
Alone, in the hot kitchen, she wants to be 
locked inside 
an old song, echoes 
from another life; 
sung by Ma, in a humid kitchen, on lonely nights; the
lyrics 
about a prince and a farmer’s dusky maid without dowry, a distant castle, 
with 
a scheming queen; 
sometimes, the changed lyrics,
hummed above the boiling oil and a whistling cooker, cutting
veggies with a mechanical hands, Ma singing of a nebulous region in a fluffy space decorated with stars, the blue space, illuminated by a
full moon spilling milk over sleeping earth; a rabbit
with conical hat upright on spindly legs, guiding a solitary gypsy,
without her caravan, in a dim forest; the words creating a place 
where forms mutate, form, deform, reform into enchanting islands, 
lapped by
the lapis-lazuli waters lying languid; lagoons and rocky shores, 
rolling waves, kissed 
by 
the circling gulls and birds, ecstatic
in 
their freedom, coordinated flights across the 
choppy seas and skies threatening tempests.
.
Sunil Sharma
Picture Nick Victor
Bio: A humble word-worshipper: catcher of elusive sounds, meanings and
images. Published 28 creative and critical books— joint and solo.
A winner of, among others, the Panorama Golden Globe Award-2023, and,
Nissim Award for Excellence-2022 for the novel Minotaur.

Academic |Writer | Critic | Editor | Freelance Journalist | Reviewer | Literary InterviewerEditor: Setu: http://www.setumag.com/p/setu-home.html
Website:https://sunil-sharma.com
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