RANJANA SHARAN SINHA

RANJANA SHARAN SINHA

Dream Girl

Amid blasting music

and flashing lights--

An array of blues, greens,

hot pinks and gold,

she appears and swims in

the midnight river of the bar:

The translucent honey doll

with firefly eyes

dances seductively

in a scanty top with

swinging movements of her hips

to  a Bollywood track--

Her thick obsedian hair

cascading down her caramel skin

like the waves eventide

on a sandy beach!

Duped, sold, and abused

in a magic city full of lure,

the girl quite often feels

lost and devastated!

That night she cried a lot

before getting skimpily dressed

and dancing to the beat.

No one knows the horrors

the girl has endured;

no one knows this is not

her desired way of life--

Soon She'd suffer the same fate

as an empty wine bottle

to be thrown off with

a bit of dredges,

or a cigarette butt

smoked and thrown off!

Memories of her native village

beckon her home

like a bosom buddy

from yawning mustard fields

opening their eyes after dewy sleep

under frazil-silver sky with

bursts of amber and rose!

The village and her parents:

All have become pictures

on a fading album page

wrapped in uncertainty,

full of melancholy murmurs!

She dreams in darkness

feeling the ache and the

lost contours deep in her bosom!

Like Never Before

Your words

Touched within my soul

Deep chords

The rains

Silent acquiescence

Amid pains

Slowly

Bloomed a blue rose

Silently

Unlike the crowd

Red, pink, purple, and yellow

Sapphire in shroud

Dream-like waves

With a unique sense of surreal

The soul strides

Heart's garden

The ocean of infinite love

Petals open

Time and space

Deep down in the blue ocean

Have no trace

Autumn Leaves

Rain collapses, comes the fall,

Fall and flutter autumn leaves:

Rusted, brown, yellow, tan,

Sad silent autumn leaves!

Once they waltz with wind;

Now they lie on the ground,

Tell me why the cruel wind

Never feels for autumn leaves?

Divorced, bleached, full of dust,

The leaves whirl and twirl,

None can fathom the languid grief--

Wan and pallid autumn leaves!

Pestilence- striken, longing for life;

Lost lyrics in swell and wane,

Like the mortals who ail and die:

Transient, fading autumn leaves!

Hazy shadows, suspended breaths;

Ripples of silence ever-widening,

An acute feeling of autumn in life

Sad ruffles of autumn leaves!

A slip into sepia, grey horizons--

No cerulean skies at eventide,

The fading fires of sunset vault--

I share the fate of autumn leaves!

RANJANA SHARAN SINHA

RANJANA SHARAN SINHA: A professor (English) and poet, Dr. Ranjana Sharan Sinha is a well-known and authentic voice in Indian Poetry in English. Two of her poems have been included in the CBCS syllabus for 4 sem (M.A. English) at university level. She is an eminent author and critic, too. Authored and published 07 books in different genres and 50 research papers covering different themes and subjects. The books are :1. Spring Zone (A collection of poems and Haiku) 2. Midnight Sun(A collection of Short Stories) 3.Nature in the Poetry of William Wordsworth and Sumitranandan Pant(Criticism) 4.Feminism:Times and Tides(A historiographical and theoretical commentary on feminism with a unique perspective) 5. Different Dimensions (A collection of research papers presented in different national and international conferences and seminars) 6. Scents and Shadows (A collection of poems)7. Rhymes for Children. Recipient of many awards for her contribution to literature from reputed institutions and publishing houses. Received commendation from the former President of India, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam for her poem 'Mother Nature'. Poems, short stories, articles and research papers published in highly acclaimed dailies, magazines, web-zines and archives at national and international levels  in print and online. Poems and Ghazals published in more than 15 global anthologies. Her poems have been translated into German, Spanish, Russian, Albanian, Persian, and Hindi languages. The topic of her research was "Sri Aurobindo and the Epic Tradition". Research supervisor, RTM Nagpur University, Nagpur, India. Associated with many Poetry Groups and literary associations. Lives in Nagpur with her husband who is a doctor (ophthalmoligist).