One Hour Poem by Pradip Chattopadhyay

She was standing at the temple gate
Beside where hung the big padlock
Sorry sir you are by an hour late
The temple will reopen at four o’clock.

I had gone at the abode of the goddess
To be blessed by touching her feet
Forgetting she too needed a recess
After standing hours for the devout's meet.

My watch told me an hour was not too soon
And time would run out without seeing more
But the banyan’s shade of the early summer noon
In its sunlight and shadows held something in store.

The girl at the gate gave an all knowing smile
An hour’s wait sir would not go in vain
The goddess’ face at the end of the weary mile
Would make you forget all your travel’s pain.

Her smiles broke through the dark tan of her skin
The barefoot girl watching over that godforsaken hamlet
And as from the river the southern wind blew in
I decided to wait with her at the temple gate.

Then we walked to the river following the wind’s smell
She showed me on the bank the zamindar’s broken palace
Took me to the cornfields boastful in their golden swell
Before the hour flew us back to the temple’s terrace.

When I asked her about her school and standard
In her eyes I found rising the rustic river’s mist

Doing it all by himself is for my father too hard
In the chores of worship he needs me to assist.