The Way of A River, The Forest, Night

Manju Kanchuli

Poet Manju Kanchuli

I did not forge that river
whose current drags the living down
and tosses a carcass to its banks
I only wet my feet—that for a few days
became lifeless. The river was not the stable still
continuous flow I thought it to be
I could not cross that river

I never tread that path
where my tiny range-bound hands
were fated to be brushed by the beast;
its solitude devoured
by the leopard's clawing paws
I cleared that forest with my gaze
Thinking it useless to render it so,
my eyes turned back immediately
The forest was not blessed
with the security, solitude and pleasure
I thought there to be
I could not pass through that forest

Not again did I step through to brigand night
whose tusk now gnaws the moon
having devoured the sun. Only a morning,
naively, reached day and it
blanched with night—its whole body so soon
took on the darkest hues
Night was not the cove—warm, impregnated
with mild dream—I thought it to be
I could not immerse myself in the black liquids of that night.

(Manju Kanchuli is the author of the short story collections Some Love, Some Differences and Stories by Kanchuli and the poetry collections My Life My World and Inside and Outside Eyelids.)