Kolkata, India

Bridge

I write to you, inside you can see only

blood stains gleaming over the plain,

they must go somewhere,

you are done with your race.

How easy to get hurt, how hard to come after that,

images distort in the silvery mirror,

no places to hide, the vacant dryness that run

the corridors of trees.

You grieve, you cry, you do not

trust those fragile markings in the

long cold tunnel of darkness, snow flakes

can never wake you up.

I write to you, you can see within,

now it is here, waiting to be lit,

the little bridge of courage and faith.

wishing you can see the light.

Touch

Something drifts in the air.

Not yet puncturing the featherbed ground

not yet rooting for violence.

So thinks old man, the tin shop owner, the slum boy,

not knowing the sense of glass in the body.

The walled city looks with heavy-lidded eyes.

and the flame of the chulha do touch you anywhere.

Intrusion

Clouds and twilight

mauve, scarlet and pink.

The moon interrupts with its silveriness.

I see some warmth in the voice

I see hands reaching out.

I see a body lying cruciform on the sands.

There is a sense of trespass as you

intrude on my reverie

but what does that mean?

with nothing in between us

questions are unanswered now.

Gopal Lahiri is a bilingual poet, critic, editor, writer and translator with 27 books (17 in English and 10 in Bengali) published, including eight jointly edited books. His poetry in English and Bengali, is also published across various anthologies as well as in eminent journals of India and abroad. His English poems are translated in 16 languages and his works are published in 12 countries. He has been nominated for Pushcart Prize, US for poetry in 2021. He is the recipient of the Poet of the Year Award in Destiny Poets, UK, 2016, Setu Excellence Award, 2020, Pittsburgh, US and Indology Life-Time Achievement award, West Bengal, India. His latest collection of poems ‘Alleys are Filled with Future Alphabets.’ has received wide acclaim. He has recently edited an anthology of poems ‘Voices Within’, published by Setu publications, US and two other jointly edited anthologies, ‘Home’ and ‘Poetry Conclave Yearbook, 2021’.