Indian Summer by Jayant Mahapatra

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 Indian Summer



Over the soughing of the sombre wind
priests chant louder than ever;
the mouth of India opens.
Crocodiles move into deeper waters.
Mornings of heated middens
smoke under the sun.
The good wife
lies in my bed
through the long afternoon;
dreaming still, unexhausted
by the deep roar of funeral pyres.


[Note: midden = dunghill]

by Jayanta Mahapatra

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