Selected poem by Suman Tinku

 

Monon Mukur Selected poem by

Suman Tinku

Monsoon Has Come with Hidden Shades of Pain

Rain smears my eyes at the midday window,
A trick to hide the color of tears.
O heart, is life nothing but
A floodplain of echoing memories?

 

Cloud-maiden’s fairy tale 
Each layer hides volumes of pain.
Ashar’s chest bears the weight
Of silent sorrow, deep and drained.
First love, lost yet blooming still
Inside the chest, always awake.
It may never return,
Yet the mind wears its shadow
In every drop of monsoon rain.

 

O hand if you were meant to let go,
Why did you write the saga of Padmavati?
Why did morning, bird-song,
And starlit sunbaths gather round her so earnestly?

 

On a sunlit noon,
Your lips bore beads of sweat shaped like her name.
One such noon,
At the edge of the roof 
I kissed those lips.

 

The folds of my handkerchief still hold
Painted temptations of word-filled jars 
So many words,
Sudden touches,
The handkerchief 
A secret forest of hidden letters.

 

Where, beyond the field,
Three hills curve and merge 
Our first sight unnoticed by hundreds of eyes,
Now pricks me with memory’s thorn
Along the cornice of pain.

 

That evening 
When the Shehnai played, and rain washed the streets outside 
That sorrow-soaked Ashar dusk
Refuses to be erased,
So stubborn in its staying.

 

So I let the rain smear my eyes again 
A trick to hide the color of tears.
O heart, is life nothing but
A floodplain of echoing memories?

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© shobdomukur

Published in Monon Mukur Media e-magazine