Have a thoughtful beginning of the year, and an actionable 2017

Spare a thought

Spare a thought this new year
... for your Country

Has democracy taken root?
When the mantle of leadership is passed
from parent to son or daughter
With little thought to qualification
or selection criteria,
When the government runs by ordinance
because your elected representatives are busy
shouting slogans, raising voices,
disrupting business, because they have no idea
how to debate and discuss
They got where they got,
by wielding sticks and pelting stones,
Words aren't their stock in trade,
pens are for the weak, How dare
you portray their Gods with pens and not swords in their Hands?

Spare a thought this new year
...for the Constitution
When journalists can be imprisoned with impunity
For the courage to stand up against the state
When the state can kill, maim and threaten citizens
then subvert and subdue the process of law
When standing up for the national anthem is more important
than standing up for your rights,
When those who most flagrantly break the laws
can makes the laws anew to cover their tracks
When the legislature abdicates its responsibility
in its thirst for power gives up its legitimacy
When every decision needs to be made by the judiciary
Is the day far when a judge will decide the team for every cricket game?
Or what should be your beloved child's name?

Spare a thought this new year
... for Nature

Mother nature we call it,
for it mothers and nurtures our growth
Yet use and abuse is all we know
We take its many gifts with merry abandon
then abandon it when it needs our support
Choking up the rivers with our filth
we choke on the air so precious, so unique
Far and wide have we travelled, roved and voyaged
Watched planets circling stars now dim to our sight
Never once found air so pure that we once had before
that gave us life, made our electrochemical synapses glow
Everywhere we go that essential life force - H2O
is scarce or toxic, or buried miles below
Yet we who have it treat it with utter disregard
pump into it our waste, our dead, whatever we discard
Yet from time to time we remember our roots
Our ancestors who celebrated it, gave it its due
We utter the prayers, take the holy dip
open a mineral water bottle for a sip
Then throw the bottle when we are done
Into the soil from where we get our "Ann"
Annapoorna, we have a name for her
the nourisher, the giver, she banishes hunger
Yet we poison her gifts with chemicals so vile
The land where we sow, we rape and defile
When we reap that harvest, it will be ripe with sorrow
For the land we do not love or cherish
We will miss dearly when we perish
When the rice turns to dust, and the grains to ash
there is no more forest left to burn and slash
Spare a thought now, or it will be lost forever
do you pin your hopes on the SpaceX endeavour?

Spare a thought this new year
.... for yourself

For who you want to be
What is your identity
Do others dictate the words
that come out as sounds from your mouth?
Are your opinions your own?
Unfettered by blind allegiance,
Wide and accepting of the delightful diversity of this world
Do your actions reflect the yearning of that dead poet
Who dreamed of a world free
where people could live with respect and dignity
Where scholar and reason
are not considered traitor and treason
Where we build bridges of hope not walls of fear
Walls that narrow your view, imprison your mind
Shackle your soul, until you can no longer find
your voice, your identity
you will have lost your dignity
Is that who you want to be?