Tag: news

Silent Tears Flow

Old expatriate 

Far away from home,  alone

Every morning,  fear

Separation wide

Technology builds bridges

News flow instantly

Every dawn new fear

Instant message, news of loss

Dead,  lost someone dear

Mind flies away fast

Limp body outwardly calm, lies

Heart weeps silently

Memories disturb

Silent tears flow unseen

Loneliness company

Wait and Waiting:Week Thirty Seven of My Fifty Two Weeks Journey with the Letter ” W”

Last few days I had to wait for many hours to get a call or text from my better half. She has been travelling with family in North India visiting the states of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Punjab  and Himachal Pradesh (HP).  Every day she had spent lots of hours on the road, travelling from one place to another.  With a twelve and half hours time difference between USA and India and the fact that she being on the road it was difficult to get a good phone connection, I had to wait for her to call me or text me to let me know where she was.  Yesterday ( or rather today morning Indian time) she had reached the hotel at 2:30 AM travelling 250 KM on hilly roads from one hill station to another.  Waiting  is difficult.

This made me think about wait and waiting and its many forms.  When I was in college doing my engineering degree, there was no cell phone.  There was no good telephone connection even. To get news from home, sometimes I had to wait for couple of weeks to get a letter from home. When I followed my sweetheart to USA for my graduate studies, I had no way to contact her before I left India to let her know when I was arriving.  She had to wait for my call from JFK on my arrival to let her know that I was in USA.  Unfortunately she was in class that time so I had to relay the message to her through circuitous way.  I had to wait till I met her at the airport to know if she had got my message or not.  I do not even want to mention about the tyranny of Ma Bell, waiting till the wee hours past mid night to get a cheaper rate to call India from USA.  In today’s technology driven world  of instant messaging, those type of wait may be history.  However, wait and waiting have many forms and all of us, sometime or other, have experienced wait and waiting in some form or other.  Many of us, for whatever reason, are waiting for the results of the coming November 8 presidential elections.  Everyday lots of people wait for the results of their job interviews.  Many wait for the results of their medical tests. For those who got good news, their wait is over.  For others, it is back to square one.

Last but not the least, if I do not mention about my wait for my $1 weekly investment to bear fruit, this story will be incomplete.  I am sure one day lady luck will smile on me and my wait will be over.  I will be a multi millionaire.  Will definitely win the lottery. Just wait.

Slowly and steadily I am coming towards the end of my journey with the letter W.  I am waiting anxiously for the next thirteen weeks to be over.  Thirteen more words starting with W and thirteen more poems, then I am done with this journey.  But today I wait. I wait to finish my poem starting with “Wait and Waiting” for week thirty seven of my fifty two weeks journey with the letter W.

This post is in response to Write Anything Wednesday-Oct-12-2016 sponsored by Writerish Ramblings

Week 9 of My Fifty Two Weeks Journey with “W”

With today’s post I will be completing two months of my yearlong, twelve month, journey. That’s completion of one sixth of my journey, sixteen point six percent or rounded off to seventeen percent. Definitely sounds better than nine out of fifty-two or forty-three weeks more to go. I think that’s what statisticians do, fudge the numbers to make it sound better to get their points across. That’s the same tactics politician adopt, look at the same data set and proclaim that the economy is improving or unemployment is decreasing and the opposition proclaiming that economy is tanking and we are worse off than when they were in power. I am digressing here. Did not want to talk about numbers and statistics but about an inspiring news item I read today.  Yes Virginia, sometimes dog bites man is also news.

I was reading my morning news today, of course in internet, when a headline caught my eyes : ” 5 PhD thesis on this class III – dropout poet”. Poetry being my passion, I was naturally intrigued to read the story beyond this headline and will like to share with you the story of Haldhar Nag.  Mr Nag , born in Indian state of Odisha, had to leave school at a very young age of ten years when his father passed away.  Though he lacked formal education, he did not leave behind learning. Starting his working career as a dishwasher at age ten, he wrote his first poem at age forty and had not looked back since. He was awarded the Padma Shri, one of the highest civilian awards in India, by the President of India on Monday. His literary work will be a part of the curriculum of Sambalpur University in Odisha.  Inspiring story indeed.

When I was reading the story of Mr. Nag, I started thinking about the word for week nine of my journey with the letter “W”. For today, I can not think of any other inspiring word than “Wisdom”.  Does it come with age, experience, learning, bookish knowledge or formal education? Or life itself is the best teacher if we are willing to listen and learn? I don’t have any answer yet nor do I proclaim to have an answer by the time I pen my poem starting with “wisdom”, but I sure do promise to explore.

 

This post is in response to  Write Anything Wednesday 3-30-2016, Daily Post Community Event, organized by  Writerish Ramblings