The Poetry Marathon

I am alive, and I am breathing, my wounds are misleading

I am neither hurt nor injured, neither deterred, nor hindered

I am serving my purpose, just the way rain must pour, the river must flow, and fire burn and crackle

This shackle,

Is only mine, and I will not carry it forward

These chains are only mine, and this pain will not move onward

My daughter will grow and bloom, in a world that isn’t born yet

and if I must die to birth it, I will not forget,

why I was born

this fight will die with us and if I must die to let another be born free,

I am a sea,

of martyrs who win the war when they die,

so why not?

I am the dam, I am the bridge and I will chip away at myself to let the tomorrow’s river flow

You know, the future we fight for is so beautiful that being a mere step towards it,

Is often enough

So I am neither maimed, nor hurt

I am the desert,

That will revert,

And spring if she should grin,

Knows,

“Tomorrow the next chapter would begin”

From Jaishree Misra’s “Ancient Promises”

I hate the girl I see in the mirror

She stares back, I hate her more

Her incomplete story of tarnished desire,

Her tangled mess of thoughts set on fire

I hate the girl I see in the mirror

A hate that is light, so light that it creeps in slowly,

Through each crevice, each crack in her mind

And chips away at the girl hidden behind,

The hate, the loathing, peeking through hopes declined

I hate the girl I see in the mirror

And she hates me more because I let her forget, forget how to love herself

And remind her only that time traps her in an image of hate,

A resentment I spend years to create

Because it’s easier to hate the girl in the mirror, than let her love who casts the reflection

Your love is an Island,

A refuge from the storm,

An embrace warm,

Your love is like an Island,

Caressing and nourishing,

Hopes flourishing

But your love is like an Island,

In the middle of a hail,

Sent me away setting sail.

At the tip of my tongue,

It’s a song I’ve sung

A melody that just rung,

In so many ways,

On solitary days,

And now I gaze

At the way it eludes

Oh shrewd!

Wicked muse!

I stand at the end of inspiration

Of wilting aspiration

Who am I if I don’t create?

If I don’t satiate

The hunger in my soul

I spring forth

‘Devour me whole,

O emptiness’,

Where would I land

if not at another beginning?

Why divulge in art, 

Why indulge uncertainty?

In a duty-bound, 

Eternally narrow world;

To do, to embrace, 

What is neither required, nor needed, 

Is a present.

I am made of borrowed words, 

Chipped away, 

Gifted, 

From the strangers I meet

each, adding a pleat

to the fabric of

My life

And If I were to live, 

Live life in earnest 

I would write their story.

I’m afraid of how deep

The deep blue ocean

Can take me 

I still, 

Settle my feet 

At the hem of its billowy skirt 

The ripples tease

My toes, 

The wind nips, 

At the tip, 

Of my nose

I take a dip, 

Ever so lightly 

Into the water, 

Cold, and snug between 

The mountains 

Cerulean and teal 

I look down 

My eyes drown

Into the sea. 

I have wanted you to belong to me, like no other prayer prior 

Some higher power, laughs at my refusal

To pray for you then

To ask for you, beg for you 

How could any divinity make you mine?

When we are already both one?

It rains,

Five times, in a whole year, 

For grains, 

Humans, and beasts to share,

And so I carry, 

All my days with the sun 

I’m never wary, 

Of the sun in my city 

That shines, 

Brighter than anywhere I have ever seen,

We often align, 

My sun, and me.

We were born believing that the world centered around us, 

It’s confounding, really, 

when we catch this lie surround us, 

I believed that the pink of my mother’s tea was the only right way to feel warm, 

But the beauty of being wrong, 

Lies in the generosity of truth

And youth is so forgiving,

I could count the number of lies on the fingers on my hands, and not need more, 

And how many more days till the world stops revolving around me?

I’m told, it takes at least three heart aches? 

And at least four falls, before I realize the crunch of the leaves beneath my feet

Is another pleat in the longing of our entwined existence 

Across the ocean a lady in white, 

I think, she makes her tea exactly like my mother 

But each time I ask for another, it tastes a little different, 

Looks a little red, 

I dread, I would need another finger, to account another lie, 

The wind here, so sly, 

I almost felt my mother’s hand on my cheek.