Translated from the Original Hindi by
Kanwar Dinesh Singh

We were sitting on the beach late at night.
Late means…very late.
It must have been around 1:30 a.m. The waves in the sea were raging.
I was sitting with my knees bent, wearing blue denim shorts and a white spaghetti strap, making random shapes on the sand with my fingers.
Wearing black shorts and a black sando, he was lying nearby on the sand, both hands under his head, staring at the sky, and said, “The night is very dark. Isn’t it!”
Like an ostrich, I quickly raised my head and looked at the sky and then around. His slippers and my sandals were kept together on the sand in such a way that the waves would come again and again, kiss them, and go back. Sometimes the waves would play the same game with our bodies too.
In reply to him, I said, “Can you see the moon?”
He looked at me and smiled.
I picked up a broken shell lying in the sand and threw it at him and said, “There is no need to be so filmy. Look at the sky, not at me.” After calling him filmy, I myself pointed my finger towards him, turned my finger towards the moon in the sky, and said, “I am talking about that. Do you see its light? Look at the shimmering moonlight on the waves. You say that the night is dark. I say look at this wonderful light, which is filtering and spreading down. There is so much glittering in it. Often things that are said to be only visible can be heard too if you feel them carefully. At this time, you can not only see the light, but you can also hear how the moonlight is dancing on the waves with the sound of ghungroo (bells). And this magic happens only at night, not during the day.”
He turned towards me, bent his elbow, rested his cheek on his palm, and said, “What else do you see?” “I can see that it is an old saying that every night is followed by a morning. Now the thing is that nights are beautiful in themselves.
The light of sorrow fills us with a completely different kind of light. It enriches and enlightens us from within. And we are people of a sad nature, my love. We enjoy being in its embrace.”
He asked smilingly, “Will you come with me?”
I said laughingly, “I have better things to do in life than drowning.”
Laughter tinkled like bells in the moonlight. Two pairs of footprints on the sand kept appearing and disappearing for a long time.

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Dr. Kanwar Dinesh Singh
Poet, Storyteller and Critic
Email: kanwardineshsingh@gmail.com
Mobile: +919418626090