R is for Romulus

is for Romulus

Small Mercies

Remus and Romulus were the twins

said to have founded Rome, the linchpins 

of legends and intrigue -

Romulus ahead by a league.

A wild creature  by them through thick and thin.

Both the brothers when infants were orphaned

helpless babes in river and woods abandoned

a she-wolf came a-slinking

and I know what you’re thinking

but preparest thou to be now thoroughly stunned.

She didn’t make mincemeat out of the babies,

she didn’t chew them up or give them rabies;

she gave milk and mother-love

and brought them straight up

to know their numbers and their Latin AB’s.

But then the story gets murky, coz sibling

rivalry spares no-one, they got quibbling

Remus liked a different hill

and Romulus fought to kill,

didn’t believe in some casual nibbling.

And so Rome was founded by one twin

the survivor brother who did the other in.

In plain words - fratricide

though legend doesn’t deride,

or call this dubious act a terrible sin.

Quite clear that it took a long time to build

From orphaned twins to getting a sibling killed

That is why they say

Rome wasn’t built in a day

years to the finish from when first pencilled.

I’ll bet you’ve never thought  – cause no one does -

It’s so long ago so why make a pointless fuss?

But think - if it so happened

the clash had a different end

then Rome wouldn’t be Rome, but named for Remus.

The Rose may Remain a Rose, that which we call Rome (okay, the Limericking's over now, there's no need to Rhyme endlessly!) would probably smell quite different.  What do you think? Do names shape the people/places? Or do the individuals/cities beat their names into shape?  How important is a name? Would the rose petal smell as sweet if it were called popocatepetl instead?

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

Q is for Quake....which is what this post always makes me do

makes me Quake

Q never Quite Queues up

Most people do not have a single clue

how hard it is to find a name with ‘Q’

Tom, Dick and also Harry

yeah, Radheshyam and Parry

but Q doesn’t queue up, no can do.

Did Q ever give you a Greek god?

name a famous Roman Caesar? a cephalopod?

We can moan and grumble

but Q is not an example

of a letter that is abundant and broad.

Where exactly does Q come from?

Search from Greek Omega to Sanskrit Om

You won’t see it anywhere -

magicked from Latin n thin air

and the upstart’s made itself quite at home!

Let me give you some facts, plain and cold:

Q’s the second least common letter, all told.

Less than one percent of words

where Q is seen and heard

it clearly believes that silence is gold.

And no guesses for what's the least common letter - that makes me shake in my shoes too! 

Does anyone else here shiver and shake, Quiver and Quake when the time comes for the terrible-two baddy shoes (Qu) letters? Why does Q come in always coupled with U? What are your top Q-tips for getting over this speed bump in the A-Z? 

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

P is for Pliny

is for Pliny

There was once a Roman called Pliny.

We’re talking of the Elder, not the Mini.

He wrote on birds, bees, and blooms

 37 whole volumes

Now that’s a work that cannot be called skinny!

Oh, he was a man most astute and Prolific

but his death was quite pointless and horrific -

in a bath he chose to stop

when Vesuvius blew its top

and the toxic fumes turned out too soporific.

P is for Post : Now that's a word which has had its Paradigm shifted in the last few decades! Post was something I did to a letter when I was a child. I had several Pen Pals, and also regular friends who became Pen Pals because we moved around so much. I used to look forward to those letters, and also Parcels of goodies, mostly books, from grandParents and other relatives.

And thanks to technology and a different kind of Post I am still in touch with some of those friends, though we are separated by thousands of miles.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

O is for Ocypete

is for Ocypete

Ocypete and hOw the patriarchy determines stereOtypes

Ocypete the swift was a mythic Harpy

A bird woman, though not quite as chirpy

Whatever may be the jam

It’s always cherchez la famme

From mythology to crime to malarkey.

Why do women have to always take the rap

from epic Opprobrium to daily crap?

In literary stereotypes

and in mundane real lives

for every accident and Odd mishap.

Why must Harpies and Sirens be all females

the nastier sex in most of the tales?

If Ocypete were sometimes Pete

I for One would find that neat;

if those cherchez-ed were sometimes males.

