A CHILD SAID

 

A CHILD SAID

A child said

I am just a child

I still do not understand

The differences between political ideologies.

Today I am homeless.

My parents have been killed in the war.

I have also lost my playmates.

You are happy that you have killed

The people whom you considered wicked,

Whom you thought dangerous;

Whom you did not know,

But whom you were determined to kill.

They are dead, unwept, unremembered.

They are no longer there.

But I am here an orphan,

A child with no home, no school, no playground,

No toys, neither mother, nor father, no friend, no dreams.

I am sleepless. Theoretically alive practically dead.

 

I think and think but fail to understand

The so-called blessings of war, its victory

And the philosophy of celebrating that victory.

 

Don’t keep quiet at my questions.

If you have no answers, feel helpless,  and repent.

 

No beating of drums, only shedding of tears

For years to come.

 

                                                            *******

 

G.R.Kanwal

31^st May 2025  

AT LAST – A POEM

 

 

                   AT LAST – A POEM

          “AT LAST” is a poem by the American Quaker poet John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-92) .

          He is most famous for his anti-slavery writings.

          Among his quotes the most prominent is:  “Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest ones are “It might have been.” The purpose of this  quote is to  expresses the profound melancholy caused by lost opportunities and unfulfilled possibilities.      

          In the poem titled “At Last”, the poet seeks God’s guidance and comfort when he is completing his life’s journey.  

          According to a literary critic the poem deals with the themes of – mortality, faith and hope for a peaceful afterlife.

          The full poem reads as follows:

When on my day of life the night is falling,
And, in the winds from unsunned spaces blown,
I hear far voices out of darkness calling
My feet to paths unknown,

Thou who hast made my home of life so pleasant,
Leave not its tenant when its walls decay;
O Love Divine, O Helper ever present,
Be Thou my strength and stay!

Be near me when all else is from me drifting
Earth, sky, home's pictures, days of shade and shine,
And kindly faces to my own uplifting
The love which answers mine.

I have but Thee, my Father! let Thy spirit
Be with me then to comfort and uphold;
No gate of pearl, no branch of palm I merit,
Nor street of shining gold.

Suffice it if--my good and ill unreckoned,
And both forgiven through Thy abounding grace--
I find myself by hands familiar beckoned
Unto my fitting place.

Some humble door among Thy many mansions,
Some sheltering shade where sin and striving cease,
And flows forever through heaven's green expansions
The river of Thy peace.

There, from the music round about me stealing,
I fain would learn the new and holy song,
And find at last, beneath Thy trees of healing,
The life for which I long.

                                                            **********

G.R.Kanwal

30 May 2025

A WAR POEM

 

                A   WAR    POEM

            Given below is a war poem with the title DREAMERS. It is written by Siegfried Sassoon (1866-1967). He was an English war poet, writer, and soldier.  who took part in  World War 1 of 1914-1918 .

            His distinction was that he fought whole-heartedly and got himself  decorated for bravery on the Western Front.

             According to a literary commentator Sassoon became one of the best-known – and most controversial ---poets and novelists to emerge from the First World War.

            The poem Dreamers highlights the grim reality of war rather than its glorification.

            The terrible toil that World War 1 took of young poets was not only in the loss of promising lives but also in the bitterness it left with the survivors.

            According to Sassoon’s experience:

            Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin.  

            They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives.     

 

            But later on, says he, the scene changes :

 

            I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats,

            And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain.

 

            The full text of the poem reads as follows:

 

Soldiers are citizens of death's grey land,

Drawing no dividend from time's to-morrows.   

In the great hour of destiny they stand,

Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows.   

Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win   

Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives.

 

Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin

They think of firelit homes, clean beds and wives.

 

But later on, says he,  the scene changes:

 

I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats,

And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,   

Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats,

And mocked by hopeless longing to regain   

Bank-holidays, and picture shows, and spats,

And going to the office in the train.

 

                                                                        *******

G.R.Kanwal

29 May 2025

 

 

A POEM BY HENRY VAN DYKE

 

A POEM BY HENRY VAN DYKE

 

          Henry Jackson van Dyke Jr. was an American author, educator, diplomat, and Presbyterian clergyman.

         

          He was born on 10 November 1852 and died on 10 April 1933.

 

          He also served as United States Ambassador to Luxembourg from 1913-1917.

         

          One of his best-known poems “Time Is” was read aloud at the funeral of Princess Diana in 1997.

          He is also famous for his quote: Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.

 

          His poem These Are The Gifts I Ask which is given below is a sort of hymn addressed to God. The poem comprises two stanzas. In the first,  he seeks from God strength, courage, good cheer and inward joy for the hours of next. 

         

          In the second, he prays that his sins, cold disdain, hot anger, sullen hate, scorn of the lowly, envy of the great, and discontent that overshadows his daily life be taken away.

 

          The full text reads as follows:

         

THESE are the gifts I ask
Of Thee, Spirit serene:
Strength for the daily task,
Courage to face the road,
Good cheer to help me bear the traveler's load,
And, for the hours of rest that come between,
An inward joy of all things heard and seen.

These are the sins I fain
Would have Thee take away:
Malice and cold disdain,
Hot anger, sullen hate,
Scorn of the lowly, envy of the great,
And discontent that casts a shadow gray
On all the brightness of the common day.

                             *********

G.R.Kanwal

28 May 2025

LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

 

                      LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING

                            BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

            The English romantic poet William Wordsworth was born on 7th April 1770 and died 0n 2 April 1850.

           

            His love for nature was boundless. He believed that nature is an educator. It builds human character. It has massive healing power for the ethically and aesthetically sick. There lies in its various forms a unique divine spirit.

