The Long Road Poem by Sasanka Sekhar Panda

Sometimes it seems to me that
from some unknown corner of my heart
a strange music swings through
as if someone sings in the dense woods of bones, flesh,
blood and veins and arteries.

Sometimes it seems to me
the immense immeasurable
emptiness of our life
beats its wings
to awake us
from the immaterial dreams
when bitter darkness
spreads like black canopy
and we hear
the uneasy sound of Satan's drum.

Sometimes it seems to me
we are just like
lone ranger in the
deadly terrains of the Himalayas
passing in a funeral procession
in baleful silence.

We were all blind to the road
but we know very well
to reach that last Sarai*
in the road side,
we shall have to go
through the thorny road
that old way of bleeding
with burden on our heads.

But we know it well that
reaching that last Sarai even
we can't overcome
the countless
centuries of suffering.

* Sarai: Rest houses constructed during the Mughal period (16th-18th centuries) on the mazor highways and trade routes in India for the travellers to take rest in the night. Those were having provisions for dining and entertainments like dance and music also