That Night

That night, in a strange place I was like a fly Circling around a street lamp Reeling…Reeling! I felt so alone Fear wrenched my throat Couldn’t predict When I would be charred to death I had heard, In the cover of dark Everyone was a robber Or a cloaked assassin! Without a roof over my head I was like a mole Smoked out of its hole And exposed to blaring light Had it been my own town Where I knew Every nook and cranny Like the lines of my palm I wouldn’t have minded Being so helplessly stranded Or left in the night At a distance…. I saw the faint silhouette of hills Like dreadful dinosaurs, crouching Also the outlines of buildings Reminding one of medieval haunted castles Stray dogs, mangy Were raiding the trash bins. I don’t know why then I enjoyed their company I could hear the falling hooves Of cattle, led to the slaughter house And the lash of whips falling on them Echoing the shrieking of a banshee! Saw an auto lying upside down Fallen unwary in a pothole A line of tanker lorries Seen halted by the road side Like the bogies of a goods train And their drivers gone home To sleep with their mates Behind the cover, I saw Two figures leaning; A man and a woman Night owls at a mating serenade! I closed my eyes, Covering them with my palm In that unearthly hour An eerie fear gripped me And how my mind longed To slither out of that hole To curl up in the warmth of my home Far… far away!