Friday, July 1, 2022

SWAPNA BEHERA

 


A Night In The Refugee Camp

 

In the refugee camp of Afghanistan

Scorching days of ‘No Water’

Desperate queue of   hours hue

Only a bucket per a tent

 

Lusty eyes of the guard

Craving gesture of all horror

Precondition placed by him

An extra bucket; come for a night

 

Never a night but explosive fight

Never comes the dawn or peeps the Sun

 Shahnaz a girl of fourteen

Awake whole night in a fix

in her tent a bucket for six!

Those five days she needs water  more

 

Restless Shahnaj makes a deal

Better to be the Begum of the guard

Instead of burning every second

Can bathe and wash all her parts

 

Monthly these days will be stress-free

So what the guard above sixty

Certainly, water beyond all needs

 

Fourteen-year Shahnaz chooses the path

Walks to the guard slowly and slowly

“Uncle, will you marry me?”

Copy right @ swapna Behera

(This poem is translated into 67 languages and published in many National Na International journals and magazines  }

 

 

Migration At Zindagi.Com

 

Every migration is harrowing

You cannot carry the well

The old broom or the doormat

Or your granny’s patchwork bed sheet

Even your diaspora heart

That craves for berries, mangoes

And guavas of the backyard

 

Every migration is painful

You have to carry the domicile certificate,

Your I Card and Aadhar

But you cannot carry

The tea shop of the Nukkad

Where people play Holy

Sing Kirtans in the evenings

 

You may carry the bucket

But not the water

You may carry the deity

But not the enchanting echo of the mantras

You can carry the memory

But certainly not the scenery

 

Every migration burns within

But projects to be damn cool outside

 

Migrations leave behind night jasmines

A flowing river that taught you swimming

A mountain that gave you height

A spring season that blossoms love within you

 

Those rice powder Rangoli

Marigold flowers in the courtyard

The fresh Hilsha fish of Padma

Porridge cooked on bamboo leave stoves

Mustard flowers in winter

The fresh green veggie

On the banana leave plates

 

Migration makes you a solitary reaper

On the Metros Escalator

But yes you can stay in the Holiday Resorts

To upload a photo in the Face book

All that you have left behind

 

You will buy a living fish in a jar

To show your child a new zone

Zone of Zindagi.com..........

 

The Juvenile Time Zone

 

The illuminated satellites

With floundering credible numerals

The robot with a portable heart in the briefcase

The synthetic salad on the plates

Malfunction of the globe’s wardrobe

Dissolving glacier

The radiating reading glasses

The planet will hire a story teller and a Love Guru

The lucrative smiles of granny

from the frames of the heritage

A peeping melody of a canary bird

From the horizon

The last hibiscus in the park

The lost tiger in the cemetery

Love, the costliest spice in the diaspora cuisines

Little eyes gazing to ozone

with the mask of oxygen

The diaphragm of time will crack

The impulsive butterfly will fly

A fairy will reborn as a Banyan Tree

Rag pickers will dance with books

The mothers will hold digital progeny

The Earth will celebrate   a new dawn

The squandered forests will spring

the Anthems   of a new Time Zone.....

 

         

   Knock ! Knock !

                           

      Be silent dear islands, mountains and rivers

      The youth tired and weary

      withered; in hibernation

     Searching Google to express emotions of love

     Just a minute; let him sleep and dream

        Love swirls, swims in his blood

      Love is accredited or debited

       Or is it never deposited?

    Nations are drops of dew in the bucket of winter

    Love is in the nests of sparrow

 

   Is love a portrait or a proposal?

   hung in the front room with dry flowers

     Dear leaves don’t ever feel degraded

    The Google is colourful

    The ducks are muddy in the real pond

   Is there none to welcome love?

  The child is alone in his own planet

   Where is the whistling?

  Where is the canopy?

   No hip hop of visions

   Everywhere the traffic of money

 

  Knock knock

  May be love at the door

   with astounding graphics of eternal logo

   Listen to the splendour of the nature, forests and  rivers

They are the love makers,

song makers and profound progeny

The cumus  or cupids !!

Knock knock .......

 

A Poet Is Dying Tonight

 

A poet is dying tonight;

In a panacea of blood

Enough of transfusion, transmission

And lots of confusion

He is in love with the widow droplets on the grass

Love is a forbidden Adam’s apple

A poet is a pet or the Jagir of the society

His heart is on lease

He can neither smile or cry

Has to be in the syndrome of hangover

 

A poet is dying tonight

Tired and sleepless,

wrapping the blankets of the stars

The tattoo of time on his soul

Is he the broken bangle pieces

to celebrate peace?

Or a prism to refract the beam of light?

A stamped flesh hung in the butcher’s shop?

A poet is dying tonight; before comes the twilight

The world is ready for the funeral condolences

Let him die peacefully

For thousands are in the queue

To be the martyrs, to be the poets ..........l

 

SWAPNA BEHERA

 

SWAPNA BEHERA is a trilingual contemporary poet, author, translator, environmentalist and editor from Odisha, India who writes in English, Hindi and Odia. She was a teacher of Mont Fort School from 1984 to 1995 and a teacher of Kendriya vidyalaya from 1995 to 2015. Her stories, poems and articles are widely published in National and International journals, and ezines, and are translated into different national and international languages. She has penned seven books of different genres including one children's literature on Environment. She is the recipient of the International Mother Language UGADI AWARD WINNER 2019, honored from Gujurat Sahitya Akademi , International Poesis Award of Honor at the 2nd Bharat Award for Literature as Jury in 2015, The Enchanting Muse Award in India World Poetree Festival 2017,  World  Icon of Peace Award in 2017, and the Pentasi B World Fellow Poet in 2017.. ATAL BIHARI BAJPAYEE Award 2018, Rabindranath Tagore Award 2020,2022. Mahatma Surja Kumar Karfarma Memorial Honor 2020, Konark Odisha award,Smt Simhadri VisalakshiMemorial Award FOR literary Excellence 2019, International  Life Time Achievement Award  the Honoured Poet of India from the Seychelles Government accredited Literary Society LLSF and from Algeria,Morocco, Kajhakhstan ,modern Arabic Literary Renaissance of  Egypt, Republic of Kyrgyzstan; International Arts Council Argentina etc. She has bagged nearly 50 National and International Awards. Her one poem A NIGHT IN THE REFUGEE CAMP is translated into 67 languages. At present she is   the Cultural Ambassador for India and south Asia of Inner Child Press U.S. The Chief Admin of India and Middle East zone of India office of the Motivational strips. Cultural Convenor &Literary Coordinator of   International Society for Intercultural Studies and Research ISISAR of Eastern India. She is the life member of Odisha Environmental Society, a peace activist whose motto is Listen to the tears and Save Mother Earth for every child.


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