The distance between success and failure

As his world lay shattered in pieces so small,

He sat grimly, his back pushed close to the wall!

Not an ounce of strength could his feet muster,

As thought after tired thought formed a cluster!

From a missed promotion to a broken relation,

He felt life slipping away, slowly without a caution!

“What am I missing?” he asked himself in frustration,

Searching for answers from people living in his nation!

He met an old man whose words worked like a balm,

He was as spirited as ever, smiling with youthful charm!

The old man held him close and whispered in his ears,

That worked like magic erasing all his deeply held fears!

“The greatest distance between success and failure,

Is only as long as your rejuvenated mind can find a cure!

Search hard, within the hidden depths of your mind,

And then with renewed will to succeed, a path you will find!”

After a pause that held the young man still listening,

"What you think of as failure," he said his eyes glistening!

"Could be an ill-defined success," said the wise old man,

"Redefine your success and your failure may change its tan!"

It only took a moment for the young man to realise,

The power of human thought as brought out by the wise!

Define your success 'ere you think you are a failure,
And then every low moment, your strong mind will endure!

 

Battle on the field!

Men were needed, for the battlefield required helping hand,

And, ‘Send in one son,’ was the call to every mother in the land!

The earth was bloodied beyond recognition as it turned into red sand,

Each day, men fell prey to men, amidst the sounds of trumpet and band!

Call it greed, call it hatred, war after painful war was won and lost,

Each war was justified as the cause was noble and was justly fought!

The victory was celebrated in style and pomp, as the victor’s ego sought!

Failing to understand that the so-called victory was but a loss of their own lot!

But the day is not afar, when men will be needed to plough the field,

So the humans can win their struggle for survival with their labour’s yield!

The day is not far, when men will throw away their weapons and their shield,

And till their land to eat in peace; and rise together in unison, their hatred healed!

Hope is streaming through the tiny pores of the green leaves that beckon,

As a new generation is set to cleanse the earth, emerging as a force to reckon!

May mindless boundaries vanish letting knowledge replace every war weapon!

Let freedom define itself equally to all and integrity widen the world’s narrow horizon!

The tantalising laddus!

Her eyes scanned the place before returning to the laddu. Once her eyeballs spotted the golden brown cashew, they behaved more like a flat surface than like a ball.

They stopped rolling any further!

After a few seconds they got back to scanning the surroundings. But the tantalising invitation of the ghee fried cashews was overpowering and her poor eyeballs were forced to return to it. If the power of two eyeballs was not sufficient, how could a single tongue fight the temptation alone?

Her tongue started responding to the cashew-nut’s unwitting invitation!

What her pair of hands then did was simply completing the formality.

“There you go again! What’s wrong with you? I told you not to touch the laddus until the Pooja was over!” screamed a lady’s voice from behind.

But little Meera had learnt to ignore her grandmother’s warnings and carry on with the dictum of her temptation.

Once the last granule of the yellow sweet found its way through the little girl’s alimentary canal, her legs were bestowed with the extra power needed to escape the old woman’s anger laden hands!

But that day, somehow, turned out to be different. The power of laddu failed before the anger of the old woman and Meera was caught stealing laddus!

Meera stood still in front of the small idol of Lord Krishna, her grandmother holding her by her arm.

Suddenly the little girl folded her hands in prayer.

“Oh Lord,” she began, “forgive my old grandmother, for she knows not the power of the gastronomic juices. I am sure you will not only empathise with me, but also thank me. Please call your mother Yashodha and let us both try and explain the concept to both the women.

In your case, you can continue eating butter while I can make do with one more laddu,” Meera pleaded with the lord.

Her grandmother hugged her little granddaughter.

She took her on her laps and gave her one more laddu.

Then, as gently as only a grandmother can, she explained the need for self-regulation and how it makes a person strong from within.

Meera listened to her grandmother.

“It is necessary to hold on to your temptation and not yield to it. As every home is a grooming ground, such tests are often conducted in households to make the children stronger and more resilient,” concluded the wise lady.