Poetry and Night

As night walks into my senses 

with trees wearing the songs of winds 

halting the day's insane run,

I unbutton the fever of my joints

and let the cool air flow inside me.

There's no distant corner I can call my own 

for sounds invade like putrid smells  

to empty my soul's belongings,

with crowded din ringing inside my brain

making me wear a heart outside,

a heart grown cold. 

Practised gestures and plastic smiles

reduce me to a doll, winded, in gay dresses

till stars beckon me out in the open

to shower silvery drops of nostalgia 

in the interspaces of love and pain, 

the breeze making room, ruffling my hair 

awakening wounded rivers, sleeping deep inside my dried discs,

offloading hurts ----

like heavy clouds, birthing a rain-relief on Sahara . 

O night! You undress my longings,

my frozen throbs of passion, 

the time when you voice 

muted seeds of thoughts 

which grow like trees 

in the darkness of your lap

till they flower and become

poems of mystic wetness, 

joy and prayer. 

By Satabdi Saha