Girl On The Train Tracks

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Let my ripped dream, my lover and my battered heart alone.
I drag my body’s burden through the scarred edges of the platform
Where the last local train of the evening has blown
Its perennial whistle, and scurried past me,
When I stare at it, dazed, nursing my own wet borders.
Time, the blessed poets, as they see it in its winged chariot,
Is only the smashed whistle of the body of a disappearing train
That leaves me, fettered, looking around,
For the leftovers and chewed crumbs of the earth’s children
In the train station.
My lover guy, you have left your masculine musk
In the tracks, and I lose my body in those unnamed tracks,
In my scavenger hunt of that musk, all the while, in that living hell.
Here, I bury my body’s mass, and know not the blazing wants,
The carnal hunger that threatens to usurp my being.
This fierce onslaught burns me, shreds me into pieces,
I squeeze the pieces with my fists, stuff them into the pockets
Of my own silence, but my feet refuse to leave their imprints
In the worn-out tracks.
Have you ever walked by those frayed edges,
Smelt like coal and the rotten flesh of desires that graduate
In time, into placards in these lovelorn tracks?

Let my ripped dream, my lover and my battered heart alone.
I know this falling and peeling off, this hunting and burning
Will overpower me till the last platform I know, and then
You will find me, in smithereens.

Life on the Tracks: My Personal Essay Published at ‘Cafe Dissensus’

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This is a personal narrative born out of a series of dream sequences of a night journey by train. The dream probably has its origins in the past decade of my life in suburban Kolkata when I used to commute by local trains on a regular basis. The narrative structure of the piece is inspired by Dennis Silk’s essay ‘The Marionette Theater’, where an action performed in repetition is depicted with emphasis on every part of the movement. So happy and honored that this short piece is published by ‘Cafe Dissensus Everyday’, the blog of the online magazine ‘Cafe Dissensus’. Also, the piece is now a chapter of my book-length collection of essays.

Do have a look at the piece here and leave the footprints of your mind on the page:

Life on the Tracks