To Our Beloved Children Poem by DEEPAK KUMAR PATTANAYAK

The time away from school
For may be one brief hour or so
Or a summer long through a sabbatical
Ah! how delightful it looks
Happiness untold, of joy and zeal
With friends unto fields and groves
Hunting lights of phantom and rainbow-gold and spitball
Until unto books
Good to see again how you turn being studious and thoughtful
But when an anguish of pandemic lashes
And such infamous rounds of holiday follow without a school
Between, what then do you do and say within confines
Of home and room overseeing seemingly a thorny wall
Now that alienates this world and the sky you touch and smell but in scares
Though conforming to rules you move but in veil
Half in throb and half in smile while recalling friends,
Teachers, class rooms, playground, recess and closing bell
Oh, could I but understand the moment of your winter blues
Yet I believe in academy you will stand out well
From strength to strength grow and develop competitive edges
For the time away from allows you to become mature, composed and cool
As from shallow and murky waters springs up a lotus
So will you sprout and bloom from such weeds as well
Leaving a mark and setting an instance on the path of ambivalence
Cathedral of morning as when my eyes fall
Upon you I see the whole universe lighted up with your radiance
Serenity of evening when I see you around stars above in the sky twinkle
Shimmering in the dark diffusing brightness through your charms
Happiness of night when I look at you it seems as if all
The sun and sky and ocean melting into one in your quiet starlit eyes
Suffusing love and peace and tranquilizing us to sleep in serene stars'light quietly
Oh, dear come to sleep for midnight draws nigh awaiting to fill you with dreams
And will soon usher in morning with delights of birds, sunlight, cloudlets, flowerlets, leaflets so magical
And ceremonial- -chill, thrill, still, frail - - oh! catch and hold them that they may pass on soon as life's sweetest moments