The Mirror

I look in the mirror

And what do I see?

A strange looking person

That cannot be me.

For I am much younger

And not nearly so fat

As that face in the mirror

I am looking at.

Oh, where are the mirrors

That I used to know

Like the ones which were

Made thirty years ago?

Now all things have changed

And I’m sure you’ll agree

Mirrors are not as good

As they used to be.

So never be concerned,

If wrinkles appear

For one thing I’ve learned

Which is very clear,

Should your complexion

Be less than perfection,

It is really the mirror

That needs correction!!

Edmund Burke

1729 – 1797, Irish Philosopher.

What is it with Dreams these days?

A Dream within A Dream

Take this kiss upon the brow!

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow

You are not wrong, who deem

That my days have been a dream;

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

In a vision, or in none,

Is it therefore the less gone?

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,

And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand

How few! yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep,

While I weep - while I weep!

O God! can I not grasp

Them with a tighter clasp?

O God! can I not save

One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?

-Edgar Allen Poe

via: Simran Khurana

A book on poetry...

...thats what I need (or dream of it).

A Dream

In visions of the dark night

I have dreamed of joy departed

But a waking dream of life and light

Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day

To him whose eyes are cast

On things around him with a ray

Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream - that holy dream,

While all the world were chiding,

Hath cheered me as a lovely beam

A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro' storm and night,

So trembled from afar

What could there be more purely bright

In Truth's day-star?

-Edgar Allen Poe

Never for the Verse!

On this nice fateful day, I quote a poem (Eliot's) sent across by a dear friend.

There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?"
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair--
(They will say: 'How his hair is growing thin!")
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin--
(They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!")
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by TS ELiot

Poignant, truthful, hurtful at places and yet in such light vein. What would mankind have been without verse. Which reminds me of Dead Poets' Society and voila, I have a name for this post!

On an Idyllic Sunday Afternoon

Propped against the wall I sit

With thoughts that keep fluttering

Momentarily now, looking at the grey clouds

Fluttering in a jiffy to yesterday

of the bright blue sky (yes, GNR)

And then in a trance thinking of tomorrow

How fickle life is; and how strong the character.

Days of the yore that come

With the swat of the PT teacher's whistle string

Turning red the back of our thighs

To the English prose classes; about Kipling and spice

Friends and the tease

Days when we dreamed

of going to college or making it big

College days and ones spent

wooing and occasionally, oh ever so, being

The idealism and fire, the want to be the best

And yet, not miss a moment of fun

Slumbering away those hot summer afternoons

In the library stacks; and being woken up by the Librarian

And aspiring, each day to be healthy, wealthy and gay (sic!)

Toiling the midnight oil

Trying to make our dreams come true

Working each day as if it would never end

And making the most in what Rand

would agree be productive achievement

Never failing sight of the vision

Growing by the day, adding dimensions to life

Getting caught in an abyss becoming

Another Brick In the Wall (the video)

But that's where God comes in and gives me a kick

Says, son, you aren't fit to be mashed to sausage.

So go on, dream, smile, work and enjoy.

But remember, don't let those dreams become your master.

That's when I remember that the constants through our lives remain

Our dreams and our guides.

---------------

Thoughts go out to my parents, teachers, gurus, well-wishers, elders, friends, authors, books, poets on this auspicious day of Guru Poornima. Thank you for all the light you shed on my path.