Thynroit

(A village in the Khasi hills) Sickly pine trees in tiny clusters On balding hillocks with grey grass Fighting harsh battle for survival Against bronchial suffocation Of dust storms stirred up from a ravaged road That winds up to the village church, Where an elderly clergyman sleeps Every Sunday morning amidst fluctuating notes Of a choir of country girls. A young pastor preaches gospel truth In native dialect with some of his sermons, His mind, however, pondering upon The cuisine he'll be savouring later In homes of the faithful Who had been blessed with a good harvest. A middle-aged village drunk Shouts obscene warnings to a black bull For molesting his wife's cow grazing nearby. The village masseur sits in a rickety chair And waits for city clients with broken limbs. Screaming urchins in dirty red, blue and pink gum-boots Stampede on the dusty path to the crowded watershed Where their aunts and sisters wash smudged linens. But when the sun sets behind the emptying hills After the church doors have been locked And the good book has been closed for the day, A calm silence settles down on the village, And the moon takes the shape of a clipped fingernail While a dog howls at it in wolffish superstition, Between echoes of mothers calling their children home, Thynroit urges me to remember a village In a faraway land I left behind.