My autumn days

My autumn days

P K Routray

Cherish I with fond memory

my young days’ autumn glory,

travelling in open window bus,

taking day and night, with many forests to cross,

also to pass across many villages, towns with their panoramic view

during mid day, mid night, at dusk or dawn with morning dew.

Hours and hours we take at a stretch or with many intermediate breaks

enjoying company of strangers, having morning chores on the bank of streams or lakes.

Belittle many may, laugh or sympathize you may,

but to travel five hundred kilometers we were taking a day.

Travelling leisurely in scenic forest full of autumn foliage

with murmuring streams, singing birds, running animals during the voyage,

not in a hurry as in maddening life today

we become part of autumn beauty on the way.

During night we see rare animals in the bus light

move they on their way exhibiting their magnificent sight.

With varieties of birds in the dawn, dusk, day and night

we enjoy their flutters, songs, every act and fight.

Peacock dance, elephant’s bath, running dear with their crowning horn

fragrance of flowers, trees growing together without caste, creed bar, I cherish and mourn.

Clear water of hilly streams with their muttering melodious sound

even today reverberate within me and its cherished memory keeps me spell bound

Grown were the trees as planted and planned by Him

human aestheticism and sense of decoration looks poor and too slim.

Flowers with various colors and varied fragrance

bloom at various parts of the day and stay in harmony with their natural variance.

The fishes in the streams with many unknown aquatic creature

Swim in the streams with their beauty but sacrificing their life for others to nurture.

Today the jet travel, fast life and with no time to stare at nature

the beauties of autumn stay hidden and only in poem or on canvass they feature.

The dilapidated bus and long hours of journey of yester year

may be mockery of today’s youth, but the music of autumn can they hear?