Poems by Snehaprava Das

Snehaprava Das

Maa!

                                   A HOUSE LIVES IN ME

Years before,

I lived in a house that stood 

Undeterred on its inconspicuous ground

Its terrace-face to the east and 

Its back to the west;

I woke up to the crimson dawn 

That grew and glowed 

Across its front-yard, 

Over and around the tall coconut trees

That stood guard over the 

Peace and little joys 

The house hid in its silent folds 

Of brick and cement;

I sipped the sunset that slid in 

Through the back wall windows 

To fill the rooms with a shade of liquid gold;

I went to sleep 

Wrapped in the moonlit dreams 

That rolled inside in wispy coils

Through the wooden window-bars;

Years before,

I lived in a house that throbbed 

To the rhythms of the trains

Juddering down the tracks beyond 

The boundary wall which 

Slumped under the weight of 

Seasons and noises

And the obscurities the urchins 

Scrawled in charcoal

On its weatherbeaten face;

I put my wishes in the racing trains

And hoped secretly they would reach

A wonderland where they will come true

Never knowing of the precarious tunnels

The trains had to move through!

I lived in a house with a roof 

That hung gentle and low

I climbed a wooden ladder to its top

And reached out to touch

The foot of an elusive rainbow!

   **           

Years after,

When I met the house

It wore a fresh but distant look

Filled by unknown faces,

And inside its east-west bounds

Through another sunrise and 

Another sunset

I played Blind man’s Bluff with

Muted memories;

The beads of laughter 

And the trinkets of dreams 

That sat in the secret niches 

Now permanently un-homed,

Had boarded a runaway train 

And disappeared in the tunnels of time!

**

 Years before, 

I lived in a house I called Home

Stands a stranger now,

Staring at me from

Eerie, depthless eyes;

I no longer live in the house

But the house it was once

Now lives in me!  

***

2. I AM A CITY IN RUINS   

I am a city in ruins

A city that has lost its name 

In the ever-lengthening road of history

That never turns a bend,

How I thirst for the drops of moonlight

To relieve the night 

That fills me from end to end!

I am a no-man’s land

Gasping under a blanket of sand

For a short breath of green,

A vanquished warrior 

Splattered with my own red sweat

Struggling to wash myself clean;

I am a scorched woodland 

Sprawled by a river that has lost 

Its way to the sea

A storm trapped inside a blind fortress

Desperate to get free;

I am a living cemetery that

Houses memories under breathing blocks,

And solitary souls that crave to hear

Life whispering behind the curtain of rocks!

Bio: Dr. Snehaprava Das, Associate Prof. of English (former) is an eminent fictionist, poet, reviewer and translator from Odisha. She has three collections of English stories and five collections of English poems to her credit. She has translated thirteen texts of Odia both classic and contemporary, in English. Her works are published by Speaking Tiger Books, Oxford University Press, Penguin RC, Sahitya Akademi, Black Eagle Books and other noted publishing houses. She has received the Prabashi Bhasha Sahitya Samman, the Jivanananda Das Poetry award, the Fakir Mohan Senapati Translation award, the Lakshmi Narayan Mohanty Translation award for her contribution to literature.

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Setu, September 2025