A Day Unfolds Poem by Ananta Madhavan

In our suburb, every dawn
Is a new meld of colours and light.
I like to get up before sunrise to behold
The darkness breaking into skeins of grey,
Purple, orange cloudlets; some are gilded,
Some are scalloped. They form patterns
Above the mass of mist below;
Evanescent shapes of animals and faces
Mutate and melt away in breeze.

Above the treetops of coconut, gulmohar,
Mango, rain-tree, cassia, jararanda,
Flowering tabebuia, champak, frangipani,
The holy hill of Chamundi emerges from haze.
The hotter season lets the sunlight seep in

Momently morphing shades of green, blue, mauve
On sheer rock-face, terraces, roofs and threads of road.


The air comes to life, birds awaken
And chirp in dialogues. Eagles fly around the fronds,
A fruit-bat goes home. Shy crow pheasants,
Russet plumage agleam, glide among the clumps.
A pair of horn-bills fly to their nest in a mango tree.
I hear the screech of parakeets; bulbuls, mynahs,
Wagtails and sun-birds are stretching out.
Suburban pigeons perch on balustrades.
Crows have their own criss-crows flight-paths.


At ground level another day begins.
A milkman comes on a motorbike
With his dairy stock in sachets. The greens vendor
Cries out his wares. The flower seller comes
With jasmine strings, threaded with marjoram,
And rose petals for morning puja.


Another day of noise and chores to dispel
the magic of early morning. Summer this time
Is simmering too soon. We yearn for rain.
Some days I see the crescent moon at dawn,
Effulgent, a bark afloat in a lonely sea-sky.
I thank Providence for gifting us Reason and Fantasy,
The solace of astral wandering and wondering.

April,2017,
Mysuru, India