Happiness: I Know Thou, Not Still Poem by Aniruddha Pathak

Man's is useless passion, a thinker said,
Life is futile, a foison of stale dreams,
And not worth all the fuss heretofore made,
Which, more is made, more futile to me seems.

A hackney horse, happy he seldom feels,
As karmic workhorse too, miserable,
Trees happy look, so do birds, even eels,
For, little they care for an assigned label.

O Happiness, in thee he's himself not;
Nor when dark is night, nor yet when he sees
A beautiful sunrise, picturesque spot,
A tranquil lake, nor nature as it is!

Yet, should there be no happiness on earth,
Unto a hellhole the planet might turn,
Or else, this Creation's monstrous non-worth,
Won't with a strange smirk the sun might here burn?

Yet, more melancholic man grows, the more
Meaningful he oft feels thanks his ego,
Strange, but in joy, apart he feels from core,
And seeds of misery he tends to sow.

So, how much happiness this man deserves?
As virtue scarce to me seems his chief good,
Nor any a vice mankind to self serves,
And lost is he though familiar's the wood.

In pampering pain man his own self seems,
And yet, pain does when pinch, man's a misfit,
Things going all wrong he resorts to dreams,
In perfect fit man still forgets his feet!

He too forgets him if life's fulfilling,
In dilemma: to be or not to be,
If to swim this ocean of misery,
Life looks when futile of any meaning.

An idle nurse man seems to every vice,
A sure mother of all the ignorance,
Of all melancholy, of loaded dice,
He hopes still, ignorance is bliss at once.

O Happiness, thou art an enigma,
What season ye bloom, what's thine perfect clime?
More I know, more I drown in dilemma,
Who's known thee, and who has time's primeval rhyme?

Thou art relative, Happiness, like time,
In pain we know time seems to stand nigh still,
In good tidings it takes to wings sublime,
And yet thou dwelleth far beyond the hill!

It's man that makes happiness hard to kiss,
How? By inflating passions' appetite,
What else? His joys are here and hard to miss,
O offload that mind-dwelling load, feel light.

Happiness, ye hardly dwell in having,
But lie in contentment, Frugal Being,
The mind readily appreciating,
And heart in a perennial state of spring.

To wretched man bliss scarce be in being,
Nor happy he's on way to becoming.
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First line, the reference is to Sartre.
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Ode | 06.11.11 |