O is for Odd : As I scheduled this pOst, there was news Of the Oddest possible hijack, an EgyptAir plane was hijacked this mOrning by a man in a suicide vest, demanding a meeting with whO? the POTUS? nO, his very Own ex-wife! NOt tO pOOh-pOOh the Ordeal of the passengers Or anything, but we were all geared up in frOnt of the TV, the media of cOurse zOOming in with their chOps all licked and dripping, agOg for the terrifying drama, people all Over social media frantically trying to get messages acrOss to their lOved Ones and all, when Oops! the suicide vest turned Out a fake. Egg On everyOne's face, TV crews dispersing with tail between legs, security experts who had pOntificated earlier, going ballistic with Outrage.  All round hilarity ensued, with the Egyptians laughing the lOudest.  LOve their sense of humOur!

The plane was supposed tO land at CairO but was diverted tO Larnaca instead. And what has the CypriOt President said about the incident? - "..there is always a wOman invOlved."  (Sigh...) Of all the cliches did he have to trOt this particular One Out just now??

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

N is for Nero

is for Nero

Nero was no fiddler

A most unpopular man was Nero

he may've been a Caesar but no hero

no fiddler on the roof

cause there is ample proof

that his fiddling quotient was close to zero.

He may have been one peculiar geezer

but no way  could he be a fiddling Caesar

The fiddle didn’t exist

untill 1556

however eager may have been the beaver.

Of course the violin isn’t the only thing

that can be fiddled or twiddled by a king

the selection’s quite wide

thumbs, body parts aside

there’s other stuff to scrape apart from strings.

All I’m saying here is that I’ve learnt

he wasn’t playing music while Rome burnt.

He could well have gotten

up to things far more rotten,

but not a violin – that much I’ve discerned.

N is also for Name and my name, Nilanjana : which is difficult to pronounce. Tough on a child who spent her childhood outside the comfort zone of her Native tongue.  I had a hard time explaining the pronunciation (Nee-laahn-juh-naah) when I went to Delhi, and it was mispronounced by everybody. I got asked endlessly about what it meant. The various interpretations took yonks.   Then there were the misspellings. Uribbaas!! as we would say in Bengali.  

I went to Nigeria, from the frying pan to the fire; globalisation, child-raising by villages, multiculturalism, were far into the future. The Delhi practice in explanations came in pretty handy. My classmates had as much trouble wrapping their tongues around my name, as I had wrapping mine around theirs.  But in time, both sides learnt to do it, and we were both the richer for it. Some classmates shortened it to Nila, which was my Nickname anyways, and some even further to Nil.

I went back to India after high school, graduated from Delhi, got a job in Kolkata, got married and settled down among Bengalis where my name was commonplace, I did not have to explain the pronunciation anymore.  Then suddenly one fine day we upped and moved to Arablands, and I had to learn the Arabic names, and the Arabs who I came in contact with, had to learn mine.  Story of my life, boss!  

So. Would I change it for a lighter, Neater, more portable, travel-friendly one? Nope, No, Nah, Niet, Never!! And that was the same way when I had to spell it out for the Ninety-ninth time in class as a Nine year old. Nilanjana (girl with blue-kohl lined eyes; the colour turquoise; lightning), Nila (sapphire), Nil or Neel (blue), all of them so me! Even though I've never lined my eyes with blue kohl till date, but who knows? one of these days I might just! :)




Nuts! that was quite a Non-post slushfest Now, wasn't it? Nonplussed - going the memoirs way, Not a good indication of possible age. :D Tomorrow is a No post day.  I'm going to use it to catch up on my reading and rest, it's been a big week offline and on.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

M is for Marie

is for Marie

The reason why the French love bread

Marie Antoinette sat reflecting in a chateau -

deep thoughts on how popularity hits a plateau,

When in ran her aide and said,

“Majestée, the poor get no bread”

“O Foolish One,” she cried, “Let them eat some gateau.”

“No, no” the peasants growled, “we’ll have our bread!

We will NOT be fobbed off with cake instead,

we the French peasants

can get quite unpleasant.”

We all know what happened – the queen lost her head.

Was she just a thoughtless woman, or plain rude?

Or quite out-of-touch with her wider brood?

Her aide lacked for tact

that is a certain fact.

The moral? mess not with ye masses over food.

If you’ve wondered why the French are so passionate,

so finicky about their croissant, and baguette

well, now you clearly know.

It’s that long ago gateau

the French were offered by Marie Antoinette.

M is also for Marionette - very strangely close to a portmanteau of Marie Antoinette, who May or Mayn't have been one of circumstances.  At any rate, there is no historical evidence to support this famous let-them-eat-cake callousness of hers.  She was a very extravagant lady no doubt, but family members of terrible rulers have been known for their dodgy shopping habits in all times, then and now, Imelda Marcos, Suzanne Mubarak, Many examples, only I can't just now think of any More names with M. 

