PROBAL MAZUMDAR

 

Hanged

 

Ears strain, eyes grope.

 

But inside the mask

they are useless organs seeking

sounds of the anklet’s vibrations,

contours of the beloved’s face.

 

Far away, in familiar haunts,

The birds and temple bells lose speech,

the anklet’s tongue is slashed.

 

In the convict’s hutment,

silence and shrieks alternate in cycles

bangles splinter against brick-walls

and prayers billow through the smoke-stack.

 

The hands are raised skywards for justice.

But tall verdicts have a way of their own.

 

Before sunrise, before darkness is quelled,

the two will be free.

One on whom the noose will descend

and the other who traded the pages of history.