The Other Side Of Sanity- (I) To (Iii) Poem by RAJ NANDY

THE OTHER SIDE OF SANITY
(I)
The man lay sprawled on a psychiatrist’s
couch,
With vacant looks and staring eyes;
As he got gradually hypnotized, to speak
out his unconscious mind!
He began to answer the questions asked,
And spoke in a low voice as if in a trance!
As the psychiatrist dropped his plumbing
line,
To measure the depths of his unsound mind;
While trying to ascertain and delve, -
As to what within the patient really ails!
(II)
That thin dividing line that demarcates, -
Like a silver colored gossamer thread, which
separates, -
That yawning chasm between sanity and insanity!
And when this thread gets suddenly snapped,
The mind withdraws from all reality;
Breaking bonds with our measured time,
To enter a realm of absurdity!
The mind loses its coherence and patterned
thoughts,
Which is lost in time and space,
When the very gods are said to curse, -
And withdraw all their loving grace!
That Rubicon of rational mind and thoughts,
When once crossed, there is no getting back, -
And all is gradually forgotten and lost!
When echoes resound through the labyrinth of
the demented mind,
When all normal thoughts become unhinged,
Of the eccentric, the psychotic and the lunatic;
Any one then can easily tell, the mind is cursed
to suffer a living hell!
But when sedated and put to sleep,
That wide chasm stretching dark and deep,
Closes up momentarily, during few hours of
induced sleep!
(III)

As the man lay hypnotized on the couch,
At prodding and persuasion of the medical
man,
Begins to speak out his chaotic thoughts, -
All at random, - making the doctor look lost!
He referred to those unknown hackers of his
mind,
Corrupting the programmed software of his
loving thoughts!
If he could lay his hands on them once,
He would take a revenge of his own kind!
His mental gyro now lies toppled,
For he only sees inverted planes!
Where all dimensions lie inter-mingled,
O what an unprecedented mayhem!
He too was a lover of Robert Browning once,
And like ‘Porphyria’s Lover’* to make his love
forever last,
Had killed his beloved in a loving trance!
He felt that he is not the man, once he use
to be;
For when the mirror reflects his face,
It shows a man rather thin and small, -
And does not represent him at all!
Could the good doctor now render some help,
And unite him with his departed love,
Since she has left without a trace,
Though he had showered on her his eternal
love? !

-Raj Nandy
New Delhi
11 Oct 08
(* In Browning’s poem the lunatic lover kills his mistress by strangling
her with her long flowing hair to eternalize their love! As a medical
man, I had the opportunity to both read and observe the demented mind!
Kindly read PART – (IV) of this poem -‘OTHER SIDE OF SANITY’, -
The conclusion)