There is a land by faith I’ve seen
Where skies no clouded regions know;
Where they know not the sorrows of time
and no shadows fall to blight the view
That land no want has ever known,
Nor pain nor sickness nor distress;
there, Death, the last enemy, is slain;
There those who meet shall part no more,
And those long parted meet again.
There’s a land far away..
Beyond these wild winds and gloomy skies,
Beyond Death’s cloudy portal,
There is a land where beauty never dies
And love becomes immortal;
A land whose light is never dimmed by shadow,
Whose fields are ever vernal,
Where nothing beautiful can ever fade,
But blooms for aye eternal.

Saving Stones

Wading along lake shore,

Searching for stones to throw,

Two are one in purpose here,

Clasping hands, do endear,

Words between unneeded,

Each to other ceded,

Signing pact, intertwined,

Not with ink, one of mind,

As stones are uplifted,

To each other are gifted,

Clasped against beating heart,

Signifying fresh start,

At this shore many tears,

Sink with stones, taking fears.

On this day I pledge my oath of love to you

I promise to cry and laugh with you.

I will always hold your hand when you are scared and reach for yours when I am also.

I promise to never let you guess how I’m feeling. I will remember to love you even if I don’t feel like loving myself.

I remember that together we don’t make happiness, but we search for it every day together.

You are my best friend and I promise to study you, so I get all

A’s when it comes to your heart.

This is never  hard or an assignment because this pledge was voluntary.

I never thought that just the sight of someone could bring me this much joy. 

I’m glad we chose each other.

Your love is unconditional and I am blessed for cold feet under the covers and warm nights with you when it snows.

Who knew that a love could be so fulfilling. The mysteries and the anticipation for the next day grow each moment we are together.

I’m at a loss for words on how much I truly love you.

 So, on that note I will just say. 

 I Do 

Eight twenty-five A.M his bare feet shuffle across the floor into his bathroom.

I run, I stand, I listen, silence, the water, the brushing I imagine, the splash, no water he dries.

The footsteps they thump he’s awakened fully I suppose his hair is damp, his robe is white. No blue.

He thumps, the beep is loud his coffee is ready a splash of cream two sugars I know this he drops his receipt one day coming from the coffee shop.

I wait, the toaster pop two pieces of toast is that jam or butter I don’t know he bites he chews, I wait.

It’s a quarter to ten. I sit in the bedroom; I wait for blue jeans, beige sweater socks then sneakers.

He squeaks across the floor. The trash! I ran to my front door keys in hand in case someone saw me in the hallway alone.

Bam the incinerator door I count the steps back. Twelve bam his front door.

Back inside, I wait in silence for the T.V. ten o. Clock news the weather I wait with him for the weather.

I lay on the love seat and counted the cracks in my ceiling thirty-two. He stands, the squeak. TV off

It is ten thirty-five two things can happen he writes, or he does morning walk. The silence I assume he is.

Writing I hear laughter one sided conversation. I listen to squeak laughter double squeak a deep laughter.

I wonder if I listen to the silence again, I’m straining I can’t hear then the blessing I hear clearly, I love cheesecake. Eleven o Clock on the dot

I called the bakery, and I ordered one small cheesecake with my name and apt# 3A on the card, direction leave at apartment #4A knock when leaving. I hang up, I wait. No squeaks, I listen to the silence.

Eleven forty-six the door bam I listen he has taken the bait I hear no squeaks eleven fifty a knock at my door the terror he read the note in the hallway. I freeze he knocks again I spin I’m sweating just eat the cake decide if you want it or not. You are too honest Sir! I freeze. A voice. Hello, I walked to the door. 

I Open it. Two years later. He says honey do you want cheesecake or pie with dinner. I smile, I blush, I am grateful I laugh and say Cheesecake. 

You have always been there for me.

You have always been strong because you needed to be.

So, since today is your special day,

I just have a few things that I need to say.

I remember the nights that you tucked me in,

you would say a prayer with me and kiss me with a grin.

You taught me to get an education and believe in myself,

you kept lots of powerful books on my room shelf.

I remember those cold mornings you took me to school,

getting an education was your golden rule.

I remember the hours you spent helping me with my homework,

I am so glad that I did not drive you berserk!

Even though we had little and were pretty close to poor,

you always made me feel like I had a whole lot more.

You always made sure I had a roof over my head,

I had plenty of clothes and a comfortable bed.

You always ensured I never missed a meal. 

You just don’t know how special you made me feel.

There were times when you got very little sleep,

on many occasions I would even hear you weep.

You told me that I would be a strong woman someday.

You always said, “Believe in yourself and continually pray!”

