A Silent Volcano

In a world where silence screams
To make heard its voice
I have my ears tuned to society’s
Woes. It’s like a silent volcano,
Of a sensitivity sublime,

Ungraspable in imagination,
As it lazes around in a blue lagoon
Interspersed with green islets
Inside its large caldera
Cast in the form of a Diya
That lightens the world around,

As if to make an offering
To the spirituality of this site –
A sight that I breathe
As I walk on the upper rim
Of its emerald crater
One sunny summer day.

Standing on the cusp
Of a buried silence
As if in a state of meditation
And with a sacred trust for it,
I can imagine far within

The breeze-swept lagoon.
The winds of dissidence,
Seething and maddening,
Stir magma to a state of
Ebullience, giving vent to its anger

Caused by its relentless repression.
In this drought of social justice
Internal pressures build up
And so erupt restive revolutions
And wars for liberty,

All in the quest of distilling justice,
An idea rife with an irrepressible
Call for equity and love for Humanity.

Pramod Rastogi is an Emeritus Professor at EPFL, Switzerland; He is a Poet, academician, researcher, author of nine scientific books, and a former Editor-in-chief (1999-2019) of a major international scientific journal. He has published over one hundred poems in international literary journals. Read other articles by Pramod, or visit Pramod's website.