Mummy!
Don't leave me 
To the vultures!
The monsters!
Mummy!
Come beside me 
And comfort me ...
Cajole my body 
Don't let anybody 
Touch me!
Mummy!
They really hurt me ...
The dressed monsters
The nurses...the doctors....
They pierced my thighs
Peered into my eyes ....
Squeezing my hips 
Shut my squeaking lips ....
Mummy!
I shuddered shivered 
I was totally terrified..!
They are worse than snakes , mummy!
Spewed venom on my little tummy!
You said I am sick and they would cure me ...
I am worse here.... See the marks of torture, see!
Take me back home mummy ....
I' m afraid ...no one looks here chummy!
Cure me at home ...this hospital is filthy 
Medicate me to become healthy! 
​
( Indian police investigate alleged gang rape of girl in hospital....www.news.com.au )
(Girl, 4, ' is gang raped in India by nurse and four others ' as she lay in an intensive care unit being treated for snake bite... Dailymail.com.uk ) 

Where an abode of education 
Becomes a terror-  stricken  location,
What more can prevail except barbarism
And mindless bigotry and fanaticism ...?
The cowards have no strength to fight 
The mighty imperialist State 
They pounce on women and little children
To exhibit their power and domination ....
Their hue and cry of patriotism, nationalism
And allegiance to islamic fundamentalism 
Is nothing but spreading sham anarchism 
Attracting from the world, severe criticism
They have lost the tenets of humanity - 
The basic teachings of any religiosity - 
They cannot win people' s confidence 
By perpetrating continuous violence 
​
( More than 80 people, mostly children kidnapped from school in Cameron ...
Www.africannews.com , November 5, 2018) 

​Nature is beautiful 
With various forms of life 
With myriad scenes colorful 
And resources rife...
But nature is dreadful 
When tornado or torpedoes strike 
Or cyclones and storms terrible 
Devastate land and life alike ...
Enjoy it's beauty 
Acknowledge it's fury 
Nature can bring Ecstasy 
And also severe calamity

​Dates change 
Weeks, months and years change
But struggles continue ....
Despite consistent repression
Arrests and incarceration 
Protests and rallies continue ...
Amidst floods and droughts
Cyclones, storms and quakes 
Battles for survival continue ....
Even if losses are numerous 
And wins are sparse 
Hopes for better future continue 
To propel human beings 
To march forward 
With renewed vigor 
And new resolutions 

​Celebrations have begun 
To usher in another January one ...
Expecting something new 
Abundance of joys and sorrows few 
The world marches forward 
Leaving history backward ...
But
Pause for a moment ...
Look at your surroundings with intent ...
Not all is well on the planet 
There's pollution and change in climate 
Children are dying of disease and hunger 
Protests are rising with discontent and anger 
Innocents are languishing in sub - human conditions in jails 
Activists are being roughed up and denied bails ...
Time is not ripe to fully celebrate 
Still there are many evils present and need to annihilate 
Let the world become safer to live and tolerate 
Then festivities could be enjoyed without controversy or debate 

​I gaze into the dark expanse,
the deepness of time.
The night is cold, bitter,
but I stand solid
at the meeting of plates.

Tectonic land masses beneath my feet
more sturdy than my shifting
yet young in comparison
to the sharp specks of light above.

The Milky Way curves a clear path
but there are no Northern Lights tonight.
No matter.
The silence is palpable.
The glittering show beyond expectation.

I blink in the frost, my eyes water
and the stars rearrange themselves in the sky.

​In a dream I see
the rainbow rings of Saturn
burst in a shower of colour
as the planet explodes
before my eyes

and then this evening
with a telescope and you
from the roof garden
I watch four satellites
embrace cold Jupiter
as the full moon dances
over Dublin city sky.

​you are beautiful

especially here
at night by the sea

you stand tall but shiver slightly
with the sharp wind of an oncoming storm
dark strands of hair surround your face
that glows whiter than the full moon

eyes like black craters gaze
over the waves
as they churn and dash among the rocks
close to the shore below us

I watch in awe

you are a dream
and I must wake
in another land
without you

Marcia J. Pradzinski, an award-winning poet, lives in Skokie, Illinois. Her poems have been featured in print journals, anthologies, and online. Recent and forthcoming publications include   Redheaded Stepchild, Clementine Unbound, Your Daily Poem, and Ink In Thirds. Finishing Line Press published her chapbook, Left Behind in 2015. She credits Plumb Line Poets, her cadre of fellow poets, for helping her stay productive. When not reading or writing, she enjoys water aerobics, qigong, walking, and going to movies.

