മരം ഒരു ചിന്ത

PHOTO MK

Whispers of a scorned leaf

The sky looked like a broken kite,

just as the lone murmurs of the street girl, Paru;

Buses were roaring away;

Automobiles were writhing at the deep impact

they had made on lifeless bodies

Wind whispered a rare mantra akin to a

jungle song in Paru’s ears;

The tentacles of depressed heat waves

were encircling her

amidst the buzz of the city’s unemployed lot

She found succor in the tantric rites of tribes,

their concoctions, blood red garlands and

broken coconuts

In the pay-ward of anguish,

she waited for the birth pangs of yet

another dream

The thirsty moans of the oppressed

got drowned in their own sweat;

as also the wailing of the illiterate

and hapless

The empty bowels had the

hunger of the Panchapandavas

The bleat of the horns of buses

reminded the moans

of those tribal chieftains

who succumbed

to unknown maladies;

The street became deserted like

the frustration of an young girl

Yielding to archaic

temptations of a scorned soul’s

noontime heat,

Paru turned a wild beast

In the street she snarled

at the onlookers;

she boogied forward

on the look out of the killer demon

In the backdrop were whispers of the

scorned leaves which have lost its green

in automobile emissions;

The creeping whispers hung

as a crown on the

monstrous

theyyam dancing just

behind her

MK