The Jinn of the Walnut Grove
The bark is a tapestry, gnarled and grey,
Where the light of the living goes limping away.
The walnuts are heavy, like green-hooded eyes,
Watching the valley as the summer heat dies.
A shimmer of silver, a flicker of smoke,
Moves through the hollow of the lightning-scarred oak.
No breath in his lungs, yet he sighs with the leaves,
A weaver of shadows whom the darkness perceives.
He wears the old silence like a tattered, black shawl,
Scaling the height of the garden’s stone wall.
With fingers of ivy and a heart made of peat,
He listens for footsteps on the dust of the street.
Don’t linger at dusk where the branches entwine,
For the sap in his veins is a bitter, cold wine.
He offers a secret, a glimpse of the past,
In a mirror of water that is frozen and fast.
The night-jar is calling a warning of dread,
As the Jinn of the garden awakens his bed.
Where the light of the living goes limping away.
The walnuts are heavy, like green-hooded eyes,
Watching the valley as the summer heat dies.
A shimmer of silver, a flicker of smoke,
Moves through the hollow of the lightning-scarred oak.
No breath in his lungs, yet he sighs with the leaves,
A weaver of shadows whom the darkness perceives.
He wears the old silence like a tattered, black shawl,
Scaling the height of the garden’s stone wall.
With fingers of ivy and a heart made of peat,
He listens for footsteps on the dust of the street.
Don’t linger at dusk where the branches entwine,
For the sap in his veins is a bitter, cold wine.
He offers a secret, a glimpse of the past,
In a mirror of water that is frozen and fast.
The night-jar is calling a warning of dread,
As the Jinn of the garden awakens his bed.
Harrison Cashmere is a poet and writer from the heart of Kashmir. His work explores the delicate intersection of human introspection and the fleeting beauty of the natural world. Deeply rooted in the atmosphere of the valley, his poetry seeks to ground philosophical ideas in the lived, sensory details of his homeland.