As I Stand Today

As I stand today
@ sixty, the trail of milestones recede by
Clear, hazy, silhouette and dot.
The Time beckons
And ordains them out.

As I stand today
Alone, stuck in transit
Between the world lived and gone by
With all its clatter and clamour and clangour
And the world quietly in wait
With blossoms of promises.

As I stand today
At the exit edge
To bid you all adieu
With smiles of tears,
Rapture of forlorn agonies,
A colossal shadow behind me looms;
On my shoulder, a towering touch
Assuring ‘chinta se mukti’
In muffled million voices.


As I stand today
On the precipice, perilously perched,
Under the deep, dark, azure sky,
The long horizon watchful in hazy intrigue,
To breathe up to plunge
Into the ocean of time and space,
My prayer loud and shrill:

Let the exit find an orbit,
A path, a direction, a mission
Off the colossus of ESIC,
Ever growing, ever evolving,
Ever stretching its realms
To secure and shield
The humble souls in factories and field.

Let the prayer blossom
In myriad humming motions.
And in ringing rounds of flowery applauds
Let the dream not die down.
But all said and unsaid,
Let Thy will alone be done.
           -------------                                                                                   RK: 31/5/17


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