A poem from 'The Maha Bodhi' published in 1984 (Vol. 92)

Like shadows, impersonal forces
Hold sway over all we may cherish.
I scan philosophic discourses,
Bewildered to see the good perish.

The whim of the waves of vast ocean
May sink a strong shop in a moment.
Imagine that hellish commotion!
Just think why that lethal bestowment?

I think of adventure unending,
High lighted against dire frustrations.
Not seeing what signs are portending,
Invalid men find expectations.

Deluges, earthquakes and disasters,
Tornadoes, cloudbursts, or explosions.
No men anywhere are their masters,
Consuming they are like corrosions.

Fine shrines fall to pieces, saints totter,
Though people are full of conviction.
In ruins but refugees squatter.
And truth is oft stranger than fiction.

Bolts out of the blue make us stagger,
Outweighing the best calculations.
The shock comes to us like a dagger.
In vain we shall look for equations.

Great things in the small I am marking.
The wind howl on high while I ponder.
On quest analytic embarking
I care not for time I might squander.

I think my designs are inspiring,
Yet questions appear multiplying.
Terrain that I tread is requiring
Great caution, at times horrifying.

New times and fresh trends cannot alter
That heart-ache afflicting so many.
In faith I am not a defaulter,
Though solving few problems, if any.

I take a disliking to changes,
When they would not come as a blessing.
As life here all things rearranges,
I wish we were only progressing.

This empty existence is nameless,
Engulfing us all in illusion.
I flinch from pursuits that are aimless,
Those merely involving abstrusion.

For poets, scene-painters, scene-shifters
Are flirting with frilled pre-conceptions.
Well, men without drill are not drifters,
While art is above all subreptions.

In flickering shadows we dwindle,
Not knowing directness of action.
Pragmatic, I wish I could kindle
Inquiry precluding distraction.

Self-willed, wonderstruck I am facing
In rain teeming down or in blizzards
Hard work, and the nerves I am bracing
Recalling my Gurus were wizards.

To be in some measure Lord’s image
Is what I look for, true perfection.
I see on world scene but loose scrimmage,
Men screeching with cross predilection.

Whatever the case or conclusion,
Renouncing my pleasures as treason
And pity all those in confusion,
For whom words are never in season.

Oh, life! Is it dream or deception?
A glide over peaks and dark valleys?
A gift we have got be subreption?
A journey through intricate alleys?