‘Bird Cries’ & ‘Old Neighbours’

by Mallika Bhaumik

Bird Cries (song of protest)

A morning comes wrapped in silence
in this walled city,
its bridges and parks, museums, eateries, clock tower wear a solemn look
the breeze too blows with caution,
it feels no flutter around it.
We look at each other
trying to gauge what is amiss.
A whisper goes around, ‘where have the birds gone?’

An old fakir sits by the bazaar gate
‎his ektara hums another tune; a tune of bird protest.
‘How songs of freedom have been quashed and throttled,
how ‎people have been cloaked in green or saffron or red,
how they have flown away leaving behind the corn,
how we are left to wonder, ‘where have the birds gone?’

People of this land have lost their tongues
they speak nothing, they speak to none,
different bird cries fill the empty spaces of their mind.
They toddle around long after the birds have gone.

Old Neighbours

The nights grow dense,
the weary shadows of the day
merge themselves with the darkness,
– a darkness that remains mute witness
to the spilled dreams on the sidewalk, -dogs and humans cohabit
their territories clearly marked.
All shrivelled up,
bundled,
yet
breathing,
breeding,
weaving the fabric
of their insignificant lives.
Some nights go deep inside their bones
some nights pause before the final bite,
some nights crawl in silently to script the epilogue of their unfair lives.

The vacant corners are again occupied.
Some other migrant arms
sell newspapers, rose bunches, agarbattis
at traffic snarls
some other wintry nights claim them perhaps.
The city folds its paper heart,
only the dogs at times, sniff and look around for their old neighbours.

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