The Cave of Existence

 

—Poetry by Kushal Poddar, Kolkata, 

W. Bengal, India

—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

 

 

 

NEAR THE RED LIGHT

From the drunken garden,
from the dancing silhouettes,
the clients and their mates
turn their sweaty heads when
the bells of the temple sway.

Summer, and yet the garden-floor
muffles the footsteps
with its layers of fallen leaves.
The fallen ones never leave
here and now—they stay. 

 

 

 

 

THAT LAST TRAIN

Tomorrow's train passes
the Wait-for-me station
leaving no one.
Songs wear torn trousers;
a tambourine sways in
the cradle of their constellation;
the singer sniffs some nail polish remover.

The girl waiting, my unborn sister,
my long-gone mother,
perhaps seen through my rear window
like an ongoing slow-motion murder,
does not stop believing
what she never believed with all her
senses and knowing.

"Roll over,” a beggar asks his partner,
"Heart aches." The announcer
goes berserk with some rotten news.
Night wanes.

 

 

 

 


WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER ABOUT 1969

In another birth, contemplating
whether to haul the end nearer
or to wait for it to arrive at its own pace,
towing the knowledge
that I wouldn't emerge in this life until 1977
and that I would build ruins again,
have the same phobia of the cemetery birds,

I had no notion of the social media trends
or of a question that would hollow out
nostalgia carelessly, causing the cave
of existence to collapse.

 

 

 

 

 

THE SEE-THROUGH DRESS
SUN WEARS TODAY

The town idiot writes
"I am broke, broken” with
his nails on the staircase.

I see his toes through
his open-heart shoes.
His wife-beater reveals his ribs,
and his ribcage the door behind.

Weather dot com says,
it is raining now, and so
I open my umbrella although
sun shows no promise, no veil.

Nothing is covered today.
A sculptor has forged the town
with a nod to hiraeth. 

 

 

 

 

THE GARDEN

In its green flawed dress
the garden stands in between
two families. It has an orphan look.
You know what I mean.

Instead of the gnomes here
lie the chunks broken free from
the old concrete.
One night the burden of maintenance
leaps from the parapet.

I stare at the apparition.
The organ tunes to the lub n' dub.
The garden holds a flower.
You should not touch it. 

 

 

 

 

 

LOOPS

A white and glossy thing
sends a signal to my myopic eyes.
The wind sways the sheet
of codes hanging on my
neighbour's clothesline.

The midday waiting for the rain rolls into
a late afternoon waiting.
From the first floor boudoir
I see and do not—a pair of shears
hidden in the green,
some shrapnel of bad mood
spilled through the bad wood
of an old drawer.

I try to decipher, and you smile,
"No. No. No. Not all the codes
convey a meaning".

 

 

 

 

 

A HALO-RAINBOW AROUND MY SINS

To Robert Frede Kenter

A halo-rainbow surrounds my sins,
its glow almost motherly callous
and concerned as if she stands in
our longevous balcony and sees
us playing soccer in the street
without watching us, and hence we
can be the truants from good behaviour,
moral language.

I blink. I cannot remember a rainbow
in my life let alone a halo around the sun.
I murmur, "Forgive me for leading
a monochrome life”. Cold breeze
feels for my pulses, touches my neck.
"Am I alive?" I desire to ask and decide not to.

The grass smells of a memory of falling
from a great height, from the parapet of Eden.
The air thronged with the particles
reminds me of how the crows circle and scream
when one of them falls. Light has fallen.
It is sundown soon. I can call you, Rob,
and say, "Slainté Mhaith" or hear
the sobbing water of a lake nearby.

______________________

Today’s LittleNip:

THE BAKE
—Kushal Poddar

The new potatoes seem to take
eons to be baked.

I step out onto the balcony
wearing my sweaty vest.

A foggy-haired dog walks
an ex-politician in a tight leash. I wave.

His waving unfolds the doves;
an anthem crawls up my jawline

towards the brain.
A ding indicates the baking is complete.

____________________________

—Medusa, welcoming Kushal Poddar back to the Kitchen today, with our thanks!

 

 

 

 Kushal Poddar

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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