A Poem Composed Beside the River in Hampi

Salvaged from the delirium and euphoria of my India diaries.

While the ferrymen climb the steps for tea
And passengers amass either side of the river
Some whistling themselves dry with impatience
The water wanders idly by
Speaking softly to the rocks with gentle caress
The rocks, worn grey and speckled pink
Like the ears of the elephants that are bathed beneath them in morning light
The rocks that, thousands of years and thousands of driven water buffalo ago
Were deposited like so much sediment
Across the great boulder fields that punch ham-fistedly into the panorama
When all this was river
Its silence shaped the earth.