Bijoy Philip - A storm is coming

Radha you knew me before I was born
Those days you would stare at the dark rain clouds
Your eyes blank with your glass bangles of different shades
Jingling against the dull greyness of the monsoon air
Your eyes empty
You did not see that storm coming
The birds fluttering around you in panic to their nests early in the evening
Didn’t tell you anything
You remained beneath that banyan tree
Your arms clutching its wrinkled ancient bark
That had in it the scars and wisdom of a century or more.
You did not notice its ancient branches swaying
In that wind that sprayed tiny droplets on your eye lids
She was the messenger before the storm
But it was then I noticed the tears in your eyes
The salt of those droplets mixing with the crystal rain drops
Running down your cheek
Your lips quivered as the rain lashed on you
Radha, the river beside you is swelling
You should go home.
But I knew by the way your feet moved
That home was too far away
As like a river nymph you swayed your way into its swelling banks

I still see that banyan tree in my dreams, Radha.
I do not know what grief stricken eyes you had
But when the storm comes every year
And the river bank swells
I think it cannot contain your tears


Dedicated to Chumki.

Bijoy Philip

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-storm-is-coming/