​Sunlight creeps in without warning,
bleaches my dreams and tosses them
 
skyward where emptiness guards
the space I need to move, to think.
 
No shadows follow me there, I fuse
with the face and open breath of time.
 
Silence surrounds and consoles until I hear
a blue jay shrieking. Life
 
scrapes its way in –
an awakening like this won't hold.

​I fall asleep and in a dream I'm a man
named Larry the Apothecary of Gary, Indiana.
But for the sake of sanity I can't remember
how or when I transformed. And now I'm
chatting with a drummer, a blacksmith,
and a dog catcher – as we all gather 'round
in the square. Or the Plaza? (Or maybe
the Ramblas? uhh...Spain?) How did we
get to Spain? In fact I can't say I know anything
anymore after I give my presentation, “Duck Hunting
with an AK47-101”, (which I am, in no way, 
qualified to do), but the professor insists despite
my pitiful lack of preparation so I read
from a sheet I cadged from The New Wikipedia,
and as I fire a pop gun at a squirrel near
the birdfeeder everything resolves in a flash:
I'm not Larry but Merry (that's me), the amateur
lapidary who's making pendants with Ak47 charms
for birdwatchers in the neighborhood.

​Water runs clear and smooth
over each dish, each pot,
pan, and tumbler as it
bubbles into the blue
champagne flute
and flows over the heirloom
wine glass etched with leafy stems
and what resembles red elf coreopsis –
the wine glass itself like
a bowl-shaped flower with gentle
curving petals.
 
Water streams over my hands,
dry from winter cold,
now bathed in warmth –
 
washing dishes
such a simple task                   
like nothing, but now taking me
from the kitchen
and out to the flow
                                                                                   
of water from the city
filtered in lake cribs,
water from the lake
alive with perch, smelt, alewives
water reaching the lake
from tributary arms of larger waters
as it circles back to me and
my kitchen faucet.                    

​I had this friend
Who admitted to me once
That when he was a child
He’d been fascinated by life
And that now he’d grown up into a man
This fascination hadn’t gone away
And that whatever it took
He was determined
To get one for himself.
 
I was staggered,
He didn’t seem the type,
But despite my protests
From then on
He spent the better part of each day
Devoted to this task,
However detrimental it was
To anything else.
 
A few years later,
Having drifted apart
Some while before,
Him not having the time
For the things he’d used to,
Me not caring to push it any longer,
I was surprised to get a call,
And to hear his urgent voice on the other end
Telling me to come over,
Cos he’d got one.
 
I asked where he lived now,
Not expecting him to answer
That he was still in the same place,
But I put my coat and boots on
And made my way across town
Wondering if the area
Had improved without me knowing.
 
If anything, it was worse.
 
I found his house
And it looked a bit rundown,
The garden was a bit weedy if anything.
The car on the drive didn't look that much either.
In fact, it took nothing to notice the rear-left wheel was off it.
 
He answered the doorbell quickly, smiling.
Inside was as I remembered it
Only 10 years older.
But he seemed really happy,
And started showing me round,
Pointing out things that really weren't worth pointing out.
 
I wondered whether he had been ill, to be honest.
 
It turned out he was single, too.
 
“What do you think of that?"
He finally said, waving his arms
Like some kind of evangelist.
“Isn’t it fantastic?”
I looked around, I didn’t know what he was on about,
And finally I told him,
“What? I can’t see anything?”
He paused, looked at me, puzzled,
Asked if I was sure.
I said I was.
He looked at me again, sadly I thought.
“It’s so strange,” he said.
“All of you say the same.”
 
As I walked back across town
I kicked some stones down the road
And found myself crying a little bit,
To do this day I don't know why.

