After retirement as a professor and Head of English in 1994, Dr. Ram Mehta splits 
his time between India and North America. He visited France on a cultural mission
in 1989 and presented a scene of the French dramatist Moliere's La Tartuffe in Paris. 
He also visited UK, Scotland and Ireland. 
He is a life member of the World Academy of Arts & Culture  and attended its 
convention at IASI, Romania in October, 2002 and 25th World of Congress at 
Los Angeles in August, 2005. He also attended 4th Encuentro Internacional 
Literario at Montevideo, Uruguay in April, 2003. 
He has been awarded the honorary degree of Litt.D -by The World Academy 
of Arts and culture at Los Angeles (USA), in 2005 (UNESCO sponsored)
His poems are published in Algeria, Australia, Argentina, Canada, India, Ireland,
Italy, New Zealand, Romania, USA, UK, Uruguay and Zambia.

Absolution

In the magical surroundings of
The Chimney Rock Mountains
My grandkids were enjoying ice creams.
The little one climbed over the table
With ice cream con in his hand
Eating and showing to a young couple.

The woman was eating not the ice cream
But listlessly moving the spoon in her mouth
And the man was looking down to his back.

Did they come to confess to one another
Over the privacy of the ice cream?
Their past was flowing over the table,
Neither there was any sign of the rain
Nor the ice cream in the cup melted.

There was no conversation between the two,
But the chatter of waitresses at the urn
And echoed voices of the people
Climbing the last lap of the mountains.

Suddenly there was a gust of wind & shower
That forced them to go inside the restaurant
We show them hugging in a corner
And the ice cream melted on the table
And their present flowing over the table.

O’Word

O word, for my Bibliogenesis 
‘my Dolly’
You are not fatherless
that I love you in the
Mouth of dear one Aesthesiogenically.
I feel you in my Parthenogenesis veins
Like an unfertilized egg
With the traffic-jammed
In my polluted blood.
I streepteased my desire
That breathes in your mouth.
The world is made up of things-
Things do not speak but have
A language and a reason for being.
I think of the silence of
Your lips I visit to form embryo
Make me wet with erotic desire
To gratify erotogenically
And mould you in good shape
With the vault of your mouth
So that the world around me
Can hear you in the heavens

* (In March 1996, the news of the birth of a fatherless sheep affectionately 
named "Dolly" shocked the world.)

The scenes of Korea

Look there! A newly wed bride steps out
Dismounting from the wedding coach.
The tradition expects the bride to step
On the lid of the traditional huge pot
Before entering into her home-to-be.
The pot being hanged on the threshold.

Look again! Smoke rising off the chimney,
The woman puts the soybean skins in the fire,
‘tak, tak, tak’ sound comes from burning wood,
Now the hearth blazes in flaming red
And brightens the woman’s beautiful face.
Her charms come unbidden
Like a phrase in a sentence.

An old man chanting first to the drums
And the paddy planters sing after him,
Sending the echoes over the Naju plains.
The old man shouts a word of command
And the planters move to the next line.

I hear the famous Hori & Gyeori songs
To converse with Mara and An cows
“Mara is stepping back- A-Ha!!!!
But An is just going slow, A-Ha!!!!
Where are you going cow?
Pay attention to where you are going
Here! Here! Boy, Here! Go straight!
Here, Boy, Here, Ahead we go!!!!!!!”

Thus, the earth is tilled,
The earth makes soft breaking sounds
The cows breathe heavily
The farmer’s song too gets out of breath
The calf feeds on her mother’s breasts
The life on the earth goes on and on..

GLOSSARY
Naju Plains: The productive agricultural plains of Naju. 
Hori and Gyeori songs: There is a tradition of gathering cows with a song.
Jeonggeum-Ri: The most famous songs - Hori Song and Gyeori Song. 
Gyeori: The name of a large plow pulled by two cows. 
Mara: The right-hand cow in a team of two. 
An or Ahn Cow: The left-hand cow in a team of two. 
 y twenty to thirty performers.

Copyright, Ram Mehta.
All rights reserved by author.