Of Man And Grass

By Suman Kumar

These strong muscles will atrophy

And only bones will remain,

And then soon enough

These bones too will be fossilized.

I'll sprint through the Meadows

Taking in all that youthful verdancy

And this lush greenery

Will take my youth from me in turn --

Slowly, Surreptitiously --

So that soon my muscles will be atrophied

And My bones, they will be weak and brittle.

And I, no longer in my youth

Will stroll through the meadows

And the yellow tufts among it

Will tell me of our journey together --

Of morning dew on fresh culms

Transforming into long blades

To sturdy humans turning into fossilized men.

It'll remind me of

The beauty of cycle of life & death --

How I came to think of such great strength

Standing on such feeble limbs?

How I came to believe I could

Live for long

When I'll die for sure?

I'll understand the foolishness

Of thinking that names are important

And that even if they forget my deeds

They won't forget my name,

Since who remembers the grass

That just died?

Only thing remembered

Is the lushness that lasts,

But you see

Everything is the other way around.

And when death finally

Spreads its velvety charm

The grass and I will be one,

My weak bones will lay

In the decaying ground,

And those bones will

Eventually be picked clean --

No Pain, No Burdens, No Dreams

And No Names

To be kept unsullied now.

But the grounds I lay in

Will not remain fallow for long,

I will be born on the wind,

My unsullied soul enriched again

Will rise after a moment's rest,

Inhabiting and growing

In a different suit.

Morning dew will fall again,

I'll be sturdier once more

As the culms turn into blades

Longer still,

And this way

I and the grass

Will rise and fall

Together, forever!

By Suman Kumar