The Fool - III

This is a poem spread across multiple pages. Please read in order.

The Fool - I.
The Fool - II.

The sweet allure of reinventing his self
Giving birth to oneself without much help
Of leaving one’s past behind for good
Not giving back what one’s withstood
But to strive for a world that is right and fair
Where one can dream and one can dare
To constantly renew oneself
And get rid of ill-got pelf
That desire burning strong and wild
Leads him to quests – modest and mild
-and make his life a living hell
Unrequited desires within that quell
And torment him for days at stretch-
Should he move on and miss the catch.

The catch that used to haunt his nights
To strive for which with all his might
He used to labor night and day
Come winter, autmn, spring or may
But now that she is within his beck
He somehow wants to turn the deck
And move ahead with a trip that’s long
Not certain, easy – like a song
But meandering, convoluted and contrived
May lead to grail, may take for ride
And leave him broken and forlorn
With an aching heart, a sticky thorn
Or may just end on a lighter note,
Neither grail, nor damsel , nor a prize of note

But only a weary and dreary end
No good or bad , but mediocre end
A journey without its moments of magic
That was neither glorious, nor eminently tragic
The one that could be easily relegated to past
No sonnets , poems or epics to last
And what’s for more- No damsel back home
One could have had the girl – if one lost the Rome
But only drudgery common and trite
The journey lasting like a rite
A ritual that one had to perform
A bad dream - soon forget its form
Only retain the sense of waste
A journey with such common taste.

Filled with humdrum, daily life
No passions, victories, war or strife
No ‘happily ever afters’ to boot,
No damsel, luring, acting cute-
Overshadowing the goal at large-
No goal at all – nothing real, just farce
A journey without an end in sight-
And yet not filled with tragic might
The normal quest for daily bread
with little glory that could spread.
No traps, or snares or whodunits
No heroic act that one commits
That for the boring quest could make
And afterwards as memories take.

Memories of what one did sacrifice
The courage shown, the battle cries
How valiant one did act on time
Though what one achieved was at best lime
No trophies of war or loots to say
Yet marks on skin that one proudly may
Show to others and which testify
That one did fight-one did not shy
From the battles – but did fight brave
Or make up stories of what one did save
If not an actual damsel in distress,
Yet ones honor and ones grace
Of courage shown and wounds and marks,
Of biting hard – and not just barks.