अशी पाखरे येती

अशी पाखरे येती आणिक स्मृती ठेवुनी जाती
दोन दिसांची रंगत संगत दोन दिसांची नाती

चंद्र कोवळा पहिलावहिला
झाडामागे उभा राहिला
जरा लाजुनी जाय उजळुनी काळोखाच्या राती

फुलून येता फूल बोलले
मी मरणावर हृदय तोलले
नव्हते नंतर परि निरंतर गंधित झाली माती

हात एक तो हळु थरथरला
पाठीवर मायेने फिरला
देवघरातिल समईमधुनी अजून जळती वाती

कुठे कुणाच्या घडल्या भेटी
गीत एक मोहरले ओठी
त्या जुळल्या हृदयांची गाथा सूर अजुनही गाती

--  मंगेश पाडगांवकर

Snows of Kilimanjaro

There are some stories that read differently when you read them at different times in your life. It seems like you are seeing your life's reflection in these stories, and you find yourself nodding as you read them. And then as you ruminate, some things that were in the haze of your mind's background suddenly connect and shimmer forth.

I had read Snows of Kilimanjaro long back, and then, I had appreciated it for its brilliant portrayal of a dying man's mind. Today I read it, and I see much more. I see how his mind wanders and reminisces and regrets and how he eventually reaches an understanding. The understanding that everything he didn't do, was because he didn't do it, and because dreams need too much of work and renunciation to make them real. And that those were really not the dreams he wanted badly enough. Its a revelation that comes too late, there is no turning back, no fixing it in future. But its an understanding that gives him his peace.

Its a beautiful story. 

Road not taken

I find myself wondering about this many a times. What would life have been if any of the choices had just been different? And what would I have missed from here if life was different?


Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.


-- Robert Frost

A Lifetime of Learning

Another awesome strip from Zen.

What a wonderful world

Invictus

Nelson Mandela would recite this poem to his fellow prisoners during his long incarceration.


Out of the night that covers me,
   Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
   For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
   I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
   My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
   Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
   Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
   How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
   I am the captain of my soul.

                               --  William Henley

जिंदगी जब भी तेरी बज़्म

I have been missing one of my favorite compositions. Here it is.

जिंदगी जब भी तेरी बज़्म में लाती है हमें
यह ज़मीन चाँद से बेहतर नझर आती है हमें

सुर्ख फूलों से मेहक उठी है दिल कि राहें
दिन ढले यूँ तेरी आवाज़ बुलाती है हमें

याद तेरी कभी दस्तक कभी सरगोशी से
रात के कितने पेहर रोज़ जगाती है हमें

हर मुलाक़ात का अंजाम जुदाई क्यों है
अब तो हर वक़्त यही बात सताती है हमें

                                 -- कैफी आझमी