I multiplied together 2 nine-digit numbers.
No-one wondered how I did it,
No-one wanted to check my answer.
A computer programmer, 
A social worker,
An international shipping merchant,
A translator,
And an English teacher.
And not one of them was at all impressed.
The computer programmer asked:
\ldblquote Why?\rdblquote
I looked at him as if he was the strange one.
“Because I can” I answered,
And repeated it 9 times, quietly.
 
 

​The prettiest girl
Who ever saw time
Knocked around up on the river
Next to my old father’s place,
 
And he wooed her with his boat,
And wondered at her,
Her line lolling in the water,
Her hair,
 
Her bare toes paddling,
Idle as a child,
And the only thing she caught
Was him,
 
And he had nothing to give her
But his failings and himself,
His cabin with the door
And meshed windows,
 
His rattly truck that barely
Beat the ruts,
And she left,
But then came briefly back
 
To give him me,
Which he took, unwillingly,
And lived with a look
Out of his eyes
 
For the moment
I too would leave,
As if he could will it,
Till I did,
 
Which maybe is a day
He has not forgotten,
Or he may have, or he may
Not be there anymore,
 
Or he may have a look
Out of his eyes
Totally absented
From all of his past,
 
Something akin to wonder,
Or akin to something
He knows he never
Quite saw,
 
Something like a boat,
Something like a river,
Something like a woman,
Something like a child.

​The poet has nowhere to hide,
Has nowhere to rest, nurse hate,
Rock forth, nowhere dried,
Packed, ready-sealed, to elate
In opening late, versing
As key goes in door, wallet
To floor, assured cursing -
As muse of nicht pour gullet -
Will not go between his mantra
Of world-love, all-love, and lord-love:
His larder's stocked, true tantra -
Approving spice, seed, and stove.
 
I pity my restful foe,
His non-gnomic con-me's, his lasty
Resistant eyes, his all-know
All-gone, his hair hashy,
His fear, overbearing as was,
Now sub-Socratic, bleakered,
Barely worth tongue, fosse
Frazzed; a harlequin sneakered,
Smashed on a sprung-through sofa,
Gouting largesse, loud-wording
Gauds, bits of him a knifer
Still, most an idiocy boarding.
 
Not for I must I pity,
Nor for I can, but for the joy,
For the mockery, treachery, for the smarty
Gleam, the sheerness, for the coy
Sly slippery side
Of self undoing all good,
Knuckling well back at pride,
Handily gainsaying that prude,
Slapping that Lancelot's back,
Burping that sucker, unshucking
That constabularying schmuck,
Offing that cuckooing, that clucking.
 
For there are things must be done
And them I shall do. No
Small poet frying his pan
Of lines need I now
To go for feeding from to.
I have my own bubbling.
Some boil gloop, some glue.
I've no trouble dribbling.
I sooner spend my turbulent
Roubles quibbling info
Ilka, who's noo Boss Rant?
Than grinder cuisinist curio.
 
Once I saw him in his pots,
Underneath the worktop,
Clawing at them, clats
And slams, all tempered, lop
To his eyes. When he looked
Up, at me laughing down,
His cheeks tightly in-sucked,
Hollowing strangely, a frown
Drew across his brow,
In three deep waved lines,
He formed a smile, then a low
Sound, a haiku of bent fork-tine.
 
Summitted gutturally,
Forcibly, ignobly, with
Malice contemporaneously
Sniggered, up at my standing life,
It was as if he and I was one
And he knew it first, and knowing first,
Threw me off my track, and won,
Left me tired, racked with thirst,
Raising my fist at him heading
Ahead to a storming victory
Taking with him my due rewarding
And with that everything left of me.

