‘Timeless Echoes’ is Here!

Timeless Echoes is just a click away now. Click on the link to download it and hear the echoes that would reverberate around you, reminding you of lost opportunities, repressed desires, cherished moments and hope that shimmers through clouds.

Here are all the links:

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When Echoes Vibrate

Lilies in the garden spoke to me
Birds sang merrily
Clouds of gloom disintegrated
When I let these echoes vibrate

Mute watchers warbled
Fluttering fervently around me
Stirring hopeful messages
Of joy and bliss

When smoke of your love
Tried to asphyxiate me
When dreams got besieged
I flew on the wings of words

Fears receded when
Sun spread its gold
Creating a fusion of colors
Silently illuminating life.© Balroop Singh

The Editor’s Review:

Half of what we say are lies although they might be considered true, but truth with one’s self is an accepted bundle of lies except for those rare moments of self-realization. These lines right at the start of Timeless Echoes, ‘Each moment is precious, we try to cage it within our heart, where it perches in perfect rampart, embalmed by memories,’ reveal how this book is a healer, promising to lay bare the ills of the soul as it soothes, cleanses, and nurtures; instilling in us a will to learn and live without fear, and a will to not hurt others: ‘Why can’t our hearts feel the hurt we hurl at others?’

Balroop’s new book is a steadfast repudiation of those ills that we painfully hide under the covers of our flesh to present the polished exterior as truth. This magnetic collection of poems highlights our precious human lives with all their varied emotions and imposing relations: the lives often blinded by the strictures of the self-made duplicity, an excessively common phenomenon. ‘Listen to your heart, my friend. It knows you well,’ she writes.

I treasure these ‘forgetting fragile facets of love, facade of fading memories, echoes of dwindling love, is all I have now, yet love echoes refuse to subside’ believing that love echoes are soul-launched signals, ready to hug our pretenses to forge a divine assimilation because the struggle has always been with the self that we excommunicate to build up a wall, which obscures the travails plaguing the core. And finding a path to the core is the cure since there’s no villainy in the soul.

As Balroop proclaims ‘love is such a strange emotion, it gives less, it claims more…the facade of love is so delusive,’ I concur how our infirmities require urgent banishment, more pressing now than ever. And once I’ve made peace with the self, ‘the dark corridors are like meadows, they glow with my presence.’ Yes, without an iota of my own falsehoods plaguing me.
–  Mahesh Nair

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Balroop Singh.

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Magical Feather

Sue Vincent’s #photoprompt

The feather we found on the ledge
Remains as precious as you
It’s color…just like your blue eyes
Impelling me to plunge
Into their depth

Its delicacy…a familiar touch
Reminiscent of resonance
That drew us to each other
Its magical message…
Love remains recalcitrant

Dissolve the doubts
Follow the magic of love
Its depth may overwhelm
Craters may coerce complacency
Passion portals remain open.

©Balroop Singh

Thanks to Sue Vincent for an inspiring Thursday photo prompt Remains #writephoto. 

You can click here for more poetry.

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Avenues of Harmony

Sue Vincent’s #writephoto

Once again our green hands
Disseminate sheltered serenity
Once again our life inspires
The love of perpetual giving

Come join the celebrations
Revel in the glory of spring melodies
Soft sounds of new leaves
Merge in the song of bluebirds

Recline in the carousel of lovebirds
Glide with the breezy fragrance
Smile with the colorful sweet peas
Feel the magical breath of spring

This green bower beckons
Accentuating avenues of harmony
Shifting seasons beseech quietly
To keep the rhythm of nature alive.
© Balroop Singh

Thanks to Sue Vincent for an inspiring Thursday photo prompt Avenue #writephoto.

You can click here for more poetry.

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Thank you for your support. Please add your valuable reflections, they are much appreciated.

Why Do We Like Poetry?

“Poetry is painting that speaks,”said Plutarch.

A painting that gets its hues from words.
Just a metaphor can evoke emotions that could not be described in a thousand words.

Poetry is liked due to its succinct style. It soars on the wings of words.
Poetry touches your deepest cords effortlessly. It develops perceptions.
It liberates us from the mundane. It gives us wings.
Due to its ambiguous nature, it can be interpreted in more than one way, depending on how the reader discerns the thoughts.

What attracts us to poetry?

There could be a myriad answers…some poets have shared them…

Ritu says:  “I love the way words flow in rhythmic ways, rhyming or not, echoing the poets thoughts, often conveying huge sentiments in limited words and lines.”

In Deborah’s opinion, “For me it just happens. In 35 seconds, there’s a poem. Love it on Twitter, but I also write book-length verse. I’m an odd duck, but I know you understand!

Robbie Cheadle “likes the flow of words and the meter of poetry. With Haiku and tanka poems, I enjoy playing around with words to make a statement with an impact.”

