The Noise in the Silence of the Empty Roads

Vedanti Khannaani

Delhi, India

These empty roads

As still, as silent as their portraits and landscapes

Are as noisy as the yells of an infant 

The noise of million broken voices

Adorns these empty roads 

Even though fading

This noise,well amalgamated with cement 

Is never evading 

The noise circling those empty roads is too powerful to just be heard

I see it in the imprints of the shoes

Of little children rushing to school, undeterred

I hear it in the fallen bead of a girl’s anklet

Resting on the road, beside that dried leaf as if its own

I see the noise which might be a beautiful voice in the heart scribbled on an ice-cream wrapper between the names of two lovers

I see this noise in the shadow of the cars

Standing still at the commandment of that mighty red light

Taking a moment of rest before they start running again

Only to get ahead of one another

These empty roads should appear to me as the heart of the world

For just like a human heart

They have little choice in who walks on them

For the hubbub, the noise, the chaos

Never abandons them even in the most silent times

Maybe because sometimes the memory of the voice is louder than the voice itself

Maybe because it is this noise that keeps these hearts beating

And so I wish the silence of the empty roads never dies

May the silence of the empty roads never die

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