top of page

"The Dry Spell" & "Halo- rainbow around my sins (To Robert Frede Kenter)" by Kushal Poddar



The Dry Spell

It hasn't been raining since it had.

I sound vague? You haven't stared at

the spearhead of a midday road.

You haven't tried to track rain and heard

the summer roar.


Everything set for the rain - that cup of tea,

those books and music, social media posts,

bad mood, sudden sex, uprooted sadness

that breathes on and perishes at the same time -

all hold a bowl.


No noise, tune, ting - the bowl remains

an arch of aching. It waits.

Nothing is nothingness; even a dry spell

gets wet with our sweating.



Halo- rainbow around my sins


(To Robert Frede Kenter)


A halo-rainbow surrounds my sins,

its glow almost motherly callous

and concerned as if she stands in

our longevous balcony and see

us playing soccer in the street

without watching us, and hence we

can be the truants from good behaviour,

moral language.


I blink. I cannot remember a rainbow

in my life let alone a halo around the sun.

I murmur, "Forgive me for leading

a monochrome life." Cold breeze

feels for my pulses, touches my neck.

"Am I alive?" I desire to ask and decide not to.


The grass smells of a memory falling

from a great height, from the parapet of Eden.

The air thronged with the particles

reminds me of how the crows circle and scream

when one of them falls. Light has fallen.

It is sundown soon. I can call you Rob

and say, "Slainté Mhaith." or hear

the sobbing water of a lake nearby.




An author, journalist, and father, Kushal Poddar, editor of 'Words Surfacing’, authored eight books, the latest being 'Postmarked Quarantine'. His works have been translated into eleven languages.

Bình luận


bottom of page