RAZA ALI HASAN

66

Bilal’s world, black world, mortgaged world, third world,
the black pupil in the roving eye of the earth.

Bilal’s compass had redrawn it as the crescent-world.
Warmth of the sun had made it fertile.

Now mercurial, it quickens at his name.
In locked, arid hopelessness, a sparkle in the eye.