A Poem Of Nothingness Poem by Kushal Dutta

You are restless and fidgety
looking for the definition of nothingness

Please listen—
taking a piece of paper
draw a zero
then looking at it
start seeking your required definition

Have you got it

In a blank paper drawing a line
you created a picture which is like
the full moon in your mirror
how can it be a zero like the dark moon

The picture of the mist is repeatedly lost in nothingness
it again becomes illuminated in lines of light in its fullness

You saw nothingness long ago with your third eye
you knew and understood and remembered
again and again that nothingness

In the endless splendour of nothingness you
unknowingly had embraced nothingness one day

Unknown to me a zero is hanging from a zero
my shadow less shadow is imprisoned in that zero
***
[Translated from Assamese by Prof. Prodeep Khataniar]