There in the distant land A figment of mine imagination A glimpse of fantsasy Blinked by impossibility Wrapped by uncertainty A sand castle we built To have our sorrows redeemed I know behind that smile Laid down are the inexplicable tears When every boon in itself is a curse When every curse in itself is a boon When you sit down there In front of your window in the noon When your mind's muddled up With brutal introspect of self When you peruse your own flaws While remain obscure of other's At that moment, I hope May you find your Four Leaf Clover May you revive yours fervour In that distant land, so far-flung Underneath the mythical horizon When you create poetic symphonies Amidst every lethal animosity Bringing minuscule joys From that one Time Bound Memory And remain oblivious of reality While basking in the only self curated gift The illusional happiness Everybody survives Everybody smiles But a million stories, hidden underneath Leaving behind their timeless legacies Even when originality speaks When you decide to remain altruistic Even when there has only remained A dagger strapped heart May the suffering turn paltry And the serenity a plethora I hope you may strive To shine like the thunderbird That you are I hope peace finds you And embraces the angel That could lie only within you

I wish O’ Dandelions To see the return of life Amidst the chaos and struggles Let me blow all the seeds And feel the love and care It’s been such a long time I have not heard the sweet song of hope Those hidden feelings, I need to express I want to breathe again

The peom was first published in the 13th issue of "The Little Journal of Northeast India" and was selected later for "Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English 2022" (Hawakal). Darkness falls faster in the hills, the lady said – nights are for clearing minds.   With the last stroke of light fading into a shade of no return, I reached the village square, jaunting the red soil of Khasi hills, dodging tall grasses, betel nuts; escaping the nudity of a lucid river.   The ‘6:30’ of the lady’s eatery clock was smudged with smoke, people were engrossed in rice-daal-aaloo fry – a simple affair. Nights are simple in the hills, the lady said – eat and sleep. Primitive, yet existential.   By the time I finished my simple affair, the rain washed the village with wind and moonlight; making it cleaner, quieter, simple like the night.   My night was a blue house at the end of the road uphill. How do they know that I like neon gold light when it rains? A veranda with a thousand sun stains?   May be the rain told them this house is like me, with more windows than walls, more rooms than space, a silent floor, a roving roof, a blue house for my blue rain.   I had no baggage, only a few pebbles from the river Umngot that got inside my pocket when I was trying to sheathe her nakedness with mud. Why did no one tell her that clarity hurts? Ignoring my half-drowned heart’s daylong persuasion, aloof, she went down(stream). In acquiescence, I left her water as it is and ran to the hills.   Hills are not rivers; they know how to hide things that belong only to them. Tomorrow, I would hide her pebbles; her secrets safe with the hills, with me, with the blue house that has too many windows to hide secrets but few walls, like me, like the river – too much clarity hurts.   Nights are simple in the hills, the lady said- days would come like a dream.   By Dr. Chayanika Saikia Noida