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

L is for Lucy

is for Lucy

Lucy of the hottest curves

Lucy, though quite old, has curves so hot

that folks would die to touch her as often as not -

a lumbar curve and a valgus knee

a pubic arch quite beyond sexy

assets that most other fossils haven’t got.

I'm told that's why there's just a replica -
in the museum, so robbers don't nick her.
you'll get a quick shufti
but no touching that knee!
and totally forget what was in her knickahs!!

I sometimes question what would we find
if we dug into the paleonto-logical mind?
Suppose the knees were a male's
would we get the same details
of limbs and arches, curves front and behind?

L is aLso for Lag : there is a Lag in returning comments here this week. My meticuLous scheduLes have gone sLightLy awry.  The CoLours of Life Poetry FestivaL is this Saturday, and every other evening is taken up with rehearsing. In fact, the dress researsaL is Later today, serious attack of butterfLies! But I digress, what I actuaLLy meant to teLL you was - I am going to Leap right back on track and catch up with you on Sunday.  As soon as the poetry fest is over.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

K is for the King

is for King

the King’s pickle

The King of Egypt, known as the Pharaoh,

had his innards pickled and his bone marrow

dried after death and preserved;

in Giza his tomb can be observed -

it starts off wide, but then pointedly  narrows.

I wonder why his friend and architect

thought building straight was somehow a defect?

Or was it a monumental

metaphor for the central

premise that all things fall in once they’re erect?

K is also for Knack and Knock and Knee and Knowledge - as a Knon-Knative, sorry, non-native speaker of English, this silent K business used to make me go Knock-kneed and cross-eyed as a child. Utterly, Kompletely Konfusing?  Why is it there if no-one is going to pronounce it? Why is it there at all in the alphabet when C and Que-endings are doing half its work anyways? Why does English have 3 Konsonants which are essentially doing the same job? Any Kind souls here who'll get me out of this Kwandary?

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

J is for Job descriptions

is for Job descriptions

Job descriptions of Johannes et al

Johannes, you know, of the Kepler kind

worried till he went almost out of his mind,

“astrology, astrophysics

or just plain mathematics

how on earth is my work to be defined?”

Job descriptions are the rummest of things

they flummox all, from scientists to kings.

"Must get the Bible translated,"

thought James, "or else I'm fated

to be called First and Fourth, bloody confusing!"

Don't you know a couple Jobs who never fit

their job titles and their defined limits?

They bent and extended,

counselled and befriended -

and went far beyond their official remits.

The job descriptions of letters J and G

never fail to amaze, amuse and confuse me -

G does both George and Gavin

But J’s only job is jabbin’

at one sound with forlorn monotony.


Who's overstepping the line, who's being a slob
who is falling down merrily on the job -
finally it's all a matter
of a juxtaposition of letters
and that doth time and again smacketh me gob.

J is also for Joke : which is what limericks are supposed to be.  If they are somewhat lame limericks, then they are poor jokes and bring about eye rolling rather than all round Jollity and mirth.  Come across any lately?

J is also for Just : as in 'Just one more blog/page/story/whatev, and then I'll stop reading and shut this damn gizmo down and get some rest.' And then when you next look up, the dawn is a hairline crack in the curtains.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

I Is for Isaac

is for Isaac

Isaac’s obsession and the consequent loss to humanity

How far the apple falls from the tree -

a key issue, as I’m sure you’ll agree.

But Isaac? he veered off

with the direction of the drop,

obsessed with G to an absurd degree.

The result is: we can only declare

that the apple will fall, not when nor where.

It can’t be calculated

how far the fall is slated,

because Isaac Newton just did not care.



I is for Island : which is what I live on, I mean, literally.  Not that I Ingest one as food.  

Island, that no man Is, John assures me.  Yeah, right. I am not so convinced. Maybe in John's time, It was so (he's is bit older than me, born 16th century). Men were mainlands then. Now vastly different story...more and more people are morphing Into Islands It seems to me.  One minute, a human, next minute s/he grabs a gizmo and wham...an Island! It is beyond Imagining.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2016 

H is for Henry....the Heighth

is for Henry

Henry’s heir raising tale

G is for Gorgonzola and Gorgon

is for Gorgonzola and Gorgon

The difference between Gorgonzola and Gorgon

F is For the French way

is for the French way

the French are way too cool

E is for Euclid

 is for Euclid

Euclid and the science of SMS

D is for Daedalus

is for Daedalus' Design

Daedalus’ design