Sometimes the whiteness of the cloud taps wet memories.
cafes and parks record footfalls that grow long,
etching unheard stories in palms.
The morning sun comes out in the sky
bird songs are more ritual, more covering
than musical rhapsody,
the soft haze, the whisper counts the good times,
rising rain clouds often melt and shed tears.
At the return, the thunder is more,
the light post stands alone on the back street,
the school children are in dark blue uniforms
each shadow is an unfinished ghost story,
the smell of absence opens anther darkness-
cities’ old wounds, its bleeding histories.
~ Gopal Lahiri
Kolkata, India