​I'd rolled a cigarette and stowed the baccy 
pouch and rizlas safely down in a pocket 
and rummaged through several other pockets until 
I'd found my lighter tangled in my hankie 
and unwrapped it and stepped outside the pub 
to light one up. The rain had stopped, its wetness 
still glinted off the pavement. Flash red fuchsia 
heads fallen from the hanging pots
on the pub wall lay wet and squashed on the kerb, 
floated round an algae-scummed puddle
teetering to the mouth of a roadside drain.
I stared at them as I inhaled. I paced
idly back and forth along the pavement, 
never venturing too far from the pub front,
as if, to move too far might invoke banishment,
or as if, someone might come and take
my place, and in taking my place, might take me.
Shepherd's purse sprouted from cracks along the road, 
across the pavement, little white flowers content
with any space they could find. I puckered my cheeks
to take in a lungful of smoke, and was content.
From a carpark across the road, a pair of 4
by 4s followed each other out, growling.
I noticed the mud-spatters up the sides of each, 
and wondered how many walkers they'd taken out.
A cyclist came along on the pavement, wrapped
in waterproofs, and as he passed he waved, 
because we knew each other some years ago.
I held my cigarette up waving back,
but he'd already cycled down the street
and around the corner. I really should be getting
around the corner too, I thought, considering
the time, and how the shops would soon shut
and I'd nothing in my cupboards. I finished my smoke, 
and stubbed the butt on the pavement under my heel, 
just next to a particularly blood-red fuchsia 
flower. Then I went back into the pub.
 

​My mother pointed at the mushroom,
said one word loudly, plainly –
“poisonous.”
 
But that fungus
was so plump, inviting, 
its blacks and whites
like art deco on a stalk.
 
I could feel my mouth water.
But I believed that she knew
better than I did.
 
Yes, I felt betrayed by beauty.
But if it could kill me
then I had no compunctions in avoiding it.
 
Next up,
something no more
than a shriveled lead-colored dot,
but she said, “that’s the one”
so I plucked it from the earth
and dropped it in a bag.
 
By the end of the day,
we’d collected enough
of these inferior lookers
for soup, for salads.
 
But not for death.
For life, gray, ordinary.
 
 
 

​You didn’t quite squelch that camp fire.
Little seeds of flame blew deep into the forest,
scrambled up hill as easily as oak trunk,
pounced on dry grass
that hadn’t tasted rain in weeks.
 
Look behind you. That smoke 
is the exhaust from your unthinking.
You’ve always been a careless man.
Now you have a conflagration to prove it.
 
You see the fire on TV.
You read about it in the newspaper.
The news does not include you.
That isn’t news to you.
 
And your neighbors won’t know the cause of the threat.
It’s the fire that is coming in their direction.
Not you.
 

​Your daughter rattles off
the names of her school friends
who don't have fathers.
It's as if they never did
whereas she remembers hers clearly.
After all, she last saw him
the previous weekend.
You tell her the usual pap
about how sometimes
couple discover that
they no longer love each other.
She wonders how that works
when there was no other person
to begin with.
You don't tell her how
there that has to be a father
somewhere, at some time.
You just let her believe
that some mothers
never fell in love
in the first place.
It's only a lie
if the truth hurts.
 

The heart keeps a diary. Nature adds a note when appropriate.
The frost is a continuing thread. The death of meadow sweet and swamp candles.
Some flowers gently emboss. Others open then fold the pages.
I forgive the snail's sluggish trail. But love the starlit windowpane streaks.
Pale sun, cobwebs fluttering between two branches, a stillness to the lake,
the air, generate enough incidents to be worth reporting.
It must keep it up, day after day. Otherwise, how do I remember summer.
Or the dutchman's breeches. Or the flight patterns of swallows.

Set it down, that's what I say. Not just to the heart but every organ
that looks for recompense in the woods, the fields, the walking stick at my hip.
Dead things can have their lives returned to them. The canopy could gain
insight, wisdom even, from the confessionals of the undergrowth.
It doesn't need a hand or man, merely an inference, an intimation.
And, if the author's threatened, then write and write some more.
To the earth and stars, the unpredictable wind. To your congressman if you have to.
Once added to the journal, it's indelible. Can never be removed.


The heart can read itself and learn all it needs to know of the track of the moon.
It can go on for years, look forward, look back, compare, comprehend, commiserate.
What snow and chlorophyll alone can know deepens its pages.
It even offers space to the merest twig. Or drop of rain. Or anything less than these.
And that diary's being written even when only cricket chirp is worth noting.
It makes a time and place for a bird on a windowsill. A plucked blade of grass.
Disasters are spelled out in bold letters. But so are small things.
Like healed scars. And a light that finds its way through a pine tree grove.