I just wanted you to know that you are appreciated,

I am where I am because you made sure I was educated.

Every day is a special day for you mother,

I asked myself, “With words, how can I express my love for her?”

So, for all your countless hours making sure I was well taken care of,

this poem is especially “To you momma with love.”

In the depths of the forest, a solitary sight,

A mushroom emerges, bathed in dappled light.

Amidst the ancient trees, standing tall and proud,

Its presence captivating, drawing whispers aloud.

Alone it thrives, in humble solitude,

Nature's work of art, with secrets it imbued.

In the embrace of moss, its mycelium weaves,

A silent symphony, beneath the forest eaves.

A cap of earthy hues, textured and divine,

Unfolding gracefully, as if to intertwine

With the essence of the woods, harmonious and wise,

A testament to life's resilience in disguise.

Gently it grows, defying the odds,

In this kingdom of shadows, where mystery nods.

A symbol of strength, rooted firm and strong,

In the solitude it finds solace, where it belongs.

Raindrops embrace its delicate frame,

Nourishing the spirit that bears no name.

Its spores, like whispers, ride the gentle breeze,

Seeking new horizons, fertile lands to appease.

In its solitude, a lesson can be learned,

To find beauty and purpose where one is spurned.

For in the lonesome corners, amidst the trees so tall,

A solitary mushroom finds its place to stand tall.

Oh, humble fungus in the forest's embrace,

Your presence paints a portrait of elegance and grace.

May we, too, learn from your quiet, steadfast ways,

To bloom and grow, even on solitary days.

Look up my skin,

follow the path in between two muscles forming organs

to shy my blood from your blade,

look into my wide-open eyes,

you know that I am not here.

Colour my bones,

what you found was the next relic

you will study in the research museum of History lab,

the future is willing to know: who lived here before?

I am tired of the serious mockery I have to be for you...

I want to be real,

I want to be sanguine,

I want to feel alive

so I look for danger

at any pace, în any way...

I am tired of being a serious mockery to you

So, here I let myself revealed

In the slaughtering fashion of your duty.

She and I, in the season of discovery

Weary of parental tyranny, we eloped

Judged the future to be slow; went on a quest for its glow

A starry night found us camping in a clearing in a forest

Glued together as much by love as by fear in the nocturnal drear

Like a spirit from the forest, a white-tailed fawn came by near

And stopped there as if it struggled to decipher our lovers’ code

Dazed, our tormented adolescence thought of his presence as a bode

And because we moved, the fawn in a rustle to the bloom removed

Dipped deep into the gloom, we sat there wrapped by the starry night

Look! She exclaimed, her finger signalling a point in the celestial vastness

A shooting star was crossing the immensity, a stone in flames announcing dawn nigh

A stone in flames, and I thought of my heart

And then, from a celestial nest, a hungry red-winged bird flew toward the night

And gobbled up the dark, gobbled up the stars one by one, and they were countless

Gobbled up us, too

Oh, it’s all past now

How long was it that it happened? How long?

She and I, then no longer children, then not yet strong

Glued together as much by love as by fear, ready to get it wrong

What prompted us to become sensible? Was it the fawn?

What was it that devoured our love? Was it the dawn?

Is it sorrow that I feel now, or is it anger?

Neither, because I was there. It was there

The spell, I mean, I swear the spell was there, the wonder

She and I in a clearing in the forest

Past the embrace and the fawn

Past the shooting star and the hungry dawn.

They came in, blazing with brazen incompetence. 

Their mantra of a change was a mere smoke screen, 

a grand deception designed to fool a gullible populace 

yearning for a better deal, they know all along they have 

nothing to offer because they have . nothing

It was a mere design of hatred hinged on ethnicity, 

and laced in a religious camouflage to entice acceptance 

by a generation who knew not what their first emerging 

4 decade ago appears to be; that it was far from an Eldorado

Thus their emergence 4 decades later would be a culmination

 of incompetence and retrogression. 

Though, those who knew their antecedent raised the alarm, 

but it was taken as the wailers crying for an elusive wolf where there's none.

8 years down the line of floundering, flipping and flopping around without motion, 

they have come to appreciate that our howling weren't a fluke, 

that we've brought to ourselves a calamity of an unimaginable disaster.

While the world had hoped to experience a refreshing icing 

as they wind up their excruciating reign on the land with an 

acceptable electioneering process to right their wrongs, 

but that's not to be, instead they culminated it with a disgusting 

and repulsive reign of blunder and mayhem, never seen in our history as a nation.

