Kabin Phukan

Kabin Phukan (b. 1946) has published several collection of his poems including Tuk Dekhi Na June. He teaches English literature in Dibrugarh University, Assam.

Deluded

Something somewhere had gone wrong
confounded, the mind is vacuous, the passions numb
tricked into withdrawing from the riches of life
welcome delusive death instead

I wonder how, my eyes wide open
saw reality become dreams, dreams fade into the real
passion and unreason deliberate
where lapses, illusions and errors meet
doting eyes couldn't tell Cinderella from the step-mother
gold turned lead, the apostles turned the land into a desert
could not reap the gold though
in the fleeting light hung,
the still, unencumbered, noonday moon

the impossible, dream-fed hopes of yesteryears
are wiped clean by attachments
the acute despondence of the betrayed decade
sprouted wild in the spring fallow
the jilted heroine finds the new hero make a quiet exit
the hesitant mist whispered in the ears:
who is to blame, Krishna or Kamsa?

having strayed in bludgeoning and tippling
the decadent Jadu dynasty is without an heir. [PA]