The heart was always part of the plan. I never could walk these woods
with my feet alone. A trail map is well and good. But if I see something,
if I feel something, the senses cannot quell the urge to make these permanent.
Yes, even you, lichen. And that leaf about to fall, the branch to snap,
the squirrel to stow away another acorn. Even the dead bird is part of it.
The heart keeps a diary, endlessly adding to it, even if it's the same things over and over.
There's no lock. No need even for a cover. Its pages are accessible to any part of me.
It's writing something now. But not an explanation. That's my job. I'm done. It's not.
 

I will bulldoze wooden houses, raze garages,
tear lawns limb from limb.
My machinery brooks no argument.
So trees better not try anything.
 
Memories are too ambitious for their own good.
Do they really expect to go on
once the windows have been smashed
and the linoleum’s off to the dumpster.
 
I am comfortable with the name “development.”
I don’t have to be called “progress.”
That’s for politicians. I’m apolitical.
But I am a stickler for food courts.
 
I make it possible for a person to spend
half a day looking in shoe shops,
fashion chains, beauty salons etc.
But, sorry, I no longer do bookstores.
 
I am here to knock down one thing,
replace it with something else,
That’s how it works with the people at large.
Why should commerce be any different?
 
You’re all one fatal sickness away
from being covered over by six feet of dirt
and feasted on by worms and weevils.
See, even God is a stickler for food courts.

The swelling pouch of slick leaves depresses beneath
Each step of my ankles and boots.

With the stretch of heavy maples which line
A woodland trail of antiquity, crackling upon the snapping winds,
I slow to the halt of the halting breeze, pause, then
Continue on my way.

~

“Walk across my parchment threads. Stretch through with the trembling
Wind across the fibers of your hair and all its fullness. I offer
You the deepest soil. In the madness of our departed, we welcome
The pastures of these guests of Winter.” moaned the crackling trees.

~

These trees loosened their leaves and wept
As the widower of this empty trail.

I came to a kneel, picked a fist of leaves covered
In slick rain, the slip of muds which spoke of a distant Spring.


​

Crinkled and pressed beneath the sole and heel
of these tethered boots, I feel, smell the snip
and crack from roots to quivering buds.

The onion shoot rose to the thick yellow pollens.
I stepped again and they rose beneath me.

I listened and heard a scream of the almost black,
creep and swarm of a cloud.
Brooming gusts of cool wind as the belt unloosened
and madness of Summer rain blitzed across my
well pasted shirt and hug of the dampening jeans.

I gathered myself under the spread of a canopy,
trembling trees. The branches smacked in the deep
of Summer’s madness.

I crouched and hugged as I recall the scent of you,
quiet beside the evergreen.



​

The soil I love tumbles, treads across me as the
gust of wind flutters, each mineral shrouds my chest.

I absorb, saturate the water which beads upon my
pale skin.

Trickling grass fondles the loose flesh of my nakedness.

In the crisp hour of nightfall, I stood and wandered
my way through the laughing madness of the slapping winds.

I shift and roam through the fibers of moonbeams.

I am loose in these hours.  

I take flight upon the wilt of the Autumn breeze.


​

​I wish
someday
you’d  de-orbit,
zip unrestrained,
cross universes,
enter my lost world
to collide with me,
while all watch
in shock or in awe
as we explode
and turn to dust
of fire,
annihilating
into one matter
or then non-matter
and then we quickly
vanish the eye
eternally, sucked in by
a giant black hole,
every ion of us,
every fermion of us,
every boson of us,
never to escape,
inseparable
at last,
forever.
 

Parched, frail and delirious,
lying under the merciless gust,
blinded by day, sleepless through night,
naked, covered with sheets of dust.
 
Through the crooked paths of fate
that she carved in her buoyant youth,
memory flashes back random images -
            of the music, the cheers, the laughter,
            the parties that seemed could’ve lasted forever.
            So raging, and vivid were the songs of her youth
            that the other sounds around her drowned in mute!
 
Abruptly, then she
jolts back to reality.
Silence rushes to pierce her ears,
sight returns to scorch her eyes.
Looping thoughts start streaming again-
              was it some manmade dam
              that paralyzed her midstream?
              Or, was she damned by the gods
              that left her voiceless in her scream?
              Was it…?
 