What a way to depart from an 8 year regime of unmatched inflation, 

economic disaster, monetary flopping, insecurity nightmare, 

 and a terrorized land where the populace reels under the 

burden of uncertainty; it's an 8 years of a Calamitous Regime 

Who has set the pink lotus to bloom

Across the horizon at dawn

Awakening all from lugubrious torpor

Or delicious slumber!

Who has set the deep blue sky inflamed!

Who has set the vast attuned to the music silent!

Nothing happens naturally

There is a Will behind every happening

There is a Will mysterious.

© Aju Mukhopadhyay, 2022 

A shift to online transaction

Away from all Jabbering work of assiduous fashion

Is a miraculous transfer to a modern trend

A revolution in communication

A quantum jump in scientific term.

But it is accompanied by more modern practices

Of degrading Nature, denuding wildlife

Depleting fast all accumulated resources

Poisoning Environment all around us

Online suits them most who want

To utilise it for their own selfish purpose.

But all the sons of the soil haven’t learnt

Nor agreed to live depending entirely online

No earth-link no link with pencil paper or ink

Like weaning away from mother’s breast

Children left in the mid-world to sink

Like a farmer bereft of his traditional shield

Rain mud spade sickle seed in his field

Won’t directly get the reward of his labour

Lion’s share would go to the

Spectacular speculative online profiteer.

Like hanging in the balance

Feet not touching the ground

Hands not holding anything sound

Even the key to hold on to any support

May be taken away without prior report.

A fall shall not be on the ground

No sound, one may not be found.

People would be compelled

To charge against each other

Like a massive body of soldier

Who without judgement

Has to obey only the order.

As if a civilisation is shifting its base

Away from the pristine source

Away from all earthly resource

To help a few to amass all wealth in their hands

In few marked parts of the land

Everything to bring under their brutal control.

A civilisation hanging in the balance

Cannot remain forever thus

Halting the natural progress

Through Natural process.

It necessitates removal of all those

Responsible for this state

A pack of in-humans at their best

In all the States of the world

To save the civilisation from ruin

To help it shine under the sane and selfless

Leaders of the earth fresh and new

So that after the dawn

The sunny days may continue.

(c) Aju Mukhopadhyay, 2021 

       I never knew love or kindness,

       So, I suffered in blindness.

       Hated people despised myself,

       Put my heart on the shelf.

       Why was I born?

        All I do is mourn.

        No happiness, no reasons,

        I just survive the seasons.

        I heard a voice say,

        I love you, don't stray! 

        For, I rolled away the Stone!

        You're never alone!

“The Queen of hearts to grace the day?
It seems connection dissipated away.
To find this love, a guiding light,
I weep across the centuries of every night.

The world set before me,
All the limitations that be;
The only way to stay free
Is to leave.

​

What a lonely place,

And my footprints can trace,
The storming time without grace
That I grieve.

My Maiden Beautiful to transcend in glory?
I’m sensing the drain to sink this story.

To reclaim ideals, a drifting truth,

I weep upon meaning to revive youth.

The time that has passed me,
Every tragedy that be;

My shades cannot free,
Nor relieve.

What a crying place,

And my past can now trace,
Every lost hope without grace
That I heave.

I receive the chastisement in silence,
As a tear of the trousseau I hearken.
My teardrops fade into the night

And the deepest of my shades darken.

Still through our separation I feel you near;
Your trust and love embattle fear.

Though away I am sailed to my knightly demise,
I know the truth is behind your eyes.

Never before has there been such injustice,
And not ever again will there be . . .”

“A thought is planted; my trust laid fair.

Our souls are granted, to each the other’s care.

My heartbeat is written with words of endurance.

I find her heart smitten to save up insurance.

Goodnight, dearest to my heart—

My dream for two, a wish apart.

True may it be, when nighttime starts,

You're in my dreams and in my heart.

A prayer is given; my love made clear.

Our souls are driven, to each what is dear.

My spell is broken by cries in the night.

I cherish the token of what was once right.

Goodnight, dearest to my heart—

My dream for two, a wish apart.

Though all goes dark, when light departs,

You're in my dreams and in my heart.

Close your eyes; find whatever is true.

A fantastic world of dreams awaits you.

In Castles and Kingdoms, you’ll spend your time here;

No need to break out—everything is sincere!

Now picture this, love as real as can be;

All that you need to set your mind free.

As dreamers and seekers, we'll find our hearts here;

Without any doubts—everything is sincere!

The beauty of it sweet,

The grace of it right,

Entangled in sweet dreams—

Goodnight! goodnight!

The moment in a tease,

To come before the light;

Whispering sweet dreams—

Goodnight! goodnight!

Little darling hold true,

And let the rest become of you . . .”