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ASHOK
NIYOGI
Ashok
Niyogi has been published in innumerable magazines (print and on-line) in the
USA, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Europe. He has had two volumes
of poetry published Crossroads and Reflections in the Dark, and
another recently published called Tentatively. He divides time between
the Bay Area in San Francisco, India, Russia, airplanes and wherever his poetry
takes him.
LEGACY
which lilacs
in what land
in 1921
some publisher
paid rent
now we have
phone banking
poem in 4 parts
with Lussanne
sanatorium interlude
and Dante
infernal solitude
Joyce did you
actually read
the Waste Land
in Paris
Ezra edit me
to glory
annotate in French
or Latin
as if erudition
can replace inspiration
solicit
like a pimp
this Chaucerian bath
about which I know
before the widow
where men have breasts
sequined gowns
on bed rests
no sun
excuse me
I am you
on one
orgasmic night
hermaphrodite
with Iago
jokers walk
in daffodil
the damsel
pillion rides
reaps corn
and then the woods
dark and deep
after violence
on the fairest sex
Pilgrims’ progress
from Lawrence’s Chatterley
Nabakov stole Lolita
oh! to digress
crisply
with Yevtushenko
Tolstoy
why do you frown
the Karamazovs
must have seen
the Caspian Sea
they will be
after summer
in Sochi
Whitman knew
this is nothing new
and now
maybe Bukowski
illiterate as I am
I learn
from my small baby
sociology
modern is obdurate
Ezra didn’t know
but he was
a century ago
now we float
only to encounter
Mac Beth
we have to wash
our silly hands
be careful
not to subscribe
to philosophy
until we have earned
the privilege
of wearing
an earring
it is good
that Marx can laugh
as people starve
and then the death
pare my nails
shave me close
pack my books
and no one else
because
at least
they tried
TO VODKA
Now that I am off alcohol,
Penury impresses me
With disdain.
Blessed again with an appetite,
I worry about rising costs
Of my daily meals.
Too many spoons of instant coffee
Laced with heaped cane sugar,
And my faithful Luger.
I have worked out an occupation,
I will read wasted Eliot on Eliot,
And pander to pedantry.
History never asked me pointedly,
Who had read more, Eliot or Pound,
History is Whitmanesque.
Bespectacled girls in graduate school
In awe of Neoplatonic Epicureanism,
Really do not interest me (?)
I do miss the rising smoke that obscures
Frost behind the mirrored bar,
Blades of Grass and fallen leaves.
In life, as in New England,
Autumn is gorgeously aflame
With red and gold.
Emily, I will not be dark or difficult,
Just Akhmatova’s soft pain,
Like a dove cooing in smoky rafters
With admirable resilience,
Heard forever above the noise
In a Petersburg basement pub.
LET THE CAB WAIT
Stars twinkled
all on their own
On the grass
there was dew
Mammoth steel ropes
suspended bridge
all new
from a halogen sky
The river bends
From Princep
I looked over
my shoulder
Lord Outram
you were right
This is where
justice is sub judice
Money order forms
filled in by touts
Villages run
on blood money
from metropolis
While writers
from the provincial service
sandwiched
between Marxist clerks
and likewise ministers
drink innumerable cups
of earthen tea
Snuff is tobacco dust
on gathered files
corridors mean labyrinth
One exit
sandbagged
against commando attack
Antique guns
chained to bulging waists
And even then
stars twinkle
at nightfall
in tropical haste
No twilight
for fumbling with a breast
It will be time
for pickpockets
mosquitoes
will start to bite
Whores are donning
make-up to withstand
tramcar tracks
Bells toll
loud and clear
in salutation
All wait
for sacrifice
against a paling sky
Anticipation
of cannon balls
that fit exactly into
potholes
Historic golf
between cell-phone towers
yellow flowers
on decadent roofs
Measly grass
polluted with infidelity
of cigarette smoke
in books of art
Beggars intimidate
with leprous stumps
illicit liquor
at railroad crosses
traffic jams
We must but take
the suburban route
with buildings stout
How can a hospital
be named Apollo
how dumb
to call an airport
Dumdum
Salt Lake with fresh
water ponds
Lake Town
with a hyacinth moat
Lake Gardens
just a whiff away
from the Gariahat
catwalk
and Radu’s shoes
Interesting girls
spilling over
from t-shirts
faded jeans
some mother weans
milk to hunger
Saint Teresa
is doubly blessed
by asphalt autumns
near Michael’s tomb
Famous lamb
and fragrant rice
past a tramcar hub
into a suburb
On the roadside
leather dries
with Leninism
in the perforated
Kolkata sun
copyright © Ashok Niyogi
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