Where are the whisper monsters?

Every night these days –
Dadi whispers into my ear,
about little whisper monsters.
“My little child,
God’s own child,
You should beware,
the whisper monsters have got –
new mouths.”
In the quiet light of dying candles,
her breath warms up my cold earlobe.
Her voice, like a steady whimper,
“Dear child, our foes, little whisper monsters –
will make you one of their own!
Brave child, you beware.”

Every night these days –
Maa whispers into my ear,
about my dear friend.
She snivels in a rustic rhythm.
Her breath douses the candle.
In the dark, she whispers,
“My child, my love,
you be aware,
a little whisper monster has an eye on you.”
My dear friend, a whisper monster?
My dear friends, with whom I play every day?
My dear friend, who shares his imarti with me?
“Dear child, your friend will whisper to you,
and take you away from us.”

Every night these days-
Paa whispers into my ear,
about taking the sword.
His eyes burn with hate,
but he will never blink.
With a steady candle flame beside,
he whispers,
“You, my child, are either a traitor or a coward!
Whisper monsters are not our own,
Aliens, they are. Your friends too, aliens, monsters.”
My dear friends,
Whom I see, whom I touch, whom I love,
are all monsters, not all, but some.
Specific ones, not even the ones,
their dresses, their scarves, their caps,
they are the monsters. Whisper! Whisper!

Every night these days,
the world whispers into my ear,
through mobiles, radios, television sets, papers –
And rotten mouths,
about little whisper monsters all around us.
I look around, in school, on the streets,
not a single monster in sight.
Only people, stuck to walls,
hanging upside down on railings,
whispering about the whisper monsters.
“They will come, the whisper monsters.”
Men, women,
young, old,
human, beast,
sharpening their knives, their horns!
I look around, one last time,
I saw no monsters,
but a tail, or nerve, or maybe stream,
flowing from a palace in the capital, and
into the brains of humans and machines alike.