The Sound of Emptiness

On the dusty road that led to the burial ground

I heard a night owl sing of your demise, perched on an ashen mound

In the wee hours of the second day

Of our much awaited fishing holiday the river

Would suck you into its mighty bosoms

The river that beat in our hearts like Negara drums

I would beg you to swim or at least, float

Bleating like kasai mama’s sacrificial goat

You would not hear me, nor pay heed

Filled with water and death and slimy river-weed your corpse

Would surface at the break of the fifth dawn

Innocent and restive like a day old fawn

I would run, run from you and your death

Like a cowardly David upon sighting a goliath

In the deep reaches of the patkai forest, I will wait

With bated breath for the sound of your characteristic gait

Crushing dried leaves and unshaped twigs

Your footsteps will echo among the forbidden trees

Rustling like leaves in a summer breeze but sigh!

I find myself running down the dusty road to the burial ground

Running away from the emptiness that traces me like a bloodhound

I  hear a night owl sing in a melancholy wave

Why is it that I cannot find your grave?

Notes:

1. Negara Drum: a percussion instrument popular in Assamese folk/devotional music
2. Patkai: aka Dihing Patkai – a lowland rainforest in upper Assam, parts of it are a reserve forest
3. Kasai mama: butcher uncle (a reference to the local butcher)