Honing My Poetic Skill Poem by Raja Basu

I had not written any poem for long, when my friend told me that day

“Hey Raja, you have not written any poem for long. Very unfortunate, I would say.

A true poet should always keep writing, no matter how much fast his life is

And I request you to write one poem right now. Will you, please? ”

I sat at my desk, and did prepare a small poem

Then called my friend, and to my desk she came.

She read the poem, was happy, and kissed me affectionately

And sat beside me, with her hand placed on my shoulder gently.

“You are so sweet dear, the poem is really so nice.

Thanks a lot for writing the poem! ” She smiled with pleasure in her eyes.

“But what’s the use of the poem? ” I said. “It’s so small.

In fact smaller and simpler than nursery rhymes, meant for babies who crawl.”

My friend gave me a sweet smile, before softly squeezing my left cheek.

“Oh dear, I didn’t know that you are a stupid so big.

The size of the poem does not matter, what matters is the joy of a new creation

And the pleasure of writing a new poem, which is your life’s greatest passion.

You are a poet, and you should regularly come up with a poetic piece

It’s absolutely not necessary that each of them should be a masterpiece.

By regularly writing poems you can keep your creative impulse alive

Like one regularly needs to hone the sharpness of a knife.

By not writing any poem for long you were getting your poetic skill very rusty

For me it was a development as intolerable as a garbage dump so nasty.

Very soon your poetic talent would have become completely blunt and dull

And you would have failed to come up with any new creation, big or small, my dear pal.

Today by writing this small poem you have revived your creative ability

And now it will be easier for you to write poems of high quality.

God has given you the poetic skill. Don’t let it gather dust, that’s so disappointing

So please keep writing, writing and writing.”