“The Sky Weeps in Its Silence: On Death”: The International Collaboration of Poetry Collection” (Part 1) by Leni Marlina & Bhawani Shankar Nial (Poetry-Pen IC, ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena)
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The Sky Weeps in Its Silence: On Death
Poem by Leni Marlina
(INDONESIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena-West Sumatra]
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Between unspeakable silences,
the sky weeps in its own language—
marking the vanishing footsteps,
opening paths unimagined.
Here, in a soil long hungering,
loss is not an end, but inception:
like a star born out of nothingness.
In the hush that outlives noise,
we unearth a life
vaster than thought can reach,
deeper than reason can mine—
and yes,
even death becomes
a passage to a greater form of breathing.
/2/
AN ENCOUNTER WITH DEATH
A Poem by
Dr. Bhawani Shankar Nial
(INDIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA]
Translated from Odia into English by
Gobinda Sahoo
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Many times I’ve been
To her world of lines
to the harsh jungle of planets and satellites
where the sunlight is yet to reach.
Argued many a times
Contacting her eyes
Keeping pace with hers
To unveil the mystery of my birth and death.
Many times I’ve been and come back too
To the sandy region
Of her remote valley
Leaving behind many footprints of doubts
And confusions too
Of widowed chaos and turmoil.
In the laboratory of my oblivion
In one feeble afternoon
Of an unforgettable past
Particle, atom and molecule
Of my meticulous and fastidious questions
Skipping from one page to the other
Of the books of my cupboard.
August 2021, Kalahandi, INDIA
———————————————
Dr. Bhawani Shankar Nial’s is an internationally acclaimed poet, living in Sriradha, Bhawanipatna, INDIA.
The poem above is one of poems published in Dr. Bhawani Shankar Nial’s Poetry Book “AN ENCOUNTER WITH DEATH” (2021). It is published on this online Indesian media suaraanaknegerinews.com by genting permission by poet himself.
Dr. Bhawani Shankar Nial’s including “LOCKDOWN” poetry book, has been translated into more than 24 international languages. In recognition of his contributions, he was honored as a Global Literary Figure at Kalahandi Utsav Ghumura-2025. His poetry bridges cultures and inspires worldwide.
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The Shadow Behind the Torn Sky
Poem by Leni Marlina
(INDONESIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena-West Sumatra]
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Once, I parted the seam
between the folds of sedimented time—
a fracture of silence
in a sky yet unnamed,
where light still weighs
whether to be born
or vanish without a trace.
I stood at the edge of a silent orbit,
sensing the tremble of earth
with palms stained in questions:
will any trace remain
when the world refuses to still?
The shadows recede
like seasons that resist remembrance.
I chased them
with broken breath and halved steps.
Each shard of them
settles as grains of doubt
between the temple of the sky
and prayers forgotten mid-journey.
In my library of solitude,
I rewrite wounds
with a pen filled with hush,
and ink drawn from a morning
that never had the chance
to utter my name.
When I arrive at the brink of time,
where even stars lose their language,
I no longer seek death’s direction,
but the manner
of embracing its presence
without erasing the light.
Padang, West Sumatra, INDONESIA, April 2025
/4/
In the Darkness That Gives Birth to Light
Poem by Leni Marlina
(INDONESIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena-West Sumatra]
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
I cried out to the night
weaving shadows endlessly,
to the black cloak
that devoured all form and direction:
why does light swear fealty
to the deepest dark?
Is light afraid to be born
in a day too crowded?
Does radiance only rise
when the world averts its gaze?
My steps carve time
into an unyielding mist.
Each trace—
a breath blown
across a nameless field.
I try to hold direction,
but it is a river
without banks,
without destination.
Within my body, another sky—
empty,
yet heavy with echoes.
There, questions whirl
without center,
without gravity,
spinning like an ancient chant
that was never completed.
And yet, something flared
before I ever knew its name:
not belief,
but fidelity
to what cannot be seen.
It flows—
like the ink of fate,
writing over pages
I do not yet know I’ll read.
Death arrives
not as grim news,
but as a closing line
that completes the tale.
It is earth,
and we are seeds—
silence is the season
that dares us to grow.
So at the end of the journey,
I choose not to understand,
but to surrender
to the rhythm that predates language:
that all things blooming
must learn how to fall,
and all that vanishes
is simply another name for return.
Padang, West Sumatra, INDONESIA, April 2025
/5/
The Final Step Unspoken
Poem by Leni Marlina
(INDONESIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena-West Sumatra]
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
At the rim of an unreachable abyss,
we stand—eyes piercing a fractured horizon,
the world split
like two souls torn apart.
