The City of Dreadful Night

Sleepless on a hot August night, the narrator sets off towards Lahore City. The moon blazes down onto sleeping men, lying like corpses. A restless child stirs on a rooftop, and is stilled by its mother. Through the Delhi Gate he enters the walled city, where it seems even hotter and more stifling. He hears men talking and pulling at their hookahs, and a shopkeeper balancing his books behind the shutters. At the Mosque of Wazir Khan he climbs a dark stair to a minaret high above the moonlit city. A muezzin gives his splendid cry to prayer, briefly rousing the sleeping men. As the narrator makes his way home in the dawn, a woman's corpse is carried down to the burning ghat. The city was of Death as well as Night.