Tsunami

a poem by Remigius de Souza

Up a hill a stream finds its way down
Through rocks, cliffs, rough land runs down.
Water runs down. Dark clouds pour down.

An accumulated knowledge acquired from banks
Of knowledge wants to go up, builds vaults more,
Acquires more by refining it, splitting hair,
Fragments wholesome life; very little goes down.

Knowledge has to go down to the ignorant,
And the educated who move in their grooves
Of expertise, ignorant of vital other areas
Of the personal and the collective living.

Some water goes up by capillary attraction
In a congenial body, some evaporates to cool,
A lot percolates in the lower strata, in a pool,
Runs down to rivers, ocean to sustain life.
In Tsunami it lashes ashore and cleanses land.

Floods, earthquakes, Tsunami shatter lives yet
Leave vital lessons behind: to be reborn.
The meek build from the debris. Why harp
On limitations rather than take charge of self
When nature in abundance is at the feet?
Leave all external aids that corrupt.

There’s a scramble among the learned to go up,
Up the economic ladder, keep their knowledge
Mummified in the safe custody of speciality.
Who’s that who memorises scriptures by heart
Has ever received salvation, a liberated soul?

When it rains we rarely ‘look’ at it and feel:
It needs some animal sense, vegetable instinct
In the unified holistic life, and some honesty.
Any point of time anywhere is a starting point.