The City in Your Absence

Nira Sharma

The moon abruptly
enters a nameless bar in the sky
keeping both hands inside the pocket
of a grizzled jacket of hazy atmosphere
listens to the gloomy songs
of a veteran singer the whole night
with its head down and self-esteem low

The morning in a silent way
wakes up sobbing alone
from its bed full of dewdrops

The poor and lonely Sun
wanders alone the whole day
inside the jungle of clouds

The flowers in full blossom
go dry in the basket
with the warmth of its youthful wake

The roads in the city
looks like the skin
shed by a black snake

The city dwellers
mourn the death of their dear ones;
that seems so painful

I am habituated
to continuously scanning the scenery
with my eyes wide open
the way a swallow on the edge of a granary
mourns and remembers its nest
that got buried in an earthquake

You are absent in the city
and you are somewhere
far… far away from these sceneries.

Translated from Nepali by Deepak Shrestha

[Nira Sharma (b. 1970) is a Nepali poet based in Virginia, USA. Also a song writer, her poems deal with subtle aspects of human relations with man and nature. In short, epigrammatic poems, she strikes a powerful balance between emotions and reason. She is an excellent architect of images, through which, she expresses the internal world of the human beings. Though her first anthology is yet to be published, she is already a recognized name in the field of Nepali poetry. ]