Self-Driven

Posted on 18/07/2016 by Alka

Source: Deviant Art Charpener

Self-Driven

Driving my life, now
Wheels unstuck from the daily rut
Towards all things fine

~~~

For the daily prompt Drive

Orbs of Light – Sun & Moon

Posted on 22/04/2016 by Alka

Borrowed Glory

Shining in my glory
You charm the lovesick couples?
Thus spoke sun to moon

Hopegivers

As big star goes down
Little bro moon shows its face
Keeping our hopes alive

(sunset from my backyard and moon coming up from the front)

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These are my two haiku written for Ronovan Writes Haiku Challenge 93
The two words provided were: Sun & Moon

Today I attempted haiku poems after a long time. I’m not very good at it, I thought.
But then what am I good at? I wondered. I wrote. I let it be…

Red, White and Blue

Posted on 18/11/2015 by Alka

Huge Solidarity

Opera House roofed
In blue, white and red hues
Lighted compassion

For two days, the sails of Sydney’s iconic Opera House displayed blue, white and red, the colors of the national flag of France. See more pictures from around the world here.

***

picture credit: ireport

Crying Jacaranda

Purple blossoms rain
From canopy of branches
A beautiful mess

Sydney streets are commonly lined with Jacaranda trees and in late spring to early summer that it is now, trees display magnificent purple flowers. There are carpets of blue all around and from a distance, the flowers blooming above and the ones fallen below, kind of look synchronized.
But stale fallen flowers soon become a messy risk for pedestrians who have been known to slip on these.
Jacaranda is very much a dream tree of Sydney-siders who kind of measure time with the arrival of flowers on street side Jacaranda trees.

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These were my two Haiku for Ronovan Writes Weekly Haiku Poetry Prompt Challenge 71
The two prompts provided were Cover & Color.

The featured header image is Mumbai’s main railway station, the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus lit up in the colors of the French national flag.

Weltshmertz and our Woeful Longing

Posted on 17/10/2015 by Alka

Words like longing and pining pull our heart strings because longing is related to some unfulfilled desire or an unmet need, something that most of of have experienced in life or continue to do so.

Previously, on seeing the words Pine & Grief provided for Ronovan Writes Haiku Challenge, I couldn’t help thinking of this phrase ‘we pine for what is not‘.

This phrase, that represents the universal truth, is originally from the poem To The Skylark by P.B. Shelly. For the first time I brought another writer’s work into my post.
Shelly says ‘we look before and after…and pine for what is not…’
I gave it a twist by adding ‘we overlook what we have got…’

Pining for grief

We pine for what is not
And overlook what we’ve got
Recipe for our grief

Thus, the trouble with us is not just that we long too much for our past or that scheme too much for our future. It’s also that we don’t focus on our present, forever ungrateful for what we currently have, while not making the most of it. By doing all this we are ‘pining for what is not’ as well as unconsciously creating sadness and misery rather than positively constructing happiness by taking our current life in our own hands.

*** ***

My second haiku is about a different kind of longing…

Weltshmertz

Hi-tech generation
Craving perpetual novelty
Desolation lingers

Weltshmertz is a feeling of sadness caused by ills of the world, as too much craving brings world weariness.

Longing is not all bad though. There’s a unique pleasure in yearning for the ones we love. It shows that we care. And yet, excess is bad – for excessively desperate longing is not just a sign of existing depression but it is addictive and cyclical, thus causing more depression.

Ebb and Flow Of Poetic Challenges

Posted on 03/10/2015 by Alka

My participation in Ronovan Writes Weekly Haiku Challenge is very unpredictable. It all depends upon the ebb and flow of fluids within my grey matter.

The two words provided to us this week: Tide & Flesh.

Flesh and blood humans
Riding on the tides of time
Helpless dummies

Go with the flow
Or use might against the tide
Triumph be the goal

Burn yourself out
Melt your flesh and bone
Tides will change

Nation advances
A rising tide lifts all boats
All lives boom

Causing big tides
Mighty Moon flexes its muscles
I rule the Earth!!

Receding tides brought
A mermaid’s body on the beach
Sea’s beautiful gift

~~~

Yayyyy!! (still counting the haiku).

