}} The History of Stones by Begum Asma Khatun |

Poetry at Sangam

SangamHouse

 










The History of Stones by Begum Asma Khatun

Sarabjan,
Observe the drowned stones—
Breath has long left them and yet
The river bubbles.
They cling to the spectre of life,
Clutch the sands on the riverbed
And strain against the tide of time.

Darkness catches the end of day,
There’s a burning corpse in the heart of night
And a galaxy of stars floats away.
Sarabjan, the sun is trapped
In a snail’s shell.

A blue whale swallows the stones,
Its bile turns them to dust
And out flows the dust
in a torrent of vomit.
Sarabjan, you know the cycle
Of dust and stone.

The stones have eyes
And hearts.
Every time the river hurts
All bloodied eras float on theirs tears,
Tears which, on the pages of time, turn into oceans.

When I swim in those oceans, Sarabjan,
I see charred bones
I see the theatre of expert debate
Held by the land-dwellers
I see the clapping of hands
Of the large audience.

Sarabjan,
Do you know the story of Kalidas?
He sat on a branch and hacked at the roots.
They do the same—
Start a forest fire and speak of progress.

Sarabjan, you know how
The onanistic stones have kept
The river alive; how
The civilisation of the river banks,
not written into history,
Lives life zygotic in the womb of time.

 

← Begum Asma Khatun