Journey through the windy lanes
Date : 2021-04-23I count the the passing cars
plying the dull highway.
The wind is as dusty as it gets.
The unhappy firmament smokes in scary clouds.
I get teary from the incense that pours off the smith shop;
I run for life, the road seems to fall down an abyss of darkness.
I have plans, yet I have to go where the road leads me, there are no byways.
The violet rain drizzles till I can see no further than a yardstick.
My feet are numbed and I fall on my knees: yet I crawl, for the clock ticks. I rise up each time.
A car or two pass again : happy faces peeping through the wipering panes. Some having quarrels going within. Some sobbing.
A frail old man rests his hand on my shoulder and offers help. I'm startled.
Whence did he come? How can he help?
He points towards his ramshackle van.
Soon I'm several miles through and reach the lighted streets of a shabby town.
Its no paradise, but I've escaped hell.
The town is packed with shops
But no shop is too big
Pedestrians throng the breadths of streets
and loaded bikes lace through.
No beggars can be seen around
No frail man plods the way
I pass through the market like a brook of breeze, with no rolls to spend along.
The other side of town is a family of houses
People seem to have limitless hours of leisure
I feel at home unless I talk with some:
for then I discover the distant stars of otherness to be shallow pools of triviality.
Discomfort gently seeps into my bones
as my vision sprawls
beyond the straits of dreary days.
When efforts don't yield the fruits they earn;
and are snarled in blinding chains:
a new breed of temperament evolves
a dogged shield and sword.
Labour soon decrypts the gordian knot of mediocrity
and lights up the road to fortune;
And thus I ride the occult way
like an eagle through the bolts.