Bonded Forever!

Posted on 11/09/2015 by Alka

A month old baby sleeping on top of his mother

Such bonds are not undone
With the cutting of umbilical chord
Ties that nourish forever.

Maa! That was the best sleep ever!

My son’s picture, clicked many years ago, was for the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Connection

For Cute Buds and Flowers…

Posted on 08/09/2015 by Alka

After I wrote my post ‘Crushed Crush’ (in response to the Daily Post’s writing prompt ‘First Crush’)…Roopam of Whimsical90 asked “Aren’t crushes cute?” but she also commented that there are “uncertainties and butterflies involved“

That cute conversation inspired a cute poem:

Crushes are cute buds
Best before they finally wilt
Upon blooming into a flower

(There are cute buds that bloom into flowers of love; some then survive but get stale with time, others simply crumble and die.)

To drown in Wine and Poetry

Posted on 07/09/2015 by Alka

Woman and Wine

Ditched by a bad hen
He immersed not in his tears
Soused himself in wine

Hooked to Tears

Poetry that pours out
From the core of a weeping heart
Addictive as wine

(addictive to the writer as well as the reader)

~~~

These were my two Haiku poems for: Ronovan Writes Weekly Haiku Poetry Prompt Challenge 61. Have a look at Ronovan’s site. You too can take part in Haiku Challenge.

Words provided this week: Wine & Tears

Playing these Games of Chance

Posted on 04/09/2015 by Alka

Games of Chance

In the game of Bridge
As also in the game of Life
Chance decides our moves.

Yes it does. Those who completely believe in this, leave it all to chance.

Better still, when playing the game…learn the rules, focus, know your playing partners enough and be respectable towards the opponent. Even after that you may lose. That’s because a probability of always winning is low anyway.

Hence, make the most of what you have and enjoy while you’re at it…that’s the best you can do.

~~~

For: Ronovan Writes Weekly Haiku Poetry Prompt Challenge 60.
Words provided this week: Bridge & Move

Kleptomania Aborted

Posted on 27/08/2015 by Alka

Too bird-brained she was
To thus get caught red-handed
Thief’s Labor Lost

Through my little Haiku poem, I’m not making fun of some woman caught stealing by a shopkeeper’s CC camera. But the shock or disbelief is there when we see some decent person stealing petty things.

“What? She was stealing? My gosh!! But she’s so well-off. Does she need to steal a lipstick?”

“Oh! She’s a kleptomaniac”

Kleptomania is the inability to refrain from the urge to steal items and is done for reasons other than personal use or financial gain, defines Wikipedia

So, is this stealing compulsion a depression of a some sort? After all this act is for some emotional satisfaction rather than material gains. Kleptomaniacs often steal things they do not really need.

While this mania is not totally harmless, there are often no ill-intentions as such towards the product owner. That’s why stealing is carried out without any intelligent plan, and that is the reason so many kleptomaniacs are caught, esp. when it becomes too much of a habit. Like when they steal too often or steal too many things.

And because most kleptomaniacs are women, it makes sense that women often make news when they get caught stealing petty things.

Men. Now men either do not steal that often…or they do not get caught.

Jokes apart, women are generally known to seek happiness through shopping, what we positively call ‘retail therapy’. For some people, excessive shopping that is seemingly harmless, does help fill their emotional vacuum or loneliness, while others who are even more emotionally disturbed, take their shopping addiction one step further, as they begin to find comfort in an addiction called stealing.

Possibly it’s not as innocent as that. What if they are established small time thieves and not harmless kleptomaniacs. It could be a bad habit from childhood carried till adulthood. A moral lesson not learnt the whole life, as nobody punished them for their first wrongdoing.

Whatever it is, the need is to not make fun of anyone who’s addicted to this kind of petty stealing but get the person to seek counseling so that the root cause of their problem can be traced. Try saving a human heart and soul if you can, with love and kindness.

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