Shikha - Mid-Term Assignment

II. USING LINE BREAKS

Malle Puvvu  

For at least a while,

my lips will remember

how your skin feels

under them, like the

petals of jasmine

flowers which I did

not think I would find

so far away from home.

But my lips discovered

them one morning when

your arms were around

me and my legs were

around you and whispers

of love were hanging

in the air, because time

is passing and words

are passing, and I love

you so much right now

and more with each passing.

Note: I tried to use line breaks to build a sense of surprise, not necessarily one of suspense, but to know what was discovered (how your skin feels / under them, like the / petals of jasmine) and then, what the jasmine meant in memory. I also used the line breaks to make the lines short for a certain breathlessness and excitement perhaps, of an early love and discovery.

Filling Eyes

Hollering horns wake me

up, and later I will

scream at another honker

on the road

in this honkers place.

Sometimes, I go blind

in Delhi noise.

Somehow, I cross streets

looking both ways

with my ears.

Rushing tires, squealing drivers make me

close my eyes in the middle

of traffic and I tap my feet

and think I can wish myself

somewhere else.

Sometimes, I open my eyes,

and it’s happened.

Somehow, as autumn comes,

bringing a sweet scent at sunfall

(I could never find the flower,

I’m looking for it again).

A bird warbles, a dog howls,

I hear leaves falling down,

I see all the ghosts

of a Delhi passed.

Somehow, I find the flower,

tiny whites huddled together.

Sometimes, they’re shivering

as the winter cold slithers in,

and at sunset they remember

long ago, a Delhi passed.

Note: In this poem I tried to use line-breaks for surprise, because there are two reactions to the same city, so I tried to break the lines to emphasise on these two opposing sensation of Delhi. I use it for syntax, because instead of saying in the last line, “Delhi’s past” or “history”, I wanted to still hold onto the idea of noise (and movement) in Delhi, so it a Delhi that has also passed by.

III. USING REPETITION

A City’s Vanishing Act

a road which I have not found before,
straight-straight-straight it goes
for a long-long-long time –
exactly 1 cigarette and 14 steps long,
the smoke traveling
backwards and forwards,
and we push through this city heat –
the smoke and I –
here, where the heat
rises from the ground
and falls from the sky,
and every brick and stone
drinks it all and spits it up.

a drunk man is talking to himself,
he stops me and asks:
where is your heart?
I place my hand over it,
he points at the stray dog
sniffing at my ankles, and says,
he is ram,
he puts his hands together, and starts praying,
I say bye and leave quickly, my heart beat in my ears;

a woman, sweet as jasmine,
tells me of a lover in the ink of her right arm,
and of a long-gone runaway lover, in the ink of her left –
she braids flowers through my hair,and warns me of
men, touch, love,
she tucks a hair back, her heart beat in my ears;

then, a man in love,
he tells me of a story that began
high in the air of faraway lands,
flying and long legs, and floating eyes, he says in the end,
what will happen to me and you?
I’ll never know of you, you’ll never know of me.
caught by the clouds, his heart beats in my ears;

and this road is no longer straight-straight-straight,
and it has been a long-long-longer time,
           but I only remember the cigarette, the heat, the bricks,
and a dog who is a blue god,
and a woman with ink-lovers in her arms,
and love that began far-away and shattered at home,
and a head that is nowhere and somewhere,
(and more where than I am there or here)
and a dream that is there and where
and broken and full heart beats in my ears.

Winter-Summer Mornings

Some morning, one of our first mornings,
your alarm wakes me before you,
as it would for many mornings to come,
and I lie there, feeling winter crawl up my toes,
when your arms wind around me,
veins running down your arms,
like wild mountain rivers,
rushing to oceans far away,
and I realise, I’ve tripped
on these frosted toes,
and fallen into the water.

Some morning, before a too early class,
the cat’s crying wakes me before you,
and we have just packed the quilt away,
and we’re happy we don’t have to
peel away so many layers of clothes
from each other, for a while,
and I wish that I could
return to this morning
even when I’m eighty.

Some morning, a nightmare comes,
snake fangs wake me before you,
and you say it’ll be okay,
but return to your own wild dreams,
and I close my eyes again,
thinking somehow I can go into yours,
and there we can meet cheetahs,
I much prefer to snakes fangs, and
later you tell me, you dreamt of me.

Some morning, I don’t remember which,
the rain wakes me before you,
light drops falling onto bare backs
through the open window, and I turn to you,
your back that I know so well,
after hundreds of nights and mornings
of touches and kisses,
when a raindrop falls
right on a mole,
I had never seen before.

Some morning, you tell me that,
there are mornings you wake before me.

IV. DESCRIPTION IN POETRY

Far Away From Home

I was walking down the road yesterday,
and I passed a lamppost. Under the lamppost
there were fish heads. Scattered fish heads.
Sliced neatly off. Their eyes stuck open.
They are very far away from home.

I wondered why -- fish heads taste good
in curry with tamarind and ginger
like my ma makes, but only
papa/mamu/ajaa get the head,
but home is far away, and I could eat

fish heads if I wanted to now.
Maybe the fish heads were no
good, or maybe someone did not
want to eat food that stared
right back at you, eyes stuck open
all the way down to your stomach,
even further away from home.

If the lamppost was on, maybe the fish
heads could swim sans fins in the
pool of light, but it is broad daylight
and the sun can see the fish’s home,
but I cannot see an ocean anywhere.

lovers-strangers-lovers

this city has become,

a stranger

to me,

and city nights,

when city-turned-to-lover,

and I turned to lover,

again, I turn, now:

in the shadows:

a witch is crouching

on the broken wall,

i have not seen her before,

she cackles,

she smiles,

she doesn’t answer

and outside,

a giant with

dragonflies in its mouth,

yawns and grumbles,

it yawns wider,

when I ask,

and in its throat,

in a cave,

fires dance

shadows dance

a Plato dance

and we are left,

with city-turned-stranger,

and I turn to stranger:

and they,

who are,

emptying and filling,

my ears and eyes,

don’t answer.