Gopal Lahiri is an India- based bilingual poet, critic, editor, writer and translator with 22 books published, 14 in English and 8 in Bengali, including three joint books. His poetry is also published across various anthologies as well as in eminent journals of India and abroad. He has attended various poetry festivals including World Congress of Poets recently held in India. He is a regular book reviewer of well-known journals in India. He works have been published in 12 countries and in 12 languages.

Kolkata

 Only once through a local train’s window
 I watch all those
 silent streets open up for a conversation,
  
 Walking in the rain
 I follow the silvery tram lines and mark
 its route charts.
  
 A city with weather-beaten face do not
 always follow geography,
 dropping petals on the courtyard of the houses.
  
 Trees laden with orange fruits never reach
 the overgrown shadow; 
 rickshaw pullers drink tea on the earthen cups.
  
 The setting sun descends on the calm water
 I take your hands in mine 
 the river bank buries our whispers.
  
 A word appears on the sign board speaking
 directly to the crowd.   
 I stich seven striking letters in your palm- Kolkata 

Pure Blackness

 Here is the straight line turns oblique
 the path goes blurred from which
 our lost words appear
 stars beginning to fall now on the 
 trees near courtyard,
 
 there will be no more hunger for love
 or lovers or worries of losing lovers,
 now the moonlight opens the loveless envelope.
  
 memories turn to tobacco leaves since long,
 send me back the hours left on the attic
 and the whisper hidden in the wooden box,
 rain drops on arrowheads of geese 
 removing the tail clouds,
  
 there will be no more burning timbers
 with which to light a new fire,
 erase the night’s pure blackness.