Those who were left behind

What to say of those
Who were left behind
In the race of time
That they are badly missed

They are badly missed
For their wit and humor
The way they said things
For those little things

Those little things
That bonded us together
Sweet words, that infectious smile
Hanging together all the time

Together all the time
Passed so fast
So we moved on
Different tracks

Tracks
That would never cross
Would never cross
Never cross

A love song(Poetry Thursday)

I want to sing a love song
A song for myself
A song for all these years

of joy and sorrows on this planet

I want to sing a love song
A song for my father
A song for the love and care he gave
For his young son

I want to sing a love song
A song for my great friend
A song for his braveries
Who died fighting in the battlefield

I want to sing a love song
A song for my sweethearts
Who were left behind
With the passage of time

I want to sing a love song
A song for the farmer
Who toils in the fields
Day and night, night and day

I want to sing a love song
A song for the unknown strangers
Who I could never thank
Who I would never meet

I want to sing a love song
A song for my enemies
If it were not you
The journey so far had been monotonous

I want to sing a love song
A song for my teachers
Who taught me the alphabets of life
Who guided me from the darkness to the light

I want to sing a love song
A song for the divine
For all the great gifts
For the gift of this life

Above all I want to sing a love song
A love song for my mother
Who brought me into this world
In whose ocean of love I live submerged

For more pictures visit PICTURESQUE

In love with failures

I have fallen in love with failures
Instead getting frustrated with them
Because in their company
I learn so much everyday
Success comes and goes once in a while
But failures stay loyal all the time
So I have fallen in love with failures
And it’s in their company I want to stay

For more pictures visit PICTURESQUE

PICTURESQUE

PICTURESQUE!

Thats the name of my new photoblog that I have created yesterday. I am in love with it for the time being.

The idea of telling a story through pictures is centuries old and now I have decided to give a try. On Picturesque I would share with you all the pictures of the places I'll visit here in Moscow or other cities and places of the world. This way you would also be able to see the new places and know about them. I hope you would enjoy visiting PICTURESQUE.

Beauty Burns

Your beauty burns me
While you look so calm
I lose control
My anger shoots up
It’s impossible to stand you
It’s impossible to resist
I don’t know what’s happened
But omens do not feel right
May be one day
Victory will touch my feet
When I would be angry no more
Just looking at you
When I would learn to accept
“Let it be, just let it be”
When a smile would flicker
on my face
When I would stop noticing you
in the crowd
For now
Your beauty burns me

The Joy of learning(Poetry Thursday)

I know no joy greater than learning
The joy of discovery
The joy of the union with the infinity
The joy of getting lost in now
The joy of winning space and time
The joy of losing the ego
The joy of completely forgetting the self
The joy of expanding in the whole universe

There is no joy greater than learning!

The wonders of Tsaritsino

Broken Ceramic artefact at the Museum

Happy as ever at Tsaritsino

Fishing at the pond

Tsaritsino is an incredible place in Moscow. Once upon a time the wife of Czar, Czarina lived in this huge estate with woods, bridges and ponds.Now the old structures are in ruins but part of it has been restored and rest are being restored at a very fast pace.
Its almost heaven out there in a sensuous spring, sunny summer or a cloudy autumn. Words are not enough to describe this amazing place so let the pictures do the talking. We went to this place the last Sunday. It was a warm sunny autumn day and we set out of our home to visit this place. Tsaritsino is best approachable by metro as the metro station of the same name is located very nearby. We enjoyed a stroll in the woods out there besides the ponds in a sunny and warm Moscow day. My mother saw a Russian wedding being solemnized at an Orthodox Cathedral located inside the Tsaritsino complex. Of course she was more than happy to be able to see new customs and have a glimpse of centuries old Russian culture and traditions. Afterwards we went to see the Khlepni Dom (translates as Bread House) museum that houses the sculptures, dresses, furniture, crockery and other artifacts of that era.
I can say it was one of the most memorable Sundays in Moscow.

