Hemant Mohapatra Biography

4 a.m.: the house is full
of fever and din. He stumbles
through the dark and stops
in front of the kitchen.
...

I woke up at 2 a.m. with a start.
It was raining outside — birds
were angry, the streets full
of fire-engines — and I thought
...

This unnatural hour that I have slept in still
hungry from an unfinished early meal, you appear
with your full body and voice and ask me to write again.
...

It wasn't just the snow
eating up the suburban baroque,
or that you had just walked in,
cold as a welldigger's heart.
...

What they don't tell you
is how it all ends. sure it was
spring:
...