Night

Dusk settles thickly over the trees

leaf green to dark green

flushing away the last vestiges of daylight,

the intermittent tinkling of anklets

and the chanting of the evening prayers.

Darkness creeps in; engulfing it all..

They moor their little boats to the riverbanks

as a pair of bright yellow eyes silently observes from beyond

padding, stalking, plotting its next move...

Purring, whirring and rustling

an entire world comes to life

breathing with a steady drone of cicadas and nightjars

The aroma of nightqueen and wet mud mingles;

a smell like no other.

Blazing torches and an acrid smell of smoke

and a shower of charred honeybees falls to the ground

like leaves in autumn; melting wax drips like tears.

A shrine to the striped god lays forgotten beneath a banyan tree;

smeared with vermillion

while their striped god kidnaps children

and lays their mutilated bodies

forgotten beneath a bush, smeared with blood.

Responding to a rasp with a roar; it's like a heartbeat

Purring, whirring and rustling

an entire world comes to life..

Heaven On Earth.

I sing a song to the gurgling of the stream flowing past my house

accompanied by a chorus of koel calls and gunshots alike

I see no difference;

because it's all the same now...

Nowadays instead of the morning azaan

I see smoke drifting out of the neighborhood mosque

yellowing the marble walls

obscuring the view from my window

so that I have to look hard to spot the sun rising everyday

Only a few dozen flowers remain in our garden

the rest have either died or been trampled upon.

On my way home, I accidentally step on a landmine

and shrapnel pierces my body

crippling me like it has crippled my people;

my parents and my siblings too...

Blood mars the exterior of my house

staining pristine white with dark red

I remember not whether it is the remnants of last week's Eid;

or last week's shoot-out

I sing a song to the dawn prayers

prayers that give me courage; coming from that temple

standing like a silent sentinel on the hill beyond

I fill in verses and words of my own; a plea for deliverance

freedom from this cursed land

where corpses and shikaras floating on the waters of the Dal

all look the same to me...