Kutch Rain

Rain has come to Kutch
you set fire to grasses
in preparation
burning core
melts laterally
travel through
my shattered landscape
bound centrifugally
by your gaze.

Submergence
etched, carved
arms frame
blurring edge
rebuild me with cool adobe
blocks of silty skin
cut from salt flats
of our shore.

Lips gather
pick gently
at seared flesh
epicurean vulture
elegantly scouring
to nothing but
bulbul songs,
whispered mantras
of past lives
haunting Ghat currents
through canyons
of blushing ears.

Rain has come to Kutch
at night
I know surrender
I hold you in my step well
for future drought.


Yasmeen Najmi

© 2010 Yasmeen Najmi