Moon at Half Past Noon

“Not with palms,” says the pine,
its needles combing the wind
for last night’s vanished rain.

“Not with cloth,” laughs the buransh,
shaking its wet, red skirts—
see how the stains bloom darker?

Only the spider knows,
spinning her bridge of silk
between two broken twigs.
Watch how she drinks the sky
one trembling drop at a time,
her throat a silver thimble.

We set out brass bowls
like childhood promises—
“This time, I’ll save it all.”

But the mountain steals back
what belongs to ghosts:
a school of minnows flashing
through the drop’s curved lens,
Grandmother’s voice trapped
in the ting-ting of bangles
as she shakes rice into a thali.

By dawn, only rings of dust
mark where the night’s tears fell.

Even the river hesitates
when it reaches Tehri’s drowned spire,
its current circling
like a hand unsure
where to lay its grief.

“Farki,” sighs the cloud,
already forgetting
what it came to mourn.