With nowhere to go,
she lays still.
All alone.
Her questions continue.
Her answers aren’t new.
Will it ever
rain enough to fill
the voids she
now has?
Will she ever
be the river she
once was?
 
 

​Windows open…
 
shady groves
of palm trees
picture frame
the sky and sea
and the sparkling
sand draping below.
 
 
Clunk…clunk…clunk…
 
a small boat
in the shallow
gently bumping
the docking pole
delicately nudged
by flirting waters
approaching shore
 
and the whistling
swoooooooosh…
 
of retreating waves-
a long gown
of shimmering blue
with rows of white
beaded lace
departing land.
 
 
Sounds so…
familiar.
 
In-coming
and out-going e-mails.
 
My PC, my beach!
 

​ 
We did.
 
Shots.
Numb.
No more highs.
News.
Not new,
just hit low,
below belt.
Molested.
Yet again
is life.
 
We did.
 
Shots.
Numb.
Don’t hurt.
They did
before.
Bullets
zip by
 silent.
Kill.
Guns didn’t.
Never did.
 
We did.
 
 

​Of the waves that sink
And the waters we drink,
None is the food we eat
Rather, the flood that did defeat.

Of the earthquakes that destroy
And the landslides that toy,
None can our joy deploy
Because there is no peace to employ.

Of the winds that blow
And the storms that grow,
None can our love flow
For they bring us so low.

Storms so strange
Local and foreign, at range
Storms that change
Stories, histories, eternal.

​If we write the storm
It comes like worm,
If we paint the picture
It dribbles our nature,
If we make a collage
We study it at college,
A perfect lingering effect.

We do not want to die
Hence, the knot we tie
We love to live
So we cherish what we give,
We defeat the battle
Even without our cattle,
For we must move on.

The path of tide
And the length of time
The part so wide
And the strength against crime
There, we pitch our tent
For life is so bent
Even as we pay rent.

​Raged and angered ocean
Thundering and thunderous sea,
Noisy wind and restless breeze
Troubled land and besieged souls,
Only God understands.

Weeping voices and wailing victims
Floating houses and sinking homes,
Hopeless people and dying nation
Only God knows.

Animals and beasts that raze
Humans and beings at gaze
Souls and spirits ablaze,
A world in flames
Losing her games
Evil gaining names.

​ The Caribbean tears
Mingling down the Nile,
The European gears
Going extra mile
The African fears
Haunting the file
The Asian wears
Flowing the tile,
The American years
Curing pile,
The Australian bears
Not looking fragile.

A lingering effect
Disasters, natural and devastating
Yet never frightening her
As she hopes life never ends
Loving life to wait for hope
Living it lively to the fullest,
The Caribbean hope
Across that tiny rope
Reaching heights and highs
Nervous with sighs,
The hurricanes not withstanding.

​An August visitor that visited in August
Taking away the breath of a god,
Silencing the body of a deity
Stopping the movement of a legend.

Woe betide this visitor
Wicked, heartless and ungodly
Desperate, inhumane and merciless
Devastating, destroying and cruel.

So loud a voice, so black a brother
So enthusiastic, a comrade
So selfless, a servant
Vast, conversant and familiar
So African, a creature.

Mama weeps for Kofi
She wails for her dear son
She mourns for her glory
Oh, Africa weeps.

A formidable force, a soldier
Combatant, vigilant, brilliant and gallant
Fearless, brave, bold and courageous
Stunning, astonishing and captivating
Boundless, unwavering, and unbeatable
Unmatchable, adorable and incredible
So indescribable, a knight.

Loyal and humble
Nondiscriminating, non segregating
A coach of selfless service.

A captain of virtuous strength
A winner of crystal war,
A king of hopeful future
A leader of energetic generation.

Mama weeps, Africa recounts
Dear Kofi, Mama weeps
The world will never be the same.

Goodnight, Big Brother, Goodnight Son
Goodnight, A Giant of Africa.

​The tumultuous tinder amongst your echo
Does lay fire to my light,
An ethereal body made quantifiable plasma
Like the life in your veins that swim towards your cheeks
The moment we move to meet
Two separated,
Now in the middle,
Forming a whole,
A neutrality
A singular mind
 
Whether your embrace enraptured my form to cinders
Or captured it
Into introspective acquiescence
I know it to be love
And I suppose the contradictory nature of our conjoined consciousness
Brings about change
Pain
Beauty.
 
