Prayag Saikia

Like a sprout
new time appears
from the cocoon of a hibernating past.
...

From the star of Bethlehem
If we draw a line
We shall find
It doesn't end in pieta
...

God does speak sometimes
Not like the ‘elan vital'
But merely as a meek human - - -
...

Why do the roots, born in the sky
Thirst for the soil?

On moonlit nights
...

Along the path of time
Old and infirm,
I go seeking the shade of a peepul.
...

Why need the splendid orchids thrive on others?
Why can't the euphonic cuckoos set up nests on their own?

Don't bring up these issues
...

With the disappearance of the green and the yellow,
The fields, now, are friendlessly alone.
Down memory lane
The mates of the mind are bidden adieu.
...

(On a painting by Pranab Barua)

With the descent of clouds upon the foothills
The heart trickles
...

A flock of birds
Scan the earth from the sky
Searching for ailing dead victuals.
...

When the rill meanders
Leaving the mist
Down to the sea
The splendour blooms.
...

Today I'll go to pay god my taxes
Taking along
A virile hunt.
...

Through the flaming fountains of light
That lie awake on the laps of the night
Like a life languishing in neglect,
Restless history
...

Give me an age
The scrupulous night's dark age
The royal fallen age
Struck by the venomous serpent.
...

In these very woods he had
Embraced obscurity;
He'd come fleeing from a faith,
That seized from one's view
...

Years ago I'd began to watch the trains of ants
I was stirred by their confluence
And scenes of picking of victuals.
...

The canvas has lost itself
In the yellows;
It's an iron easel that solely stands firm.
...

In the world of poetry
It's now the season of dismay
The kronch is in morning
...

It was an abyss of loneliness,
I reverently drew a figure
on my silhouette.
...

Pitching his tent in an impressionist garden,
does the green gardener
find an end to his strokes!
...

With the chrysalis of life
when lovers wait
for their winged world
happiness does not seem to be a will-o'-the-wisp.
...