            Excessive pursuit of materialism and progressive decline of interest in natural beauty has robbed man of his veritable  health and happiness. He is now a spoiled man.

 

            Look at Wordsworth’s  poem Lines Written In Early Spring. It shows the difference between the impact on man  of harmony and joy by nature and the decline of these qualities in him  due to the rising indifference towards nature.   

 

Here is the full text of the poem:

 

I heard a thousand blended notes,

While in a grove I sate reclined,

In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts

Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

 

To her fair works did Nature link

The human soul that through me ran;

And much it grieved my heart to think

What man has made of man.

 

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,

The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;

And ’tis my faith that every flower

Enjoys the air it breathes.

 

The birds around me hopped and played,

Their thoughts I cannot measure:—

But the least motion which they made

It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

 

The budding twigs spread out their fan,

To catch the breezy air;

And I must think, do all I can,

That there was pleasure there.

 

If this belief from heaven be sent,

If such be Nature’s holy plan,

Have I not reason to lament

What man has made of man?

 

G.R.Kanwal                                      *********

27 May 2025

 

 

SOME QUOTES ON JUSTICE

 

          SOME QUOTES ON JUSTICE

            Justice is defined as :  the ethical, philosophical idea that people are to be treated impartially, fairly, properly and reasonably by the law and by arbiters of the law, that laws are to ensure that no harm befalls another, and that, where harm is alleged, a remedial action is taken  in such a way that both the accuser and the accused receive a morally right consequence merited by their actions.   

            Some popular quotes on justice read as follows.

*Man is unjust, but God is just; and finally justice triumphs, ----American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-82).

**Justice is as strictly due between neighbor nations, as between neighbor citizens. A highwayman is as much a robber when he plunders in a gang, as when single; and a nation that makes an unjust war is only a great gang of robbers.----American statesman  and author Benjamin Franklin (1706-90).

***One man’s word is no man’s word; we should quietly hear both sides. ---German writer Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832).

****Justice is to give every man his own.---Greek philosopher and polymath  Aristotle (384 BC-322 BC).

*****Justice is the idea of God; the ideal of men; the rule of conduct writ in the nature of mankind. ---American transcendentalist and reforming  minister Theodore Parker (1810-1860).

******Justice is the great interest of man on earth. It is the ligament which holds civilized beings and civilized nations together. Wherever her temple stands, is a foundation for social security, general happiness, and improvement and progress of our race.---Daniel Webster , Lawyer and former United States Secretary of State (1782-1852).

            Finally, the following viewpoints:

            Justice consists in doing no injury to anyone in the world.

            There should be no war to settle any dispute.

            Might  should never be considered as right.

            Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just             may be powerful, and whatever is powerful may be just.    

                                                            *******

G.R.Kanwal

26 May 2025

 

 

 

SNAKE – A POEM BY D.H.LAWRENCE

 

          SNAKE – A POEM BY D.H.LAWRENCE                      

                The English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) concludes his poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner with the following lines:

 

                 “He prayeth best, who loveth best

                 All things both great and small;

                 For the dear God who loveth us,

                  He made and loveth all.

   

                He had learnt this lesson after he had killed an albatross and both he and his fellow shipmates had suffered the horrible consequences, particularly the total dearth of drinkable water leading to:

 

     “Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.”

    “The many men, so beautiful! all dead did lie.”

 

                His pitiless plight changed suddenly when he watched the beautiful water snakes and exclaimed:

 

                “Oh happy living things! no tongue their beauty might declare.”

   

    Immediately a spring of love had gushed from his heart, because he had blessed the snakes unaware and his kind saint had taken pity on him. .        

   

                Now read the poem “Snake” by the English novelist, short story writer and poet   D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930).

            

                                                    SNAKE                     

 

A snake came to my water-trough

On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat,

To drink there.

 

In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob tree

I came down the steps with my pitcher

And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough

            before me.

 

He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom

And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over

            the edge of the stone trough

And rested his throat upon the stone bottom,

And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,

He sipped with his straight mouth,

Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,

Silently.

 

Someone was before me at my water-trough,

And I, like a second-comer, waiting.

 

He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do,

And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,

And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused

             a moment,

And stooped and drank a little more,

Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels

            of the earth

On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.

 

The voice of my education said to me

He must be killed,

For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold

            are venomous.

 

And voices in me said, If you were a man

You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.

 

But must I confess how I liked him,

How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink

            at my water-trough

And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,

Into the burning bowels of this earth?

 

Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him?

Was it perversity, that I longed to talk to him?

Was it humility, to feel so honoured?

I felt so honoured.

 

And yet those voices:

If you were not afraid, you would kill him!

 

And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid,

But even so, honoured still more

That he should seek my hospitality

From out the dark door of the secret earth.

 

He drank enough

And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,

And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,

Seeming to lick his lips,

And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,

And slowly turned his head,

And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,

Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round

And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.

 

And as he put his head into that dreadful hole,

And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders,

            and entered farther,

A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into

            that horrid black hole,

Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing

            himself after,

Overcame me now his back was turned.

 

I looked round, I put down my pitcher,

I picked up a clumsy log

And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.

 

I think it did not hit him,

But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed

            in an undignified haste,

Writhed like lightning, and was gone

Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,

At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.

 

And immediately I regretted it.

I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act!

I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.

 

And I thought of the albatross,

And I wished he would come back, my snake.

 

For he seemed to me again like a king,

Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,

Now due to be crowned again.

 

And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords

Of life.

And I have something to expiate:

A pettiness.

 

                                                 *******

G.R. Kanwal

 25 May 2025