not, where lies the edge
But I need to walk, to know the threshold
I may stagger, stumble, even slip
but I learn to shed my load
When I have to walk
Each step, a milestone, to have passed the past
I need to look ahead, till I reach the end-
Around the bend
To the drop off, which looks to the horizon?

I need to jump, to make that plunge –
From the earth, to let lose those strings –
that  bound me in love and pain –
I need to free myself  from that abyss
Even as I look down,
The plunge, as bottomless
But I need to jump
To float, to fly, to learn to let go
I may tear in two,
Or lie as shreds
But I will rise anew
From the earth to the ether-
 Like  the becoming
Of a bird from a fledgling –
To the whole, a new being!

Those grey strands…

Those grey strands of my hair

Stand out like glistening streaks How they remind me in a mocking way Of aging , the inevitable, Of the beginning , When you are born crunched, crouched, cramped To unfurl, grow up, to flourish- The lustre, the suppleness, like the bloom of spring Every time, I fell in love, I broke apart, or I found my being, I sought to fulfil a duty, a wish, a want Every day, every time, What I had borne, what I had birthed, what I had shed, The breath that was like the wild wind, To sweep everything away, Its whistle that kept blowing To keep me on its wings, never to tarry awhile But even the wild spirit seeks its nest, someday When age catches up And you slowly start to crouch, crunch and cramp Yet again, you are back to where you had begun I see my own reflections - the suppleness that once was To the sagging folds of my skin… Or the black bouncy cascades Receding into grey strands, as their sheen fades Yes, what once was, will never be; Everything that ages, everything that withers To fall back to the earth Let me learn to shed in gladness, Embrace this change- those gray strands The silver streaks – let me braid them In a new breath, slowly, surely, wisely; Let me age, to accept what I become?

To the “Brutus-es” that come and go

Ah! this hate, the anger
The cavilling of the Brutus, the betrayal,
When beneath the cloak you find the dagger
Ready to strike you at your back
You may not die, you would live
But those wounds that seemingly take eons to heal;
Like pincers they remind, time and again
Of the “other”, the Brutuses that come and go;
To leave their mark, the victory that is
The loud clarion of your anger and hate –
Their doing to undo you –
then to march upon the ashen- the ravaged
Bereft of the calm, your being turned savage
If you could see, what you have become for the Brutus
Than what you would have been,
The “I” that can be unfazed, unhurt, if it were let to be
To tell, to teach the “Brutuses” that come and go
Let their daggers remain beneath their cloaks,
But when they strike,
It would be the unseen armour –
In the “I” that resolves, the resolute, to resound
The struck would be but the Brutus, with nowhere to rebound?