Cyclone

When earth has in its bones
an ague, it lets out a cyclone,
with sky as witness. Trees
uprooted like men, decrease
their burdens, forming polygons
for patterns. Birds flying,
are flown like rags. Winds bring
the dead resurrected from the tombs
to admit more, later build honey-combs,
exchanging men for bees, and blood
with honey. A broken branch lies dead
like a soldier, duty-bound perhaps,
on a prostrate child. The picture overlaps
and slips in memory, stacking many a myth,
misery double-marches to stay with.
ruinous cyclone is a syndrome
of a depression which comes home
for a show-down. The weary day
wears a nightgown, prefers to stay
under cover of pretended sleep.

Nothing the weather fore-cast
can spell, will undo
the will to last.
the sky in the witness-box,
seeing the present and the past,
groans, in a lightning,
the hidden meaning
of the ague that may repeat its fling.
–R. RABINDRANATH MENON
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