View source for Another Letter from Another Father to Another Son

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"'''Another Letter from Another Father to Another Son'''" is an English poem by the Indian poet [[Mathew John]]. The poem was a surprise winner of the first prize<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.indianpoetry.org/awards.htm|title=Award Winners - All India Poetry Competition 2013|access-date=2014-04-04|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140220122128/http://www.indianpoetry.org/awards.htm|archive-date=2014-02-20|url-status=dead}}</ref> in the All India Poetry Competition conducted by [[The Poetry Society (India)]] in 2013.

==Excerpts from the poem==

:Sonny, it is not my wish to advise you
:Though my tongue yearns to be advisor to the king.

:Sonny, it is not my wish to advise you
:Though this may end up as another piece of advice
:In another letter from another father to another son.

::: *******

:For, it took years for my father's sermons
:To traverse the miles between my ears and my brain
:And I learnt about most things
:After enough follies had been past.

:Let me tell you a single thing
:The way to go, seems to me
:From life to the book
:And not the other way around.

::: *******

:So, let life teach you before your father's words 
:And let life teach you to outgrow
:The interesting stories that other people tell.
:For, nobody is really very sure.

:Earlier they used to tell
:Never look beyond the wall
:Now, they have built
:A ladder for you to climb.

::: ******

:But, nobody is really very sure
:About the wall, forget the ladder.
:Very few boxes have been opened, my son
:It is still an interesting world out there.

:So, let me not offer you
:A book, a window, a jigsaw puzzle or my reading glasses
:Let me give you just these –
:My silence and my smile.

==See also==
*[[Indian poetry]]
*[[Indian writing in English]]
*[[The Poetry Society (India)]]

==Notes==
<references/>
*[http://www.duckduckgo.com/?q=Indian+poems Popular Indian Poems]

[[Category:Indian English poems]]
[[Category:2014 poems]]
[[Category:Works originally published in Indian magazines]]
[[Category:Works originally published in literary magazines]]