The Slow Learner
Labouring to learn,
crabbed sentences I do scribble,
For the world in front of me turns indecipherable
and I struggle to read
the strange ways of people,
But I fail and fumble,
I cannot fake what I am not
So I remain a fool
Among a bunch of go-getters
As I bumble around daydreaming
My sly friends make some wisecrack
And stifle a laugh out of glee
I hold my head in shame
Embarrassed as I am with my inefficiency
to get along and adjust
With a greedy, jealous and inhuman race
A pang of humiliation eggs me on to run
And seek solace in oblivion and solitude
Far, far from the hideous ways of civilized barbarians,
I run and ensconce myself in my shell.
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On the Edge
In that one singular moment
when the heart
surged with a violent
upsurge of indignation,
felt a jab
by indifference and alienation;
Every attainment till now
seemed meaningless,
frantically looking out for
someone to speak out…
The heart-rending cries
silent as they were, went unheard
crashing against the dead walls,
humanity lay asleep…
The self berating itself
for being a burden unto others,
the mind chanting a thousand chants of defeat and surrender;
The eyes seeing nothing but gloom,
the ears hearing nothing but dirges,
the body willing to escape
and dwindle into nothingness;
The soul at an unrest,
the hand then took the ultimate decision
of putting an end to all torments
and never to see tomorrow again!!
But then someone reached out
exchanged a word of concern and care
and hugged the tormented body,
soothed the agonized soul
and a life was thus saved…
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(Dr. Shyamolima Saikia is Assistant Professor at the Department of English, Gargaon College, Sivasagar, Assam. Besides editing an anthology titled Poetry Unites: An Anthology of Verse and several other books, she has also published two books of poems titled Palimpsest and Paper Mache Dreams.)
