|
Three Poems
by Jyothsnaphanija An Edged Space My village has peninsulas at the end of the streets, anklets paleness inside, twittering feet, kalankari fabrics outside the porches, Buzz of sewing machines, paddy fields, jasmine buds, cow milk, turmeric mornings, Grassy lanes, spring birds, their songs, their language, Paraffin lights, grinding stone tunes, cot threads, Pealed lemons, pickled mangoes, wet clothes, steel vessels, coconut slice, soaked rice, buttered chilies kept under the afternoon sun, Slowed time and classic TV stands. My village has a space with two ends, telephonic towers, vine, dust, intoxicating sugar, Instant insurance schemes, refrigerated fish, Reusable words, their contexts, their spellings, Petrol cabins, one -stop -stalls, Police whistles, feeding schools, beauty kits, crappy passwords, smiling clicks, hourglass wall posts, An uploadable landscape that tolerates the revisions. Give Me Some More Time Dear mum, You fixed my wedding date, I still didn’t enter it in my diary. Give me some more time I need to write those lyric stories, Musings on my everyday expeditions of the world. My diary is getting completed. Buy me a new diary, I need to fill it with my new poems. Give me some more time I want to walk around the world, want to take our home as much as I can before being someone in other’s home. Give me some more time I want to tell all my secrets with you, before I forget them. I want to be read and watched, Talked about in celebrations, Gifted, teased, photo my spirits, Dream of my convocations, spend my first salary, take my brothers for a new picnic. I want to open grandfather’s gift wrapper curiously in my next birthday, give me some more time. Let me learn eating new recipes, Recite grandmother’s tales, Sing her songs in rain dance, Imitate the birds, Lazy till afternoon. I know, you are tired of illogical questions, tired of pity gazes, tired of ailing elders, but give me some more time. I want to write your name on my consignments. Give me some more time, I want to dry the flowers, using the water for earthen lights. Give me some more time, before me I will be healthy as an Olympic stage. Mirrors When I was young enough to properly count, Had handful of mirrors where fingers wince with the wait sudoriferous palms curve tendrils for coronae. One of them was clever enough to sketch my ears. The other resembles a dry soap that slips between wet palms. Plays with my eyes, Hyde and seek, Kaleidoscope of light and dark Tunnels when trains move through The spaces that connect stations Scattering some food to the wind, Songs for the windowpane. Earlier I found them in my mother’s kitchen. Somewhere hiding the cylindrical blocks Flesh at the walls of the pickle jars Tiling her hands and feet When she burns the ends of white school ribbons Jagged onions, garlic peel, Decoctions, shells, feed the roses Her bangles draw circles in the circles of those embroidery frames. Now they prance In the leaves of ancient notebooks Acetonic threads Play the record backwards Puffed by the wild dust of the sharpeners Ready to paint my hands as squirrels To tuck on a wide oily parchment Some words to reuse, the ice, That spills from the greasy frames. |
|
