Disclosure
Jeyakirthana J.
Asst Prof (Adhoc)
Gargi College
Delhi University
It is said that Ulysses
wept on seeing Ithaca
humble and green.
Art is to be that Ithaca
the blind poet proclaimed.
In the land of the blind
a woman with her eyes
on a platter cried a river
of Time. I step into that river
with no boat and sink to the ground.
When the sky falls, I tumble
and fumble and resolve
to follow darkness
like the sinking sun, into
that ever-fading untraveled arch
—if only to pause—
If only to breathe were life!
I ask neither for the infernal
exodus nor for that epic quest:
the experience of wild mistakes.
I want only this—at even time
to hear Narcissus
(when he looks into that green river)
just so I won’t have to kill
the face that looks out at me.