Baoli

The fading light of the late afternoon sun slanted over the tops of the trees.

Like a deep green ocean beneath our feet.

Stretching to the limits of our line of vision.

Old minarets and ruined tombs rose from it. A lost city.

Majestic and mysterious.

There was poetry in the way the capital continued to buzz and bustle all around.

While this ancient island of stillness and silence sat unmoved in the midst of it.

Always at an arm’s reach, but out of sight.

So well hidden, that we almost missed it.

And on that terrace, the city of Delhi sprawling below us, growing farther away with each passing second, you held me.

On winter evenings, alone on a deserted terrace somewhere, you and I are enough.

Stone cold sobriety feels like the most intense trip of my life.