Impresario Poem by Ananta Madhavan

At dawn my awakened senses
Muddle my moods and tenses.
I don’t know why or how
Last night segued into Now.
Distinctions begin to dawn
And brighten up the morn.
All things grow different;
But am I recurrent?
We are impresarios
Playing roles, sad to jocose.

He “wandered lonely as a cloud”,
A famous poet, fancy proud,
Mused about the daffodils,
Along the lakeside on the hills.
Clouds are seldom lonesome; they merge
Or dissipate in wisps, as if to purge
Identities in mass, or diverge
From us who want to wake up sure
That we are alone, distinct and pure.

Sir Percy Someone came to speak
Of how he brought the natives meek
In East Africa to understand
That Britain gave them self-rule and
Civility with modern ways. But
He deplored the scholar-mutt
Who chose the poet’s highland blossoms
For a group of school-kid possums
In Class Four. I, who came to London town
To proudly represent my land’s renown,
Refused to let that pass. Even in the tropics
English poems are not barred topics.

Those blooms are seen with “inward eyes”,
When daylight brightens up dark dyes.

- - - - - - - - September 2015