Partial Ledger

Partial Ledger

you leave the lights on for a walk,

thinking heat could be preserved, like loyalty

maybe it’s only a partial ledger

the last building on your block is Schopenhauer,

withdrawn to its own gloom

winter evenings mutter its own health bulletin,

and coughs up dry static in a radio somewhere

now, the day is rubbished early

in the borough vat;

it waits there, to be lifted next morning,

still unclaimed

you reach the start of the block

the lottery seller in his stall is ready again

to take on Hades tonight

a red hibiscus

on his table,

an Edison bulb above his head

Sekhar Banerjee is the author of The Fern Gatherer's Association and Probably Geranium. His work has appeared in Berkeley Poetry Review, Stand Magazine, Poetry Wales, Arkana, Ink, Sweat and Tears, Indian Literature, The Lake, Cha - An Asian Literary Journal, and others.  His works have been featured in several national and international anthologies, such as Remembrance: An Anthology of South Asian Poetry (Renard Press, UK) and the Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English. Banerjee serves as a Community Teaching Assistant for Modern American Poetry (ModPo), a renowned poetry course offered online by the University of Pennsylvania through Coursera. He resides in Kolkata, India.