SANKAR ROY



Sankar Roy, originally from India, is a poet, translator, activist and multimedia artist living near Pittsburgh, PA. He is author of three chapbooks of poetry--Moon Country, The House My Father Could Not Build and Mantra of the Born-free (all from Pudding House, 2006, 2007, 2008). He is an associate editor of an international poetry anthology, Only the Sea Keeps: Poetry of the Tsunami (Rupa Publication, India and Bayeux Arts, Canada). Sankar's poems have appeared or forthcoming in over seventy literary journals and anthologies.



HOME OF THE ANCIENT GODS


What is the cost of falling feathers,
loss of their gusty dance?
Once I knew where
their day's refuge was--

between the moss-scabbed barks.
I could spot their feeble stroll within the fern,
their blurred footmark over the soft loam
and the walk trail over the leafy compost.

I also knew the touch of their twig-fingers.
the wind diction --
verbiage of their wings' beating,
blood-breathing and claws' susurration.

I wish I could I feed them once
wet rice with sliced banana from my cupped palms
while listening to their pelts' whirring over the tree husk.
and watch their final flight toward the crescent moon.


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