Poetry at Sangam
Poetry at Sangam showcases poetry in English and translations as well as essays on poetics and news of new releases.
A hungry raven caws for bits of flesh –
the floods have laid out a feast. Someone
unfurls an unearthly wail. Death
has combed the sun from your hair.
A beast howls from behind my lungs.
There is so much I haven’t told you.
When did we run out of time? Are you
just outside the periphery of my sight?
Are you merely sleeping
beyond the confines of language?
Are we together
but for the linearity of time?
*
The dog has stopped eating. The baby
whimpers hungrily in my milk-less chest.
Nirjala, remember you had once collected
my tear drops in your palms? You had promised
‘I will come back from the dead for you’.
I light this lamp, the patheya, for you.
They say this flame guides the dead
on their journey onward. This one
will help show you your way back.
*
The government official stands – as usual –
safely away from the ‘site of accident’
now hidden under fuming wet sand
for a moment before rushing off
to an important meeting with the Minister.
A dog yelps out of harm’s way.
‘Women do not work in coal mines’
so you did not make it to this list
of familiar names – the chosen ones
from all those who had walked into
the underground wearing their cracked
helmets and leaking gumboots.