A journey long, through countless miles
Yet the heart, walks with smiles
Time took the glow, not the flame
Every new turn, is but a quite game.


The past leaves shadows, but none to blame,
I move through silence, to meet the divine.


Susanta Pattnayak

You left our bed at morning’s sigh,
A fleeting kiss, a soft goodbye.
The stars still clung to dawn’s sky,
Now tears and time just linger by.
Come back, my love, don’t leave me crying.  

The bangles hum your name till dawn,
The shadows sway, their light withdrawn.
My soul’s a flame, its spark long gone,
Your absence weaves my fears till morn.
Come back, my love, don’t leave me crying.  

The sheets still hold your fading warmth,
But cold winds chant a lonesome storm.
My heart, once full, now frays, forlorn,
Each clock’s slow tick a wound reborn.
Come back, my love, don’t leave me crying.  

No message comes, no whispered word,
No echo from that town unheard.
My wedding joy, now grief’s own bird,
This bridal bloom, once bright, now blurred.
Come back, my love, don’t leave me crying.  

I light the lamp, I breathe your name,
The night returns with wind and flame.
Alone, I bear a wife’s soft shame,
Yet in my heart, you’re still the same.
Come back, my love, don’t leave me crying.



© Susanta Pattnayak

The tree stood tall,
eyes lifted to the quiet of sky.
Its branches bore the season's pride—
a crown of leaves, dancing in light.

Among them, one—
a leaf brushed in green and gold,
clung close to its place.
The hush came softly,
a gentle breeze,
barely a whisper,
yet enough.

It loosened.

It let go.
And as the stem slipped from its hold,
the world tilted.

Fear first—sharp and quick—
of falling, of ending,
of the space between belonging
and being alone.

But the breeze curled beneath
like a secret promise,
and suddenly—
flight.
A quiet thrill, a floating wonder,
as if the sky had always been calling.

It spun, slowly, weightless,
and glanced back—
at the branch that once cradled it,
the siblings it played beside,
the early rains, the sunlit hushes,
the laughter of birds.

A pang—
not regret,
but a soft sorrow,
a love for what was!

Then came thought—
of life, of letting go,
of how even in descent
there is a reason.
Even as a fallen leaf,
it would dry, curl,
be swept, be burned,
warm someone’s night,
feed the roots of its mother tree,
become earth again.
It could be a bookmark,
a decorative piece —
reminding of beauty, of quiet change.

It understood.

And when it touched the ground,
it did not break.
It became.

Still, quiet,
yet filled with a knowing—
that even in this silence,
there was music.
Even in the end,
there was offering.
Even in the fall,
there was flight.

And above,
the tree swayed once,
not in mourning—
but in grace.

© Susanta Pattnayak

A few thoughts—like wild dogs—run,
Snarling, sprinting, none in unison.
One walks wrapped in quiet reckoning,
Another leaps from the shadows—unannounced.
Serious faces in the gathering of silent aches,
While jesters sneak in, stealing peace.

He walks—a slow tide at sundown,
Breeze in chest, no ripple in sight.
But beneath—magma hums lullaby,
Cradling fury like a sleeping child.
Cool eyes, volcanic veins,
A storm rehearsing in a candle’s calm.

Family—his driftwood and his anchor.
The balm and the blister.
They lull him with laughter,
Then jolt him with a sigh too long,
A silence too sharp.

And yet—
There is a place.
Not drawn on maps or etched in stone.
Where scattered thoughts find their rest.
Where the mind exhales what it held too long.
There—he folds into himself,
A silent hymn of peace.
Not even or odd.
Just still.
Just enough.
...

But the world claws back—
A phone buzz, a sigh across the hall,
The clink of plates, a missed stare,
Little things—
Each one a thread in the tapestry of turmoil.

He smiles. Sometimes wide. Sometimes just enough
To not break.
His voice—a riverbed in drought,
Holding the shape of past floods.

The night asks questions.
Why do shoulders carry what the soul can’t name?
Why does love sometimes bruise,
Even when it’s trying to heal?

Yet still—he finds it.
That sacred place.
Maybe it’s a song only he hears,
A far away place deep in nature, unknown
Or perhaps, it’s just the breath
Between two thoughts—
Where nothing aches, and nothing burns.