The big ceramic artefact

Royal crown

At the gates of Tsaritsino Museum

A bronze sculpture of Czarina Catherine

Red House

Reflections on happiness

Three observations:-

-Happiness comes from the movement in life from a lower point to a higher point.
-Stagnation is boredom that leads to unhappiness.
-Sorrow is the outcome of going down from a higher point to a lower point.

So however rich or poor we are our happiness depends on the movement in life-real or perceived. Therefore the happiest is the one who has moved the most in life towards incrementally higher points, of course being offset by a few downward movements that are bound to occur.

What are your observations, thoughts, opinions about happiness? Let's share our ideas about happiness.

A teen of thirteen(Ringing of the Bards)

This poem is written for the Ringing of the Bards(Poetry Carnival) on the theme of Thirteen and the poem has only thirteen lines.













There was a time
When I was a teen of thirteen
Full of dreams and fantasies
Just waiting to win the world
To reach deep corners of the universe
Life was a joy each moment each day
Since then thirteen years have passed
Now I am a young man of twenty-six
But I am always in a fix
How to live my dreams
How to win the world
That I had dreamed
As an innocent teen of thirteen

Moscow Metro

Moscow Metro
Your quickness, your efficiency astounds me
You carry thousands commuters home everyday
They take your shelter wherever they go
You are the only one
that gives relief when roads are jammed

Since many years you have served
The citizens and strangers alike
Generations remember you
as city’s lifeline
Anyone once lived in Moscow
Can’t ever forget your majesty, your value


Your stations are go grand so magnificent
Like royal palaces of some king or Czar
The design, the architecture, the look
A stranger’s eyes can never believe
Sooner or later you would become part
of the world’s human heritage

Enmeshed( Poetry Thursday)

So enmeshed
in the mediocrities of the past
Rise, rise above
from this drowning dust
That anxiously waits to engulf
Would you stand there
and helplessly wait
or would you rise to the occasion
and write your own fate
Would you let the words of wisdom inspire you
or curse the darkness that drowns you
Would you rise above the whirlpools of small comforts
that entangles you stiff
Or strive to achieve those ideals
you set for yourself
when your life began
Would you search for the last ray of hope
in this dark tunnel that surrounds you
Would you find your path
from which you have meandered so far
or continue meandering far
to the point of no return;
I know you would rise
You would rise
from this drowning dust
as the phoenix rises from its own ashes
as the light pierces through the deep darkness

Matrushkas

Matrushkas
are
Russian Dolls



Can you imagine live matrushkas!
I see them walking talking,
Singing, dancing, gliding...
In the streets of Moscow

Some are huge, heavy and tall
Simply elephantine
Some are little, slim and pretty
Hidden from the eagles' gaze

They come out, be it day or night
Dressed in the latest fashion
Enveloped in best cosmetics
In many hues and colors

They can be pricey
They can be priceless
They can steal hearts with ease
They can even make one kneel down at one's knees

Matrushkas are not only grand or small
They come in all shapes, sizes and forms
Whatever one says about their beauty
Matrushkas are intelligent, hardworking and pretty!

A Saturday in Moscow

Chirst the Savior Church, Moscow

Yesterday on Saturday we (I and my mother who is visiting me in Moscow) went to see the Christ the Savior Church (earlier during the Soviet period in place of that Church there used to be a swimming pool), a newly built Church just a stone’s throw from the Kremlin (Fort where the Russian President lives). As we reached near the Church we saw a very large crowd (more than thousand people) queued up to enter the Church. It was a frightening sight for us as this was the second time we had to return from the gates of the Church. The last time it was the last Sunday, the second anniversary of the Beslan School tragedy. The Church had been closed for the visitors as the Archbishop of the Russian Orthodox Christianity(equivalent to Pope of the Orthodox Christianity) and the President Putin themselves were present at the Church to perform a service. May be we shall try once again for the third time the next week to see this grand Church that has become the symbol of New Russia, a place where people are deeply religious, a significant change from the Soviet times when people secretly had to pursue their religious beliefs and rituals. I asked a friend later why there was a huge queue outside the Church. The reason was that a part of the body of the Jesus Christ was brought from abroad to Moscow for the believers to see and was kept in the Christ the Savior Church.

