That Phulkari Hand-Embroidered Silk Linen Saree

By Moinak Dutta

 I followed those peacocks on that saree of yours

How they spread their rainbow-colored wings

And danced to the tune of that shepherd boy

Who rested at the fringe of a lake beneath a sprawling tree with its green branches shot out in different directions,

I followed by my fingers every bit of that hand woven embroidered silk linen saree of yours,

Peach in the border and ocean blue in the middle,

And at once  was I reminded of your gearing up for a party,

I could visualise you perfecting your eyebrows

And outer lines of your lips ,

Your practiced hand moving effortlessly drawing lines with pencils of different shades – pink, red, brown.

Then that saree you wore

Peacocks started dancing over your supple breasts

Till they would stop at the valley of your navel

The shepherd boy must have fallen asleep in the paradise

Drenched by the fragrance of unknown blossoms which sprung out of the meadows like little stars dazzling bright under the sun of spring,

Soft, lemony.

That hand woven embroidered silk linen saree of yours

I have kept in my closet like a dream.

*

Moinak Dutta’s first full-length work of fiction, Online@Offline  had been published in 2014,  by Lifi Publications.His second fiction titled In search of la radice was published in 2017 by Xpress Publications. He has worked as an editor of a poetry collection titled Whispering Poeisis, which had over one hundred poems from sixty poets from different parts of India and abroad, published in 2018 by Poeisis.

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