Wires and Veins

Throbbing, the life in my veins,
pulsing with data streaming unknown,
in wires buried bellow the dead man’s grave.
The corpse-like towers shouldering the power grid;
current surging overhead to light up distant suburbs,
bringing to life the lights, the ovens, the heaters-
while the dead still lie cold below.

A million voices raging in torrents
of silent telephone lines chaining continents;
cables under sea, fences on land.
Pain, joy and guilt mingling below stagnant waters
and strange the bond connecting wrong numbers;
The satellites whirling above have ears for all,
where then to pour my taboo silence?

Insipid stares judge me over pale corridors,
walking, running, falling, and walking again,
like involuntary sirens of the temple sounding the bell.
So many faces; some staring from the one eyed beast,
too many it seems, usurping my bedroom linen,
like the predicted storm breaking uninsured houses,
blowing away my distorted paperback identity.

The windows gaping curious at my grey baggage,
the blind weather dictating my daily wear;
my washing machine setting the shade of my white.
Deep inside this polluted air of indifference,
my lungs stain with blood the hanging curtains of rain,
yet I shy from the needles, and rather take the pen,
my ink bleeding over countless pregnant thoughts.

Throbbing, the silence in my veins,
charting freedom over dissimilar railway lines;
so many embracing the global emptiness.

By: Abhishek Ranjan Datta, BA English Hons. (IIIrd year)