September in Dhaka
Ehsan Ahmed
For John Ashbery
Everything around me shimmered
through my irises—lights, colors, a dun sky
seamlessly curved into the earth, neon attires
strewn on wet tracks, outlines
of shadows scudding across faces, but if
some faces reminded of other faces
I would awake, suddenly discovering myself
against the immense expanse
of a city I could escape only with my soul.
At noon a fox collapsed at the center of a roundabout
as if—he too awaited someone in full fatigue—as if
some face kept pulsing at the verge
of his conscience. And I advised myself
Patience craves not the meaning
desperation craves. Still I slipped the same
in city’s silence rushing from my sleep
for the poet’s funeral when
the day appeared suddenly over.
Ehsan Ahmed's poems and photographs appeared in Harbor Review, Stonecoast Review, Barzakh Magazine, and elsewhere. He also loves narrating audiobooks, which he often does on Librivox.
