The City Is A Drawer Of Lost Things

it slumbers near kitchen’s rusted tin stove.

Its opaque reading glasses hang around its gnarled neck.

A moth ferries afternoon dreams—

on the stained walls of the slaughter house.

Pearl

My mouth has been raining

bright flashes, a spark and a roar.

I have been to the dentist’s several times

down the lane, to the other side of the painting—

My mouth sings

Of the Sun, wild poppies,

bargaining land, trinkets of dust,

jingling coins, stolen cats...

My mouth cloudbursts

debris, onyx memories,

labour of a fragile mother,

of a baby’s half born mouth embossed in soil.

My mouth flurries

gold, topaz, amethyst rooftops

hunter boots, milkless hard breasts

cupped dew drop mornings and a dozen tiger lilies.

My mouth is a confinement cell

of rosaries—

It repeats

the prosody of belief.

It choruses the language of

lemon grass, basil, mint.

It pours cups

of pearl faith

for the deceased and living.

Ritamvara Bhattacharya is a poet based in Darjeeling