I knew myself as one who loved this land,
Who saw in the distance, shadows of stone,
Reach for a sky once blue, now choked and bland.
The earth beneath is cracked, dry as a bone,
Where water ran in streams, now dust remains,
And clouds no longer gather, bringing rains.
The breeze that whispered cool through every street
Is gone, replaced by still and heavy air,
And all who walk the paths feel the defeat;
Of promises that left them feeling bare.
“My city was a garden,” they will say,
"Where trees would shade and rivers sang with life.
But now the roots are torn, the green decays,
And all is parched with thirst, all filled with strife."
The homes once bright with hope now crumble slow,
Their stones worn down by time and empty hands.
And those who longed for rest now only know;
The heavy silence of forsaken lands.
Nothing of ease remains. The price to live -
Grows with each dawn, and those who stay must fight
To find a place, to take what none will give,
And in the silence curse the dying light.
The rains have left, and in their place, despair—
The empty sky, the broken city’s heir.
— Rishi Banerjee
September 2024