The phantom delight hangs no more!

O, bemused mystery of wonder!

You are the silver chain of fancy

And evening mentor of joys high!

And happy boon at noon

Or midnight’s roaring void

And wintery smile in moon?

Or perennial source of ecstasy

Or eternal source of sigh? 
Your stately presence baffles me!

Behold! how flower sings

And shinning dew drops fall

Past my eyes the young sun beats

Far from earth on heaven’s call!

My life beats like ball of fire

And memories whirl me back

Where profound light lacks

To shape in a gentle form--

A form that truly wrings.

When the warm blood lurked
Into my vessels sputtering and spitting

Like tinted drops from top to bottom,

Life sensed a disjunct frenzy in crowd.

A holy spring sprang into my vision

And blessed gently every fabric of numb soul, hence,

Desert turned into a flamed lamp.

And vanished quickly the illusion elf

Ere I woke up in a blossomed sense!

The phantom delight hangs no more!

You have tolled me back from death to life

And poured forth nectar in my bosom.

Where are you my waking dream?

In the next valley glades?

Ah, you are forlorn!

Heavy heavens lower on me

And chained prisoners chase

This drowsy frame breaks.

How soon fancy fades away

In deep valleys—far, far, away, away!

Hark! This sweet feeble voice…..

Wasn't it the same murmuring music

Just past, is now no more?

Adieu, adieu you vision!

Adieu, adieu you elf!

You are a fancy of fugitive mirth.

Days and nights are eternal

On limitless horizon and deathless earth.

Your presence lingers in my entangled memory

Like a meaningful moment of past.

And how enchanting were you

Even for a short while!

Oh, the memory of what had been

No more for ever shall be!
                                           © Written by Manoj Kumar Mishra

Present is Present

Past, past and gone past

Do they ever anything cast?

They do. They mould.

They shape, they truly cast

The actions of present

And advent future

To be or not to be

To abide or glide.

Comers will be coming

Goers will be going

Men will be living

Living and dying

Dying on bed

Living being fed

They will be lying

Lying on earth

Spying on grave

Fighting like brave

Laughing their mirth

Pleasure to unearth

And glory to crave.

All will then

Inseparably remain

With them to retain

Their sorrow and moan

Moan and grief
The knotted tale warrants so brief.

All are friends

Of men in silence

Who is dumb pretending

And deaf withstanding

Deaf not to hear

And dumb not to bear

The cracks of stone

Which grieves its groan.

The wolves in men

Now live in present

And leave their past

Past to die

And present to belie.

Lo! One more moment is gone

Present is present and past forlorn
On the perennial path of eternity
Where there is no life nor death. 
                                © Written by Manoj Kumar Mishra

We could not Come Close

Of the very late in September

Of tumultuous year we pierced each other

Silent eyes met contacted corner.

They turned soon the other side

To peep into the scarlet flowers’ glide.

We were nervous feeling the breaths beat

And parted for months in solitary seat.

Of the very early in next October

We marched soul by soul  

And turned aside in mid November.

I have been reiterating our relations

In December of our journey

Why we could not come close to know

Each other’s true heart beatings illumine

Every confusion of stoutly tangled emotions.

I feel like one who laughs abnormally

And turning shall remark quickly

His own expression in dry reflection

My self-possession seems a naught

In the gutter of wastes collection.

All lives wear the pretention of innocence

Though understand unspoken language of mortals

Under the mechanical and tired desire

Under the pretention truth struts

And flies in the high sky with automatic wings

“It falls, grows pale, specter-thin and dies.”

Certainly does it happen, truly does it lie.

This galvanizes me. I am no past.

It hurts me.

This is the way life crosses the earth

Staring behind the euphoric dearth. 
                                           © Written by Manoj Kumar Mishra

Time Surpasses Immortality

When pinch of godly emotions diluted

Into optical fusion of matted commotions

And the whole concealed constellation

Beguiled its proclaim in dismal dismay,

Gurgling upsurges fused with a shy smile

Amidst the mute chambers of heavy heads.

Nothing like bleak differences hanged to touch

The tumbling words of unfeigned relations.

But the sole identity of your individual reflections

Fleeced the wailing lunacy from Lethe

To sit divulged into deep oceans of cosmic naught.

Was it I who deliberately reckoned the future age

Or were it you who loved the image?

Your honeyed grace arched the parentage.

I understand love: for it creates

It activates, it inspires, it shapes

The action in distraction

Of men and women in silent backstage.

You hardly embodied it.

For you it was a grown up 'why'.

“Why shall one muse into other's eyes ?”

Love knows no burden, my friend,

Nor the weight, nor the change, nor the bend

Except the goodness, the virtue, the life

The action, the attraction, the greater sacrifice.

Love compels cruelty to those

Who don’t understand it.

Life is meaningless to those

Who always withstand it

Like the silent statues that repose

Bewildering the winks of eyes' propose.

This carnal frame is to break

With the clarion call of time.

Time sheds tears for none.

It surpasses the immortality.

Who can’t predict the dire futility

Of men and women who come and go

Trumpeting the idiot's cimbasso?

I urge yet again dear friend

Either you call me from behind

Or I call you from front to bind

The broken chords to rewind

To come to walk soul by soul

To come to tread foot by foot

To come to march hand-in-hand

On the perennial path of eternity

Where ebbing life salutes dying death
And immortality does not chase suspended breath.
                                                       © Written by Manoj Kumar Mishra