Minakhi Misra

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  • Adolescent defeatism

    I suffer from a new dis-ease:
    Adolescent defeatism.
    The daily loss of something small
    Is breaking down my confidence
    Of ever risking much at all.

    I gave up grapes of sweet success,
    Instead to drink up daily asp.
    Hormesis! Please, do grant me strength
    To bear the poisons of defeat.

    Embracing loss with heart and soul
    Is killing killer instincts that
    Could help me cut through obstacles.

    I blame, instead, and shame myself.
    I call myself a “Loser”, “Done”.

    I shudder at the thought of work.

    April 30, 2022
    Poems
  • How to: Fear

    The operating manuals,
    Those written by Perennials,
    Say Fear is momentary.
    At least, it’s how it’s meant to be.
    A flood around the village? Run.
    A tiger in the bushes? Turn.
    A monkey stealing baby? Fight.
    A snake around your elbow? Bite.
    Your Fear comes to save your life,
    Evaporates beyond the strife.

    But Fear in a comfort world
    Dissolves in us like teabags twirled
    Throughout our plain sobrieties
    To colour as anxieties
    Around our simplest discomforts.
    It takes us all our best efforts
    To rid ourselves of remnant Fear
    And make some space for thinking clear.

    It doesn’t help that marketers
    Deliver messages of Fear
    To keep us in that danger mode,
    So we can buy their latest load.
    It doesn’t help that men in power
    Divide us from their irovy tower
    To keep us in that flighty state
    To vote for them as they dictate.

    We try to stay away from Fear.
    We play it safe, wear masks of cheer.
    But this is not sustainable.
    Alternative attainable
    Is learning how to live with Fear,
    To make it comfortable, dear.
    To drink it daily on our own,
    Acquire taste, accept the burn.
    To learn its texture, aftertaste,
    To drink our water Fear-laced.
    Which cannot put us out of ease
    Can never make us fight or freeze.

    But how to drink these daily Fears?
    You go the things you’ve dreamt for years.
    The art you’ve wanted to create.
    The seeds you want to cultivate.
    You cut the safety bungee cord
    And make the leap on own accord.
    So, when you face the other side
    You see it was too magnified.
    Of course, at times you’ll fail and pay
    The price of throwing ease away.
    But check what you are paying now
    By letting Fear weight your brow.

    April 29, 2022
    Poems
  • Goody Guy

    I’m losing touch with Here and Now.
    I feel my senses ossify.
    I trap myself in narratives
    Which paint me as the Goody Guy.

    I use ’em as my Don’t-you-see.
    I use ’em as my How-can-I.
    I use ’em as my Like-you-would.
    I’m-just-a-simple-Goody-Guy.

    You come and try to help me out,
    I push you back and run away.
    You try to show the way to go,
    I show my ass without delay.

    I thank you for the time you spend.
    And thank you that you come to try.
    But I will not respond to you
    Until I shake this Goody Guy.

    If you can help me scratch my scripts,
    And sit with me to hear me cry,
    As everything I’ve built as walls
    I decimate, then nullify,
    If you can hold my naked Self,
    Defenseless, mewling, scared to die,
    I may consider changing now,
    To rise beyond this Goody Guy.

    April 28, 2022
    Poems
  • The Oceans’ Choice

    An ocean doesn’t weigh and judge
    The one to drown, the one to not.
    It simply throws a loaded die
    That favours Nature as a whole.

    It doesn’t matter who you are.
    It matters if you have a plan
    To face the fate on every face
    Of every ocean’s every die.

    It doesn’t matter which you choose.
    It matters if you choose at all
    To hazard oceans in your path
    Or cling to sands of passing time.

    April 27, 2022
    Poems
  • Pigeonman

    He wakes up to the fart of dawn
    That crackles through his radio,
    Attuned to local FM waves
    That scrunch and stretch before they wake.

    He takes a while to find his feet,
    And then a while to find his socks,
    And then a while to slipper on
    Before he thup-thups to the roof.

    He pulls a hand to shield his eyes,
    He puts the other in a bag,
    And sifts the seed between the tips
    Of kishmish fingers bit by lime.

    He hates the birds he daily feeds.
    He hates their constant gootergoo.
    He hates their carpet-bombing poop.
    And yet he spreads the seed around.

    He wonders if his nagging wife
    Can see him through the cyclone clouds.

    April 26, 2022
    Poems
  • Judging men by their shirts

    I like the ones who tailor cheap.
    They planned for fit, not brand for show.

    I like the ones without the tie.
    They’re dressed for work, not pressed for air.

    I like the ones with shabby sleeves.
    They roll those up, not hole up cards.

    I like the ones with patching thread.
    They sew the holes, not throw the shirt.

    I like all t-shirts, by the way.

    April 25, 2022
    Poems
  • The Question

    She asks me if I love her yet.
    I smile – meaning, “Let you know?”
    She smiles – meaning, “Take your time.”
    My insides drop the grocery.

    April 24, 2022
    Poems
  • Tomorrow

    Tomorrow is a distant past
    From which I did not choose to learn.
    And so, tomorrow I will err
    As if it were a novelty.

    April 23, 2022
    Poems
  • The narcissist in me, revealed

    He plays a method actor’s role.
    Today, a victim all alone.
    Tomorrow, hero on his own.
    And equal parts of each, at that.
    He sets the story, sets the tone,
    To snatch attention – snatch it all.
    It matters not how much you give:
    It’s always less than he can take.
    He has no sense of solid self.
    His self is full of bullet holes.
    His self is not my self at all,
    Though I have many holes myself.
    He and I are fractured twins:
    Two-faced heads of a two-faced coin.
    Again, again, you flip the coin,
    Again, again, a drama new
    Will siphon your energy pool.
    Before long you will feel so drained
    You’ll wonder why you feel so drained.

    April 22, 2022
    Poems
  • Not good enough

    I wrote about my thoughts today
    And thought they weren’t any good.
    Oh, not the words, the thoughts themselves.
    They weren’t good enough to send.
    But who am I to label them?
    And who’s to say that I’m right?
    The thoughts that I reject, despise,
    May be the thoughts that someone likes.
    Or be the key to someone’s lock
    They have been struggling hard to pick.
    Remember all the Milnean plays
    That pale before a children’s tale.
    Remember who decides the fate
    Of thoughts that stay and thoughts that fade.

    April 21, 2022
    Poems
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