What burdens me?

Published in Setu.

I was asked to deliver a poem on a special call of submission for the theme- ‘Colours of love and barriers’ and I am so grateful to my lovely friend Candice for thinking of me. You can read the poem in the link below.

https://www.setumag.com/2022/07/devika-mathur-colours-of-love-and.html?spref=fb&m=1

On Distress

Empathy. Discorded vermillion loops of human emotions. One must know the end of attachments. The lasting effect of expressions. But do they ever end? The language and syntax between the hurt and the healer? The strange connections of despair souls and longing eyes- the connectivity. Sadness is in unity. It clings to a verbose effigy, below the torrential glow of your elbow. We think we have time? But do we? We think we will be happy? But are we? The pain demands empathy and unity in sadness- a collectve circle of pungent healing. Longings are vapourized flowers. They stench and bloom bothways.

Longings are sadness- a temporary floral cloth that covers your nude body so that the body isn’t nude to anyone else. But one knows. Polythene eyebrows. Fermented cheeks. Eyes- swelled up. So we tend to connect- share- heal and proclaim our healing is in sharing.

The white haze

They talk about everything so coarse and grainy-

but not my mouth, empty and cold.

Lukewarm particles of mother’s voice

floating

White/ blue/ grey-

 I see shades of attachment and delirium.

Together, through a visceral bone,

Skins aglow- white talcum powder all distorted.

My dressing table is a desert.

A pause. Concrete and blind sun.

I watch my image as strong as an eel,

a pivotal insect preying on itself

frolic, lurid paper towns-

all departing my marigold fingers one by one.

Counting stops and so does the nuptial song

with neon green signs, and yellow street children,

the hem of my lips, spiral now.

Here- I go to my bed..

zig zag,

muted

Collapsed.

Through the voices.

She is a small island
A voiceless twig to flutter
A crecent of moon dropped from beneath-
 the body is resourceful
spun into a river.

Now I am silent as I watch my window
with angular toes amd face
birds so small and distant,
 That is that. That is that.

Bones awaiting the hours to fly by,
And here people like light rays leave
Salt without wrinkle
Ceiling without star.

I am calm. I am sand. I am calm.
It is the calmness that settles, flees and aborts
into miniature beings of discomfort blankets and nap.

A rare yellow minute when the birds die in the womb.
 

The lovemaking

The hem of my body is paper

and my tongue- the silk threads of ice cubes

The night spreads its monotonous tone under my moan

the voices that erupts my chest often,

about your skin:

about your name:

the existence of the Sun inside your wounds,

the mouth opens and a soft touch sits inside

The touch is of your scarlet memories

the sea beneath a mountain.

Nothing remains to be said now.

The body demands a blindfold

a language beyond comprehension

it wishes to float

to tear itself apart

with veins that sing songs of Spring.

And here,

a thing blooms too.

A thing exists too.

And here,

madness is an unleashed song

on my forehead of desire

like eye of sin protruding from all the corners

soaked in a desperation

counting backwards the hiccups spend under the sheet.