After Hours

By Thomas Thottungal

After setting the sea ablaze

With brilliant beams of gleaming gold

The sun has sunk beneath the waves

Trailing in its radiant wake

A brilliance words can scarce describe

Tingeing the wispy clouds above

With an ephemeral glow of pure delight

Filling my soul with a psychedelic joy

That overwhelms the whole of me

So enthralling was the scene I beheld.

But murky night is waiting in the wings

To engulf the earth in its deathly clutch.

And anon, the afterglow is gone

Leaving me to the demons of the dark

With a spider-like fishing contraption

Spread-eagled against a starless sky

Standing as a mute spectator

A silent sentinel to the passage of time.

And I, suddenly bereft of breath

Fumble in the dark to find myself.

I gather my befuddled mind

Cast away the fears that gnaw

At the marrow of my weary bones

And tread un-trodden pathless ways

Seeking return to the dreary delirium

Of erstwhile rootless delinquent living

While darkness enfolds the world I’ve known

In the uncertain cocoon of an unborn tomorrow

And time trickles tenaciously down

The weatherworn hourglass of human destiny.

By Thomas Thottungal