Here—
Even the chaos kneels.
The fire sleeps under wet earth.
And the day, whether odd or even,
Slows…
To a whisper.



Susanta Pattnayak

(A Song of Love, Loss, and Condemnation)

We came where the Lidder flow,
Where pine trees guard the earth below.
Pahalgam cradled us in grace,
A honeymoon wrapped in nature’s embrace.
We held each other on the mountain bend,
A love that felt like it would never end.

The air was pure, the sky so wide,
He laughed with joy, I stood by his side.
But then came thunder not from the skies—
Gunfire tore through our lives.
He fell with a whisper, his eyes still warm,
As horror bloomed where dreams were born.

Oh, although the pine still sings,
My heart can't feel a thing.
He died with his arms reaching for light,
In the meadows of Pahalgam… robbed of our right.
Twenty-six souls now sleep in snow,
Where only peace was meant to grow.
Tell me how faith became this blade—
That carves through love in a holy charade.

They came like shadows, hearts turned to stone,
No warning, no mercy, we died alone.
He wasn’t a soldier, just someone in love—
Now he lies silent beneath skies above.
Blood flows through the lush meadow’s green,
In Baisaran Valley, where peace had been.

Now the world itself breathes with grief,
And paradise weeps through every leaf.
How many must die before we say—
That no belief can justify this way?

We light our candles, the world moves on,
But love once lost is never gone.
Condemn these hands that **** and maim,
No God demands this kind of flame.
Let not one more vow be broken by hate—
Let peace rise before it’s too late.

Susanta Pattnayak

After a sprint for several years,
Amidst the din and bustle,
I sat one day, quiet… to think.
No phone, no plan, no subtle hustle.

The world kept spinning just the same,
But something in me asked to stay—
To watch the wind move through the trees,
To feel the weight of just one day.

I traced my steps in silent thought,
Each victory, each sleepless night.
Were all these miles I chased so far
Still burning with their promised light?

I didn’t judge, I didn’t grieve—
Just let the questions slowly land.
Had I been present as I ran?
Did I still know where I began?

There in that pause, I met myself—
Not the name or role I’d worn,
But something softer, more alive—
The part of me not built for scorn.

It whispered not of wrong or right,
But simply asked, with open grace:
Is this the path you meant to walk?
And do you know your truest place?

No thunder struck, no answer came,
Just stillness deep and strangely kind.
A quiet room, a steady breath—
The rarest peace: a quiet mind.

Somewhere beyond the ticking clocks,
A bird took flight without a sound.
The air grew light. The moment stretched.
Along the window rim, a star blinked.


Susanta Pattnayak

I wake beneath a sky of glass,
Where morning’s tones in pulses pass.
The walls project a forest view,
Though outside lies a city new.

My mirror greets with voice so sweet,
It scans my health from head to feet.
“Your vitals shine,” it says with grace,
While brushing teeth in zero space.

A suit wraps round with warming thread,
It shifts to black or blue or red.
Its fabric learns from mood and light—
A second skin, both soft and bright.

I step inside my transit pod,
No wheels, no roads—just paths it trod.
Magnetic lanes and silent speed,
It reads my thoughts, then takes the lead.

At work, the walls are minds, not stone,
Each desk responds to me alone.
My co-bots build with laser art,
And code appears as I just start.

We craft new worlds in quantum flow,
While time bends gently, soft and slow.
A thought can birth a flight or game,
And dreams are now a form of flame.

A break? I dine on clone-baked bread,
With fruits from labs where genes are bred.
The meal adapts to what I crave,
And cleans itself—no plate to save.

By evening, homes in towers rise,
But mine folds out beneath the skies.
Its AI paints the twilight hue,
With stars it learned I once called true.

My daughter calls from ocean’s deep,
Her submarine a school and keep.
We speak through lights and neural thread,
As sea-glass drifts above her head.

At last I rest on levit-beds,
With lullabies from bots and meds.
And dreams arrive in chosen streams,
From curated, delightful dreams.

Yet still within this world so wide,
A human spark must yet decide:
That though tech bends both time and sea,
It’s love and thought that make us be.


Susanta Pattnayak