The world is a remarkable place
And when I look at you
It becomes one
External beauty.
 
I can't help but wince
At the allure of your grandeur
And the fleetingness, of the one turned two-
The two turned one,
And the pain in between,
That enlivening burn
That we have taken to call
Existence.
 

​What are we, but lost soliloquies
Stretched out over human verse
Whispers of lust, envy, and pride
Tearing each other asunder,
With competing notions of purpose
 
Grandfather,
What are we
But our skeletal pulses,
Our carnal cages,
Our great beyond?

Divya Gautam is an undergraduate student studying Mathematics and Economics at the University of Delhi. She writes in her spare time, and is also an avid debater. 

​It is the hurry in the wind
That makes me contemplate my direction
For till now, I owned no compass
And traveled with empty pockets.
But when the gales grab at each other,
I am forced to resist the uncertain,
And stagger towards mud tracked paths
Offering samples of success and monotony.
The wind will leave me stranded here
On streets of stone, in blackened nights
With flashbacks of my fearless self
Making me veer into alleyways, suddenly.
Even then, I will not be content,
With this meaningless meandering,
And so, I will turn to the night 
For answers to questions I was told to ask
And listen for signs that defy the blackness.
 

​Misfits don’t have much to worry about,
Rooms tilt about their axis 
To accommodate singular beings.
The windows become unhinged
Like the minds of the dwellers
But even the wind hesitates to keep them company.
They sprinkle holy water on the walls
After the goners have gone away
In an attempt to lure back sanity.
I remember the summer days,
When the fans couldn’t cut through the saturated air,
And madness accumulated in the utensils like grease.
No amount of reason could cease the unraveling.
The plaster peeled off the walls,
Suicide brought upon by humidity,
And the naked house stood smiling at its own lunacy. 
The holes in the floor filled up over time,
With cement sacrificed by the ceiling,
And paved a path to insanity.
 

​Like a soldier falling into line in his fleet,
I fall into the shackles of rhyme and repeat,
And march onwards, follow the leader they say,
For it is at his feet we all bow down to pray,
I inhale the atoms of ruin and rhyme,
Each breath brings me closer to death every time,
Each comma is waiting for the next line,
I scribble searching for some sort of sign,
To tell me where this is going in mind,
This page, this life, this wondrous disarray
Of inhibited inhabitants all looking to say, 
That the reason they fell and fall every day,
Is to search for embers unwilling to die,
To search for the fire hidden inside,
To unlock this story, unravel this tale,
Know the ending before that chapter prevails,
And lock up the secrets, bury the clues,
Don't let another discover your hues,
Leave untainted, frail and calm,
Tread lightly here, do less harm,
For the last scene is yet to come,
The last thought yet to become,
So, I lie down and pretend it’s that time,
Maybe pretending is part of the crime,
I'll plead guilty to say the least,
Maybe I'll be excused from the final feast.
 

​It is here
Between the quiet places in my mind
That I find records of time
Fading at a slow pace
So as to not dispel the harmony 
I have so carefully replicated
With delicate hands 
I have carved reality from the clay of the Earth
And tread softly upon the surface
Of my dreams
For if I awaken from this slumber
I do not know what will greet me.
 

​I have always felt at home in airports
There is a sense of purpose that permeates
All the halls and the grey speckled walls.
 
The windowpanes show me heavy wings
That will soon defy gravity
While I walk on shining floors polished with footsteps
Leaving behind closed chapters.
 
Suitcases with shiny shells and handy handles
Drop like bombs onto baggage carts
Their fate forever trapped in the transience of transit.
 
The air cooling systems take their job too seriously
As if they can freeze time in this airport
Making fleeces fall out of backpacks
And cover up all that is left behind.
 
 
 
The overpriced food is an inevitability
That I will succumb to
For I cannot greet the skies hungrily.
 
I lead myself to the gate
Which is an apt name for the threshold 
That I will soon cross, never to look back
For what lies ahead may be uncertain
But the future beckons via the clouds.
 
Finally, it is time for departure.