Joy Goswami Poems

I have brought the sacrificial goat
To the heap of grass, leaves and bark

He has forgotten his last beheading
But round his neck garland-like
hangs a mark
...

By deeper water, upon greener rock, I had pitched my tent
And washed away with care the colour of my scream
Your bone and stone ornaments dried on wet rock
And Night would spread its blue-black skin upon the water
...

Ma comes and stands
by the window

The river swift below

Leaping out of the water rows of burning snakes

I come to the river to pick up
my iron-fettered flute

By the window high in the sky
Ma comes and stands

then moves away.
...

Suspicion comes and sits on his shoulder one morning,
Slowly with long, thin beak, it cleans his ear
...

If you ask me, 'what have you done with your life'
then I must tell you...
...

Lay yourself down, when you wish to be born lay yourself down
in a grassy field meadow pasture lay yourself down and say Ma Baba Ma Baba
Soon your body will become this tiny in the morning
Office-goers will see on the grass drops of dew
...

Dusk has fallen. Go home.
Don’t wait any more.
Trees, flats, trees, signboard, trees
In between the slate sky
...

When did light string me to sleep’s dark branches,
O Tamal,
When did peacocks enter
night's township
go from door to door peddling songs!
...

An eye had wandered, to another’s beloved, her leg.
When, carelessly, her sari lifted just a little -
Outside, the rain comes down. A lantern’s been lowered underneath the table, in the dark
...

Ash moves in the room, printed in darkness
Paper, book, cover, painting, the call of dead birds---
Ashes moving in the room, what is suppressed in the room
One trunk of stories wants to rise up from the floor
...