No, reading doesn’t give me skills
To market for a higher wage.
It gives me skills to find my mind
Unburdened by my present age.
No, reading doesn’t teach me how
To better talk to stranger things.
It teaches me the language of
Conversing with my inner beings.
You sit and try to overhear
The words you whisper to yourself
When you’re convinced that no one cares
Enough to overhear your self.
You sit composing not the lines,
But those anxieties of your self
That shiver into character
Against the cold you are yourself.
The pigmentation of my skin
Is proof I haven’t stayed within
On days it was convenient.
The absent arches of my feet
Are proof that even smoothened streets
Are barely any lenient.
I’ve walked the forest and the park,
I’ve walked with owls and the lark,
I’ve walked without a snide remark,
Though legs were disobedient.
You squish and pinch my Teddy whole
And think I’m made for Panda rolls?
You have to feel my calloused soles
To know my true ingredient.
I heard your sounds and saw your sights:
Your tak-tak of the heavy knife,
Your potted darlings sipping light,
Your out-of-nowhere heavy sigh,
Your windowed cotton candy sky,
Your irritated pigeon croon,
Your aeroplaning noodle spoon;
But did not feel your heart-beat hug,
Your dancing eyes that laugh and shrug.
Perhaps, tomorrow, when I sleep
I’ll feel your pach-pach petite feet
Immersed inside an azure lake
That ripples calmness when I wake.
The looking forward is the fest.
The days of buying little things:
The sesame, the cashew nuts,
The raisins (finished; bought again),
The tempting packs of powdered milk,
The ghee, and more of sesame,
The pair of freshly tailored clothes,
The fairy lights, the longer nights,
The who-will-get-the-idol fights.
The early morning “proper bath”,
The sun-dried hair that’s “proper combed”,
The not-till-pooja hunger pangs,
The always-falling brass’s bangs,
The flower lady (late again),
The fear of gaining weight again.
And then it’s over in an hour.
The ding-ding of the prayer bells,
The clap-clap of the cymbal pairs,
The blah-blah of the mantra-man,
The hee-hee of the kiddie gang.
And though it lingers for a day,
And sometimes longer than a day,
No more is it a festival.
The hopping to the next pandal
Provides diminishing returns,
Alongwith sudden need for rest.
The looking forward was the fest.
The innocent are guilty of
Unrealistic hopefulness.
The guilty ones are innocent
Of realistic boundedness.
The good are bad at making good
On promise of infinity.
The bad are good at breaking bad
Off everyday divinity.
The right are wrong to blindly trust
Their God of making tools of them.
The wrong are right to wary of
Their God of making fools of them.
No matter where our compass points,
Morality just disappoints.
What someone means to you depends
On how you make these choices few:
You think of them or think for them,
You speak of them or speak for them,
You tire of them or tire for them,
You die of them or die for them.
My words are sticking to the page
As rain drops on the lotus leaves
She wants her farmhouse pool to have.
No matter how my palmate feet
Keep frantically iambing,
They fail to hold the ducklike calm
She wants her farmhouse pool to have.
Ideas shining on my face
Are also tanning all the joy
She radiates when grumbling clouds
Arrive on cooling winds of bliss
She wants her farmhouse pool to have.
Today is not the day to write
But watch the lines being written in
The full attention of her eyes
She wants her farmhouse pool to have.
Some days, the bravest thing I do
Is fold the sheets I’m folded in.
Some days, the bravest word I say
Is “Help!” instead of giving in.
Some days, the kindest thing I do
Is give myself a little break.
Some days, the kindest word I say
Is “Coffee?” to my crying self.
(After Charlie Mackesy)
It takes two Yeses for a We
And just a No for You and Me.
A nod is not a Yes unsaid.
It’s No with barely-passing grade.
Minakhi Misra 