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The Soothsayer Sings a Ruba’i
In this land where I sit with my nervous pile of cards
Either I’m in Rashomon or I’m a nervous ward
You ask for successes, battles won, hearts broken, and cities trashed
My fingers groping the smooth crystal find only shards.
The Wife Sings a Ruba’i
Wish it were two amorous homes free and side by side
Us, meeting and loving at will, any woe denied
A sherbet glass at yours, wood apples at mine, and Megh Malhar tones
Is it not love’s best flavour picked and tried?
Brutus Sings a Ruba’i
From behind O Caesar, when I saw your trusting noble head
I imagined homeless folks, children and the old hungry in bed
Democracy raped, chasms deep in mind all around –
That sublime moment let my hand, remorseless, to strike you dead.
Shakuntala Sings a Ruba’i
If a ring were everything, a face, an identity
O king, should I call my luck all but serendipity!
Well, I too have now learnt to take a passing fancy at faces I wear
As talismans. Ah, the pleasure of possessing too many men in your city!
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