As A Writer, What To Narrate It? Poem by Bijay Kant Dubey

As a writer started I my journey long back in the eighties
And since then have been writing,
Devoting near about ten to twelve hours to studies daily
But none supported me
In my onward journey.

My father wanted to see me posted in the administrative service
But chose I differently,
Struggled, suffered and sacrificed
And life taught me
In full destitute instead of being well-to-do.

I published my first collection of poems, The Ferryman (Songs of Soul)
From which the excerpts appeared in Debonair magazine, Bombay
With the comments of Adil Jussawalla
And after that fell seriously ill
And there had been a little hope of survival.

Again, something saved me and the struggle continued in
And while moving to the university after my M.A. in English
As for my Ph.D. on D.H.Lawrence,
The bus I was travelling turned turtle
And I came out of the window thanking God
As just it took a curve on the sideway mud
And turned over.

Again, did I my M.A. in History and Pol.Sc.
Without being given a part-time teaching job,
Neither in a college nor in a school,
The customers used to take the milk from our dairy farm
And used to pay not properly,
The servants too had been bad.

I used to milk the buffaloes and cows from VII upto my Ph.D.
With my hand,
Forty litres a day
And used to look after
But father had not been so worldly
And at that time the salary too had been low.

We had the farmlands seventy kms. away from the service place of my father
But the production never did it come to regularly,
As we had been so humble and submissive,
From the tillers and farmers
Given on contract
And they showing reasons for the deficit always,
As for scanty rains, poor harvest and theft.

Even then doing household works and ill-paid tuitions,
I supported and promoted many a journal poet
After subscribing to little journals
But forgot they,
Moving ahead,
Left me behind
And I too cared not for name and fame.

Many of my poems saw not the light of the day
And the rats gnawed them,
The white ants ate into,
Snakes sat into,
The scorpions came out from sometimes.

If this be the thing, how to call myself a poet,
How to write poetry,
How to think of survival as a poet,
How to save the old books of father?

Many in the house ask it,
How long will you go reading,
Why no to sell the old sheets of paper to the hawkers,
Why to keep the rooms stocked with?