A Thousand Small Sorrows of Night

The sky is dressed in the metaphors of dark.
Two orbs of mine have seen a lark sleeping with its young, beneath the moonlight's spark.

There's a man who tiptoes from the day's rush, unlocking the gate, keys jingle in the stillness. 
With a fixed gaze, he fears the sound will awaken his beloved and their children.

A grandma sews by the window, threads glinting beneath the lamplight, 
Weaving old summers into the hush of the night,
Fingers still tremble where small hands once lay, 
Stitching the ache that won't fade away.

On roads, finally quiet after day's business, 
A drunk man argues softly with none in particular, 
Words slurring into the dust, unheard and familiar.
Street dogs curl under a bench, their ribs show faintly.

A mason pauses, smoke curling from his weary lips, 
Sits at the edge of a half-constructed skeleton of a building.
The moonlight seeps through hollow beams, 
Sketching his struggle upon the concrete bones of the city.

Beneath the murky sky, there also lies a mother, with her little son, 
Ragged, curled up with no blanket, warming up instead with dust.

The smuggler waits where no one will see.
Money trades hands, but freedom flees.

Somewhere far away, I hear the hiss of streetlamps flicker, 
Refusing to die, softly illuminating lonely streets where lost footsteps lie.
In one of the dwellings, I see a loud TV with no one watching.
Loneliness grapples man.

I see an old woman caressing old photos in the album, kept beneath the bed's gloom. 
Pages of laughter, now agony and yearning, shatters the room.

At the dusty city walls, by the lane, a young alluring woman 
Drunk with the wine of youth, has her saree tied loosely.
She waits for the night’s business, selling her sorrow, wrapped in skin.
Eyes once dreaming of soft daylight, 
Now learn to fade behind the night.

Yet somewhere a window still glows in the gloom,
A hint of tomorrow lies buried in the city's tomb.
These streets hold onto the stories no daylight recalls.
Whispers of lives resonate in the dark, silence fading into the walls.
I keep their secrets, their grief, their light. 
I am the witness as they call me Night.