Rainbows Poem by Prabhakar Subramaniam

Like colourful protractors

Tens of rainbows

Spring up in the spray

From the waterfalls

No one had told us

Till then that

No rain clouds

Were required

To break up light

Into the seven colours

The wonders never ceased

The eyes lingered

On the colours left behind

By the setting sun

Relished the rain of shadows

Thickening into the night - -

Who was there to see

When the lights that blinked

And didn't blink first came on - -

What was there

Before everything?

If there was nothing

Where was everything?

The light hides

As does darkness - -

When one sleeps

The other wakes

Dreams, fantasises,

Makes up stories

Reorders reality

In such weird ways

That makes meeting

The new day still harder - -

My childhood rainbows

Are lying in pieces

At my feet

Sibling colours at war

Sporting vain airs

Clamouring still for a

Hierarchy of shades

That is inherited

And bequeathed

For perpetuity