Turn the corner 
and you will find, some dark figures 
huddled together under the rains 
of words. In a fractured 
embrace. One chunk of floating 
pain falls on you. The assassin 
had come quietly. 

A song was knifed today. 

Turn off the lights. A smeared 
moon will rise tonight in earth’s 
shadow. Now hashish eaters were 
coming, now hashish eaters. 
Unnoticed, disconnected, 
stinging. From olive to bleeding heads, 
poetry to prey. 

The koel will not sing tonight.

Satish Verma