My Boishakh
Jasmina Khatun
Silence is best today let all words go into exile;
Suddenly, fractured sounds shatter across the sky
is this an untimely Boishakh?
I had thought I would bask in the first dawn
of the New Year’s tender light,
Yet instead, clouds gathered
across the ribs of my chest.
Upon this theatrical stage of separation,
I desire no other shelter
Rather, in the fierce sweep of the storm,
let me disappear,
losing even my own address today.
I have set my vessel afloat upon illusion
Is life then nothing but a deception?
Stilled, I ponder alone
What answer shall I offer myself today?
The blue sky had been so clear,
so pristine, like a flawless mirror
From where, then, arrived
these clustered clouds of sorrowed darkness?
Before the sun could even set
behold, the Kalboishakhi has come;
Does the anklet of dry leaves
still chime within the chambers of my heart?
The curtain by the window trembled
was that, perhaps, our shared sigh?
Beyond the glass, in ashen dust,
our twelve months scatter and drift away.
What answer shall I give,
when the storm’s ferocity shakes the house?
Then, within Boishakh itself, I lose myself
for there, at least, I am my own sovereign,
And hands are outstretched,
only to reach me.
Rampurhat, Birbhum, India 15/04/2026
