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Siraj-Ud-Daula

Time moves on like this moody river
Gobbled up by the Ganga the courts of Moti and Hira
Are memories of the past. From Khosbag
Away the river recedes. Your burial vault
Spared by iconoclastic time grimly reminds
Your grisly end at the hands of your friend
For a few pieces of silver or few draughts of drink
Or for amorous embrace of dancing girls.
The pillars of your kingdom, the farmers of your arms,
Inspired by your inexperience, those professional men,
Conspired to capture your tumbledown throne
With helps from a horde of Bargis of a different clime
Who had a plan of plunder and permanent settlement too.
Waves of time have swept them also leaving this alluvial plains
To be overrun again by adventurers of another hue.

The executioner’s axe, the daggers of hooded men
Were for king-makers and aspirers to kingdoms
But the serfs in their eternal serfdom
Peacefully plodded with the placid flow of time
Ploughing their fertile plots or plying their tiny boats
Viewing this pageant with sleepy eyes
Or hearing from a distance the rumbling guns of Plassey
Caught up in the whirpools of this muddy time
Now fight an internecine fight for whose kingdom?

18-May-2003

More By  :  Kumud Biswas

Views: 1474     Comments: 0


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