Each step becomes a thread
across the deepest silence,
where earth no longer waits,
only the creeping hush remains.
Death arrives
like a shadow without shape,
hovering with an unseen smile,
like a veil of time
falling over our eyes,
ushering us into a chamber
mute and vast.
It offers no conclusion,
only a boundless room
where the known dissolves,
and we drift—
like a river crawling
toward a sea without light.
But in the thickest stillness,
an echo emerges—
a force larger than any name,
never spoken,
but giving us the will to move forward
even as our steps fade
beneath the weight of dust and doubt.
A force that teaches
life and death are merely
two faces of the same coin,
tossed in the palm of fate
that never calls out.
Death is no curtain call,
but the gate
to a silence more sacred,
where the world,
with all its noise,
lets us finally lay down
what we have carried too long.
It comes not to end,
but to guide—
like the wilting flower
nourishing its soil,
like the wind that shifts
so the earth might breathe anew.
At the journey’s end,
we leave behind no footprints,
only a peace
born from unconditional yielding.
All that has lived
must know how to retreat—
like trees releasing their leaves
to welcome an untouched season.
In this journey with no closure,
eternity is not found in certainty,
but in the vastness born of unknowing,
like a falling star
igniting another sky,
like an ocean
that receives us without promise,
only with a stillness
deeper than time.
All that is lost will return,
all that dies will birth anew,
and all that drifts
will find its place
within a harmony beyond utterance.
For every ending cradles
an unrelenting beginning,
and in every step toward death,
a life awaits
where the soul merges
with the whole of creation,
returns to God,
and nothing is left behind—
except the good we gave the world.
/6/
Returning to the Womb of Origin
Poem by Leni Marlina
(INDONESIA)
[Poetry-Pen International Community – PPIC, ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association – ACC SHILA, PPIPM-Indonesia, Satu Pena-West Sumatra]
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
We walk back to the origin’s cradle,
between earth that longs,
and sky that listens.
There, in the arms of timelessness,
our yearning turns into light,
touching hours beyond counting—
becoming songs
heard only by souls
ready to surrender.
Here—
within and beyond all places—
we rediscover our home
in the non-being
that fulfills all being.
Padang, West Sumatra, INDONESIA, April 2025
————————————-
LENI MARLINA
Poet | Writer| Lecturer
Leni Marlina — writer, poet, and lecturer at Universitas Negeri Padang. Founder and Head of PPIPM-Indonesia and Poetry-Pen International Community. Active member of ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association and Satu Pena (West Sumatra).
Image source: Doc.of LM Starmonsun.
The poetry collection above was written by Leni Marlina in January 2025. The poems had not been published on any platform prior to its inaugural digital release through the national literary portal suaraanaknegerinews.com that same year.
Leni Marlina is a writer, poet, and a lecturer from West Sumatra, Indonesia. She has been an active member of the Indonesian Writers Association (SATU PENA), West Sumatra Chapter, since its inception in 2022. Internationally, she is affiliated with the ACC Shanghai Huifeng International Literary Association (ACC SHILA), where she has been appointed as the Indonesian Poetry Ambassador. Her global literary engagement includes a formative involvement with the Victorian Writers Association in Australia.
Since 2006, Leni has served as a civil servant lecturer in the Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Languages and Arts, at Universitas Negeri Padang (UNP), INDONESIA. Beyond the academic sphere, she is part of the editorial board at suaraanaknegerinews.com and contributes regularly to various national online media and digital literary communities.
Her publicly available poems can be accessed at:
https://suaraanaknegerinews.com/category/puisi-leni-marlina-bagi-anak-bangsa
In addition to her writing, Leni Marlina is the founder and leader of several digital communities that center on language, literature, literacy, and social engagement. These include:
1. World Children’s Literature Community (WCLC): https://shorturl.at/acFv1
2. Poetry-Pen International Community (PPIC)
3. PPIPM-Indonesia (Poetry Community of Indonesian Society’s Inspirations):
a. https://shorturl.at/2eTSB;
b. https://shorturl.at/tHjR
4. Starcom Indonesia Community (Starmoonsun Edupreneur Community Indonesia):
https://rb.gy/5c1b02
5. Linguistic Talk Community (Ling-TC)
6. Literature Talk Community (Littalk-C)
7. Translation Practice Community (Trans-PC)
8. English Language Learning, Literacy, Literary Community (EL4C)
Through her poetry and leadership in community initiatives, Leni Marlina continues to infuse new energy into Indonesia’s literary and educational landscape. Her work bridges cultural and generational dialogues, offering a profound poetic vision in response to the challenges and transformations of the digital age.
