Today’s choice
Previous poems
Kushal Poddar
As the Festival Wanes
I
The furniture covered in once
transparent now foggy sheets
craft the room a morgue, and we
identity the bodies, “This cupboard,
my mother brought with her
from her father’s place.” “This couch
still has my uncle’s bottoms ‘ shape.”
You pull the curtains and the drapes
fall apart with the fixtures.
The sombre light dissects the dark.
Seven minutes away, Autumn pauses
to shake the trees of the ‘Children
and Ladies Only’ park. It won’t be here
on time. The dust on the cold slab of a floor
becomes tear beads, glints. Outside
two kites, sentries from the festival
we have observed, look haggard.
Pigeons we wake up startle their sleep.
II
The last of the drums and DJs
drag the festival to the pier.
Some bubbles and ripples
and silence, moon has no duty
tonight.
Underneath an illicit sky
I find two shadows kiss.
Kushal Poddar is the author of ‘A White Cane For The Blind Lane’ and ‘How To Burn Memories Using a Pocket Torch’ and has ten books to his credit. He is a journalist, father of a four-year-old, illustrator, and an editor. His works have been translated into twelve languages and published across the globe.
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