He just had seven weeks to divide The British holdings on the Indian subcontinent, To slice the wheat fields and factories With his ivory pen and brass alidade Into two incompatible countries.
He came in the muggy heat of July 1947 Bringing a failing eyesight and 1931 census To reduce the geography, latitudes and magnetic directions Of the Punjab and Bengal Into two cosmologies.
A man in a hurry he occasionally overlooked Waterways, irrigation canals, Demographic concentrations And used his fantasy and imagination To reduce reality to relevance.
Even after sixty-two years We reposition the past And draw those lines once again With a cartographer's imagination Waiting for a denouement.
