Underneath every mosque –
first, a few broken bricks
pieces of forgotten scaffolding
and beneath that
wayward roots squiggling through dense rot
blind earthworms turning over layers
a hundred years of dirt
and shards of skulls
further below
perhaps a seam of coal
a streak of gold
a fraction of blue grey pottery
the fossil of the dinosaur’s spine
like a thumb print
“This place was mine!”
The netherworld river wells up like tears
carries away every prayer
into the deep deep caverns
of the earth’s first existence
Underneath every temple-
first, a few broken bricks…
- Paromita Goswami
