This poem is taken from PN Review 208, Volume 39 Number 2, November - December 2012.

How to Watch a Solar Eclipse in a Bowl of Water

Amali Rodrigo
The unbearable lightness of being no one
                                                             - Slavoj Žižek



By day, stay close to home
          speak in modulated tones.
If the paper seller's son is gone
          don't ask after him.
Smile at the vegetable man's daughter
          even if you wonder - is it she
who slips hartal notices
          beneath coconuts, carrots?

Night after night
          let the house disappear
the town
          with it the island.
Beyond the sea
          you may sense a lit planet
but know this darkness,
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