Decadence

a poem by Nikesh Murali

Another decade has passed,
Creating a blockade in millions of hearts;
Its huge fins churning pools of blood,
The whale moves on its deadly quest.
It has sailed the dark, vile seas,
Drank the poisonous ‘sensua’,
Relishing and screaming what pleasure do thee know?
Sensing the pain,
Casting thy glance on the blood- ridden shores.

Passing the shore of ‘Bosna’…
“Aaah!” laments the lady;
The killing fields of Bosna,
The gleam in your eyes…
Like a million stars.
The smile on your face.
Oh! The smile on your face,
When the fireball consumed legs and hands.
The blood-ridden shores.

The starving scare-crows,
Slightly broad sticks that wheezed and breathed.
Those silent tiny inanimate objects,
Didn’t thee experience an orgasm?
Treating thy eyes to this wretched sight.
Another shore…
More of gore.
None can deprive thee of thy nectar,
The sweet red nectar.
The sweet red, thick nectar.
Thy providers… those two legged unfeathered beasts.
Featherless and heartless,
Aren’t you thrilled?
The starving scarecrows.

There were no bloody shores,
No starving scarecrows.
The rank mist exhaled by thy providers;
Has taken its rightful place.
Permeated the mortal’s soul,
That membranous padding was no match for thy vicious machete.
Hell had arrived on earth.
How can you forget the womb?
The self same womb that cradled thee for centuries.
Didn’t you feel the tremors when millions walked around,
Made love and chopped hands,
Carrying thee in their brutal hearts.

Greetings to the, amazing entity,
10 feet long;
And ever so strong.
O! Resident of the colder seas,
What brings you here?
I spotted thee from the ship’s mast,
Shedding thy liking for things cold.
(Aren’t you a bit more bold?)
Heralding thy presence,
Spraying the brine sky-high!
You are here to stay… You gaily declare.
Sprucing up your appetite,
Tuning to the warmer side.

Welcome!
Welcome to the warmer lands.
A place deemed holy by god,
He has tied the sacred knot;
Man and woman,
Man and wife.
Given us a pearl for life.
To learn and to seek for more,
To quest for the eternal truth.
To be sane; To love all.

What was once a paradise…
The river of love that drained the land,
The fragrant wind that swept the sand,
Lord’s children who danced in joy,
With bright and sanguine minds, Ahoy!
Would all perish.
What was once a paradise would reek with a unearthly scent.
The impending doom,
Did not sound a boom.
It came, it saw and it plundered,
What was once paradise.

O! Great deceiver who hails from the bowels of hell;
How did thee hoard this horrifying weapon?
This potent thing that threatens to overcome even thee!
Unleashed upon this weaklings…
These carnal pleasures,
Ate their soul,
Raped their soul.
But you were merciful;
For you gave them an instant,
(Before the contagion)
To listen to thy bursting laughter.

Sin, Sin, Sin and Sin,
In and out;
Out and in.
Loosing count, the edifice of time,
Weeped alone, screamed alone.
While the sinners moved in the vicious circle.
Round and round,
Wound-unwound,
Making merry without any worries,
Returning to the labyrinth of the devil.
What could they possibly do?
They are mortals and sinners too.
Why, That’s a perfect smile?
Rather a smirk;
When they indulged in wine and woman.
When they writhed and wriggled in pleasure,
You had the perfect time.
What a way to buy some time?
To plant the seed of evil.
A perfect decoy,
(Of course! Thou masterful skill)
To munch away generations.

The imbeciles waited with bated breath,
For more joy-rides to come their way.
They looked heavenward for gifts of pleasure;
Unaware of the fact that they stood in the jaws of death,
For they were blinded by the sweet white powder.
(Their worst enemy in the guise of their best friend)
Oh! The poor mortals,
Blinded by the sandstorm;
The white powder raising havoc,
Twisting and twirling,
Sweeping them to the butchers place.
Poor mortals!
The twister had them twisted;
On a ‘high’ relishing ecstacy
Alas! Poor mortals.
They looked heavenward for the gifts of pleasure;
But never noticed what they had stepped on.
They had to shade their eyes from the golden gleam,
The vicious, cruel gleam.
They called it, ‘Amruth’.
The terrible golden tinge it had,
Proved to be a snare
Luring them into the bog.
All of them went down drinking,
Relishing the golden cheat,
Even when their eye balls popped out,
They strived to wash down the last drop.
Grilling their seed like organs;
Inviting them to an everlasting sleep-over,
The wicked sprite gave them no spite.
Fools! They gulped the toxic fluid,
Made others gulp it too.
Like stupid dwarfs walking the high-wire;
Weakly secured on twigs.
What brave men? Young and old,
Their haste to embrace death,
Its cold grip.

