Echo

He refused to yield, and the stars were burning hot. Night was foggy, and the moon was hiding. His white, shriveled hands held the center of gravity. Obsessively he anchored himself in the muddled egos and bleeding knives. Somebody was shouting that the legend was a big fake. The pardon will not work. Death was still sleeping. They were searching the saboteur when the sun went down. Winds were in coma. The ink rolled back from the warrant. Two faces of pain, right and wrong, fear and agony, all were him. He had nothing to hide, nothing to declare. Walked away in the high tide in raining abuses, in hurting slogans, and found his past, buried deep in the ravines, where only the echo comes back. SATISH VERMA