A rural schoolboy's revolt OR An antipastorale

Who prefers to have flies in his bedchamber?
Or for that matter, all manner of insects?
How romantic to consider the prospects
Of a cricket's chirps that rob one of slumber?
Yes, the stars are bright and the grass is tender,
Arcadian dreams are gay in many respects;
Yet lying in Elysian fields one suspects
That adders do not make for sweet surrender.

It is much to the credit of Tennyson
And other fools of the English Lake District
To pen rhymes for - a cloud, a lark, a peasant
By the fireside in their stately mansions
But who asks the cottar before they depict
A fancied idyll that only sounds pleasant?

(a-b-b-a-a-b-b-a c-d-e-c-d-e)

Dear Jane

There exist such poems in your eyes dear,
Such as would endow the mundane with wonder.
You are the Muse to whom I must surrender,
For none of my own verses could come near.
Together we've seen joy, despair and fear,
You're my pupil, my guide, my child, my mother.
As eternal friend there could be no other,
But there is some news that you ought to hear.

Her eyes! Her eyes! They seem to hide something sad.
She writes worse than you, I concede that, but then,
Possessive longing, vain anxious desire
Was a feeling between us we never had.
We could remain soulmates till such time as when,
You choose to commit my poems to fire.

(a-b-b-a-a-b-b-a c-d-e-c-d-e)

Sonnet for Karbala

I call out from the grand mosque's slim minaret,
"Allahu Akbar, faithful come to prayer"
At Karbala, site of the Imam's slaughter,
Where Muslims come to repent their sins, regret.
But is our ancient, austere religion yet
Ours to practice, free from haunting fear?
For I'm afraid, on the streets walks a slayer,
He rules the land with machine gun and bullet.

From the time when Baghdad was founded by flames,
The chants of prayer have merged with those of death,
It was not enough that one Hussein had bled.
Greeks, Mongols, Americans shall press their claims,
Fools shed blood in this land until their last breath,
Iraq shall come to peace, when all men are dead.

(a-b-b-a-a-b-b-a c-d-e-c-d-e)

The Capital Sonnet

It's said when stubborn it is strong,
Thus swollen it will pick a fight.
Buried in sand it knows no wrong,
That's when it is not screwed on right.

When it's in love, it's over heels,
No sense can be drilled in at all.
It will claim none knows what it feels,
Till the rest bang theirs on a wall.

At times of pride it is held high,
Yet it must roll when fault is found.
It's the seat of reason but why
Do pretty faces turn it round?

The sanctum of our existence,
Yet bodyless, it makes no sense.

(a-b-a-b c-d-c-d e-f-e-f g-g)

Variant of Kosovo Polje

Who stood at Kosovo Polje?
Who heard the guns at Waterloo?
Who remembers those days today,
To bear the rancour this day too?

Who won, who lost at Panipat:
What's true and what is forgery?
None alive really would care but
For some cheap rag of history.

The writer's pen captures in ink,
The time we were meant to forget.
We read much but we do not think,
And contrived hatred we beget.

The last who remember are dead
We rush to take their place instead.

(a-b-a-b c-d-c-d e-f-e-f g-g)

Kosovo Polje

Who stood at Kosovo Polje?
Who heard the guns at Waterloo?
Who remembers those days today,
To bear the rancour this day too?

The writer's pen captures in ink,
The time we were meant to forget.
We read much but we do not think,
And contrived hatred we beget.

None lives who saw the mad work done.
But mention an imagined past,
None hesitate to pick a gun
And swear to defend to the last.

The last who remember are dead
We rush to take their place instead.

(a-b-a-b c-d-c-d e-f-e-f g-g)

The sleep that comes to all

I am the candle's dimming glow,
I am the quake that fells the tower.
I am the rust that blunts the plough,
I am the graceless fall from power.

I am the vine-enwreathed bower.
I am the silent stringless lyre.
I am the heat that wilts the flower,
I am the damp that stills the fire.

I am the end of all desire,
I am the ceaseless rest all crave.
I am the flagrance of the pyre,
I am the repose of the grave.

I am the ash to which ye fall,
I am the sleep that comes to all.

(a-b-a-b b-c-b-c c-d-c-d e-e)

The metre is a little odd, 8 beats in the b & c lines, 7 in the rest.