Definition: a sestina contains 6 6-line stanzas concluding with a 3-line stanza. The six ending words of the first stanza are repeated as ending words in the other five stanzas in a set pattern. The last stanza (envoy) uses two of the ending words in each line. Sestinas date back to the twelfth century, and is a strictly structured poetic form.
To Love
Perched upon a slab of rock, I felt love
dripping down from the cerulean Himalayan sky
onto me. My heart lapped up the droplets, joy
steaming like sweet chai. The air changed
with every breath I took, and I smiled
into the compassionate mountains and dreamed.
Today I cannot tell you of what I dreamed
this summer; but the crystalline moments in which love
shone brilliantly like surya, the sun god, and smiled
with pink sunbeams upon our heads- even the sky
bows its head to love. Has anything changed?
What of all the world's sorrows in the face of joy?
If sandalwood beads fail to bring us joy
then is our collective inner light something I dreamed
during a feverish, turmeric sleep? Imagine we changed
all our thoughts into peace bubbles, iridescent love
sprouting from each of our third eyes into the sky,
against gravity, and then the Buddha smiled,
and patted our hearts, and our Buddhas smiled
too, because there was nothing else to do. Joy
cannot live in any box, not even an invisible sky,
because joy is a something we merely dreamed
once upon a moment, fast asleep. Wake up! Love
for breakfast lunch and dinner, the menu changed
forever. Oceans drown into sky, but nothing has changed:
the rosewood wheel spins. Imagine: no one ever smiled
or cried or spoke. The world is black and white. Love
is undefined. Not even sacred rose petals smell of joy.
Even then, the white light throbbed and dreamed,
kundalini exhaled and gave birth to a sky.
Atop my hill, your hill, our hill, I exhaled unto the sky
gratitude for the green Himachal peace that changed
us, for I do not exist without you. We dreamed
and created poverty, coffee and SUVs. Buddha smiled
because it is The Way. There is much we do not know. Joy
is holding hands with every soul at once; infinite love.
To the end of the sky, the saffron-robed sun always smiled;
nothing has changed; the river still flows with joy,
and all the peace of which we've dreamed lies at the lotus feet of Love.
To Love
Perched upon a slab of rock, I felt love
dripping down from the cerulean Himalayan sky
onto me. My heart lapped up the droplets, joy
steaming like sweet chai. The air changed
with every breath I took, and I smiled
into the compassionate mountains and dreamed.
Today I cannot tell you of what I dreamed
this summer; but the crystalline moments in which love
shone brilliantly like surya, the sun god, and smiled
with pink sunbeams upon our heads- even the sky
bows its head to love. Has anything changed?
What of all the world's sorrows in the face of joy?
If sandalwood beads fail to bring us joy
then is our collective inner light something I dreamed
during a feverish, turmeric sleep? Imagine we changed
all our thoughts into peace bubbles, iridescent love
sprouting from each of our third eyes into the sky,
against gravity, and then the Buddha smiled,
and patted our hearts, and our Buddhas smiled
too, because there was nothing else to do. Joy
cannot live in any box, not even an invisible sky,
because joy is a something we merely dreamed
once upon a moment, fast asleep. Wake up! Love
for breakfast lunch and dinner, the menu changed
forever. Oceans drown into sky, but nothing has changed:
the rosewood wheel spins. Imagine: no one ever smiled
or cried or spoke. The world is black and white. Love
is undefined. Not even sacred rose petals smell of joy.
Even then, the white light throbbed and dreamed,
kundalini exhaled and gave birth to a sky.
Atop my hill, your hill, our hill, I exhaled unto the sky
gratitude for the green Himachal peace that changed
us, for I do not exist without you. We dreamed
and created poverty, coffee and SUVs. Buddha smiled
because it is The Way. There is much we do not know. Joy
is holding hands with every soul at once; infinite love.
To the end of the sky, the saffron-robed sun always smiled;
nothing has changed; the river still flows with joy,
and all the peace of which we've dreamed lies at the lotus feet of Love.
ohmygod you are so beautiful. and inconquerable. and i am so blessed to know you and love you, mere sabse budhoo buddha jaan
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