St. Basil's Cathedral

The view of the GUM and the Red Square

the St. Basil's Cathedral















On the interior wall of the St. Basil's Cathedral

Slightly disappointed we moved towards the Red Square where we straight away went towards the St. Basil’s Cathedral, the colorful onion shaped domes you often watch on TV while any story of Russia is reported. When we got near we saw that the Cathedral was open for the visitors. What a miracle! Since last one year it was undergoing renovation and I always returned from the Red Square looking at Cathedral’s domes. We rushed to buy tickets (no free entry if you were thinking). I presented my Studentichisky Billet (Student Card) to get a fifty percent discount as the charges for the Innastranets (foreigners) are really huge for entering Muze (Museums). It was a long held secret we just wanted to quickly know seeing through our own eyes. Inside it was not disappointing as there were a lot of things to see, beginning with a model of the St. Basil’s Cathedral, the richly decorated coffin of St. Basil, a number of items used in the Cathedral during the past centuries including a bible with golden covers. The floral printings on the walls inside the rather dark and narrow alleys of the Cathedral were remarkably well preserved.
The Red Square and the GUM (a huge shopping centre for the most expensive international brands) looked different from the heights of the Cathedral.

Bibles with Gold covers inside the Cathedral
















Statue of a lady coming out of bath in Historical Museuem

We took a turn again, walked across the Red Square towards the Historical Museum. We spent hours there looking at the various historical artifacts from the past centuries of Russia. Dresses, pottery, weapons, precious metals, statutes, furniture, vehicles filled the museum. Recently the Museum has got some Terracotta Soldiers (UNESCO Heritage) (For More) from China especially for the Muscovites to see the achievements of other cultures and civilizations. What struck me looking at these clay soldiers was the story behind their making. The Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang wanted his whole army to be killed when he would die to protect him after death and he was very adamant on that. Somehow he could be convinced towards the end of his life that terracotta soldiers could be equally good and he was buried along with a large number of such soldiers, horses, carriages etc. all made of terracotta.

Terracotta Soldiers in The Historical Museum




















Smiling in the Historical Museum




















Floral prints on the walls of the St. Basil's Cathedral

Since ever, for ever?!

Mental barriers
Obstructed thoughts
The rising tide of anger
Engulfs the wholesome peace
On the shores of life

Mind stretches far
But comes bouncing back
Hitting the barrier walls
Those seem to stand there
Since ever, for ever?!

Day by day

For the most of us
It remains true
Life is short
And we have to move
To the future unknown
Full of fears and excitements
But the best thing is that
The future opens day by day
Leaving us with some time
To absorb the shocks
To feel the excitement
Every moment
The change creeps in clandestinely
Into our world
But for convenience sake it’s all continuity
Illusions sleep with perceptive realities

The Glory of the man

The glory of the grass is in dancing with the wind
The glory of the man in thinking big
The glory of the dog is in wagging his tail
Glory of the man in self-respect
Glory of a river is in flowing steadily
Glory of the man in standing firm
Glory of a tree is in giving fruits
Glory of the man in giving love
Glory of a sun is in shining bright
Glory of the man in finding light
Glory of God is in his creation
Glory of the man in his compassion
Glory of an ocean in staying calm
Glory of the man in his dynamism
Glory of birds is in chirping loud
Glory of the man in his sweet words

Time-Travel

I am on time-travel
To my grandpa’s home
Far away from the cities
And the crowded towns
Walking on my feet
I travel far
Across the river
Amidst the shadowy grooves
Where birds sing the morning song
Waking up the village folks
Where women carry water on their heads
From the river to the home
Where every tree speaks to me
About the days of my innocence
Where every old woman is my grandma
Showering love and the words of wisdom
Where God himself speaks
Through children’s stammer
Where time loses its value
And I am lost in the infinite eternity !