For Gregor Samsa Poem by BASAB CHAUDHURI

Just yesterday, I completed reading The Metamorphosis again.
This evening, my heart pines for Gregor Samsa.

It is only twenty-four hours since he is no more.
The house is dark.
I do not know where the family has gone.

As a neighbour, what should I do?

I feel like meeting Mr. Samsa and telling him, I share your pain.
But I do not know whether, for them, it has also been a relief.

What happened to Gregor?

How did an imagination of Kafka overwhelm me so completely?

And then I see the same feeling in city hospitals.

A man is almost brain-dead.
The whole family waits in the lounge.
They talk. Days pass.

Slowly, the number of visitors diminishes.

After about two weeks, rationality takes over.
Calculation becomes the prime concern.

And the question hangs over everyone like a dark cloud:

How long?

Finally, when it is all over, the first day's visitors return.

They weep.

But deep inside, they are happy too.

For this Gregor, this is the last visit to the hospital.

Life comes full circle.

It is tomorrow again.

And one of the visitors speeds past the hospital gate—

indifferent.