The fluid and the powder,
Served on platters, glasses and long needles,
Taken in with grimaced faces;
An emotion that stood between pain and pleasure.
The serpentining, insidious beauty,
Trapping in its web, these hapless souls.
But did they stop?
“No!” Screams the great one.

I have gifted them the smoking stick,
A burning piece of rotting wood.
Inhaled with the greatest of difficulties,
Without a break,
An infinite chain beaded with skulls…
The rot would soon begin,
The rotting vitals;
The rotting mortals.
Stinking like pigs,
Hallucinating!
They never realised they had reached the edge
.
And when they fell,
They fell hard!
Never saw what hit them,
Screened from the source of terror,
By a blanket of thick smoke.
Smoke here, smoke there,
Smoke everywhere.

What pleasure it lent?
When sent out into everyman’s air,
In circles and squares,
Blowing out the deadly hemlock,
To hinder the passage of truth,
Which pleaded to them in their mother’s tone;
“You are signing the registry of death”.
They died making all sorts of noises,
Whopping, coughing,
Spitting,
Spilling out blood, sputum and all internals.
Even amidst the pain and fuss,
The mirage stayed on.
Ever attentive… on the lookout for its wasted children,
Calling them back to their favourite haunt,
Satan’s lap;
Their favourite pass time.

The pious bridge they had made,
The bridge they called ‘family’,
Was drawn to the dregs,
Torn and tattered,
Bleeding,
Rolling along nefarious lines.
When the constituents were unfaithful,
They covered them with the rubber sheath.
Had their way, on their way.
Succumbed to erotic dreams,
Forgot the rubbery shield.
Men and woman alike,
Delved into the abominable pool,
Washed themselves with the malignant tool;
Feeding their inner needs.
Back from the pool;
Glowing faces and happy bodies,
Waiting for their next dip,
In the devilish plot to impregnate them with slimy creatures,
The disease it gifts,
The cursed four letter word.
The grotesque name they chant in fear.
The progeny of the great one that will conquer the world,
Waiting and learning lullabies,
To rock them in their graves.

They walked the plank,
Dancing away with a song on their lips.
Had they stepped back in time,
Killed the flubbery mass,
Instead of manuring and watering the plant,
Cut-off its root in a flash.
I wish they had.
But, it was not to be.
Evil is now like the sea,
Everywhere,
Dominating this earth,
Caressing its sides,
Kissing every nook and cranny.
The blue sinful planet.

The plant has grown in size and stature,
The product of the great ones loins.
It has borne flowers,
It has borne fruits.
Relishing them like retarded goons,
Conveniently forgetting god’s boon.
Mesmerised by devil’s play,
If not now, soon,
Man will meet his doom.
The barren bleak landscape;
Will once wail alone,
Singing forever its tales of woe,
Of incessant fools who reaped the harvest.
The harvest of troubled of a lifestyle.

For the Lucifer’s offspring;
The nectar is a plenty.
But what will thee do?
When there will be nothing left for you to ravish.

“Why worry,” the great one says,
“I am 10 now, I will be 100 soon,
Its only a decade that has passed,
A decade of enthralling sights and sounds.
I will relish more,
More and more.
For the plant shall grow;
More and more.
Feeding my fat filed body,
(The fat of sin)
Bestowing me with powers,
To exterminate the good;
And crown the evil.
His throne is safe, Forever!,”
He says,
“No one will ever burn the plant,
The derivative of unholy plans.
Now flourishing,
It feeds man,
His fleeting pleasures. I am safe!,”
He declares and laughs aloud.

When will we foolish men,
Slit the throat of the evil shrub;
With the blazing sword of ‘morality’.
Come forth! Dear brothers and sisters,
Realise,
Rise and act!
Against the wrongs
Which have gifted us a decade of decadence.

Identify and slay the plant,
The plant of decadence.
If not, for us;
For posterity.