gulab khandelwal selected poems

I HAVE ALWAYS MARCHED FORWARD

A suppressed sobbing was heard
Through the window-panes
Of dozing palaces adorned with full-breasted
Marble-fairies ;
Trampling the garland of flowers beneath my feet,
I have always been coming out of them like an arrow.

Oh, what a row of masked figures
I had to face at each step!
Sometimes, headless armies with bayonets
In their hands
Were standing abreast,
And sometimes broken castles faced me;
Merchants with eyes of stone
Stared at me making me melt like snow.

And they all appeared to me
Like ghosts dancing in a moonlit night;
Some were laughing hysterically
While others stood speechless with down-cast eyes
They began to clasp my arms and dance around me
When they heard
That I have been walking on the moon.

Sometimes thick gardens of evergreen trees
Arid sometimes fragrant lakes called me,
But I was helpless.
Carrying the great load of the sun over my shoulders,
I had been shifting the burden from side to side
At each step.