Temple, London (For Maggie Hindley) Poem by Yuyutsu Sharma

Wind howled
like the trumpet of a fierce Kali
rushed in through
the Temple Tube Station
to slap my face
to smother the flame
of my breath
and blind my vision
as I soared
floaing up the steely slope
of the ecsclators
in spirit of reaching
a hillside shrine
that our goddesses
always prefer to live on.

Once up
out of the Station
in the freezing cold
as I exerted to push
my overcoat up
my shaking frame
I saw her there
on the wet pavement
out alone in the open
with a swollen black eye
and an issue of The Big Issue
held like a trophy,
a sacrificial rooster
against her sagging breast.