Miriam feels… “It rather seems that poetry grabbed hold of me. I do find the musicality, rhythm and strength of emotions attract me in a poem.

Wendy took my heart away with her profound and philosophical reflections: “Poetry gives edges, expression, and delineation to experiences that allow the reader to help define and be with their own experience that is evoked from reading the poem… Great poetry renders a visual like a painting where one can see all the splashes and colors and layers and depths or like a beautiful symphony or ensemble of music where one has the time and space to really listen to each and every instrument and the synthesis of all the textures and resonances that create the culmination of the whole journey of the musical piece.”

Radhika says: “Poetry to me, is a celebration of thoughts and language. My feelings ooze out, into which I dip the quill and ink them on paper. It is also cathartic. The deepest pain and anguish, the euphoric love, the intense moments of life, all find an outlet through words, which when woven eloquently, creates magic. I enjoy the conversation of thoughts that emanates in my mind before they paint the paper with their hues.”

I don’t remember when I developed a liking for poetry but soulful lyrics of songs always attracted me.

My real introduction to poetry occurred when I joined university and took up English as a major. Initially it was challenging to understand Robert Browning and Alfred Tennyson but the simpler poems of William Wordsworth, rich with the love of nature attracted me to poetry and my fondness kept growing.

It also depends on how well a poem is explained by our teacher and those who choose to explain even a simple simile or a metaphor are remembered fondly. I met some such gems who explained poems painstakingly.

Like my dearest friend Deborah says: The first is always special and has shared her first poem with us:

Ode to a Sunday Morn by Deborah 
[Original title. I had no idea how many lines constituted an “Ode”; still don’t, nor to I care.]
Today is made for growing
With Spring knocking at my door
The sky is dark and clouded
The rain serenely pours
The flowers gently peek
From their Winter’s hiding place
The robin he doth seek
A pine of firry lace
The rain is bringing growth
To every flower, bush, and tree
The creeks and rivers floweth
With eternal life to be
The clouds gently part
A ray of sun kisses the earth
It enlivens my heart
With the Spring’s wondrous rebirth
From a church on yonder hill
The Bells of Sabbath Ring
The world is quiet ’til
The birds begin to sing…
“I was nine years old. It was published in a 4-H magazine. I have never forgotten it, though I forget my short Twitter poems now because I write so many. The first is always special! I had been a city kid, and due to my Dad’s job we moved to the country. At first, I was afraid, but then I fell in love with nature.”
© Deborah A. Bowman

Ritu remembers that “one of my first was a poem about my brother, and how annoying he was! Apt since at 9, siblings rarely get on!”

Wendy wrote her first poem in, “I think, 6th grade (age 11 or 12, I think). It was printed in the school anthology. I wrote the poem, I believe, because it was a homework assignment to write a poem. By this age I had read quite a bit of poetry, although I suspect all of the poetry read at that point in my life had been poetry written for children. The emotion, at the time, of the poem, I believe, was silent acceptance and hope. The poem had an expression of Divinity in it-although not directly but abstractly. I think that was very reflective of where I was at in my life.”

I could not write poetry at such an early age! Even when I started writing, I didn’t share it because the poetry of John Donne, Keats, T.S. Eliot and such great poets intimidated me. My early poetry (Read here)

To be continued… Stay tuned for more!

Meanwhile please note: I would be gifting two ebooks of Sublime Shadows Of Life, my debut poetry book to those two readers who write the most poetic comments to all the posts I publish this month – #NationalPoetryMonth. Happy writing!

Thank you for reading this. Please share your valuable reflections, as they are much appreciated.

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Balroop Singh.

My Comfort Zone…

I feel most like me…
When I am at home
When I can speak my heart out
Without thinking I would be misconstrued
When I am surrounded by the people I love
The friends I can trust

I feel most like me
When I bask in the glory of my days
When I laugh like my grand kids
Who add sparkle to my face
When happiness reflects in my eyes
And my heart exults with pride

I feel most like me
When random memories make me smile
When rain drains away emotional dust
That gathers unawares
When my grand son hugs me tight
And whispers… ‘I love you’

I feel most like me
When my words flow like a stream
When my reflections are understood
And touch somebody’s heart
When I have all the time in the world
To look at the stars

I feel most like me
When I am in my comfort zone
When I feel free to take decisions
That I know would be respected
When gratitude percolates within me
And peace pervades around

I feel most like me
When I listen to my inner voice
When I am unaffected by criticism
And stay calm in my heart
When I refuse to be manipulated
And can listen to divine within.
© Balroop Singh

You can Click here for more poetry.

If you have liked this poem, please share it at your favorite social networks.

Thank you for your support. Please add your valuable reflections, they are much appreciated.