The sky is starry no more, series of stars in the galaxy have failed to light up the moon. Sun has blotted the entire luminosity in herself, oh Vincent! It is you who conspired with the galaxy in favour of the sun, with series pouring down from the intercourse of your palette and brush. All those sunflowers played the trick, rendering the sky moonless, unstarred. You painted these lethal flowers, I know, to welcome a guest of yours, there in Holland. The guestroom was brightened up with the spirit of those sprightly petals, those bright green leaves of dilemma, deadly enough, however, to conjure rest of the stellar world to be absorbed by pollens of desire. From these floral bunches of sinister desire, my daughter tried to trace you with her brush strokes, here in Kolkata. She waited for years to liberate, pigment by pigment, those ebullient yellows. She challenged your sunny pride. It was an unending affair though. Her eternal perseverance won. All pollens of desire could be unstroked out with the bristles of her patience and the blotted universe stepped out of that veil of vanity. Stars shimmered in the sky again. Moaning moon smiled back through her beams.
Poet’s Note: Glossary: *Tournesol, refer to sunflower.
Visual by Different Truths
Rituparna Khan is an Assistant Professor in Geography at Bidhannagar College, Salt Lake, Kolkata. Her inclination to Literature, especially poetry is no less. A few of her works are published and well appreciated and awarded in print as well as social media. Her first book, a collection of short stories, was launched at Kolkata International Book Fair, this year.
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