Four Poems
Four Poems
(i)
november babies, i’m afraid
the vibes are off, the caterpillar
regrets the dark
& the cost of flight + taxes
from another life.
we learnt that
on ur last trip
u took the window
seat & refused to
remove the shades
sir, we insist —
pls switch
with someone more
sympathetic
to bodies of water, &, things
that hang for no purpose
conventionally
attractive, forever out of reach
who might write better poetry
on million-pound nomads;
in case of an emergency
we prefer it if u didn’t sulk
over ur stolen childhood
it’s advisable
that u fell thru the skies
& screamed
to ur heart’s delight.
(ii)
i wish they saw trees
moss, insects, not private woods
autism, not the word
(iii)
fevikwiked luggage, delayed flight, thai fish curry, urulai roast, pigeon-blessed car, getting hit by a truck, chennai, 3 am brahmaputra, a lover’s discourse, insecurities, waiters and chefs lending an arm in clutch starting, yeh jawaani he deewani playlisting through a body of mist, a river-turned spectre, midnight through a looking glass, inaccessible father, sleepiness, baggage girl watching emily in paris season three, forgotten psychiatrists, doting mother suicidal, mustard fields from DDLJ faintly lit by a condescending moon, you’re so kind, then why are you so rude, the sound of engine eases all falsity, once a small town cricket realised the big city ain’t all that, then it didn’t want to live anywhere else.
(iv)
On the swings,
you talk, because
gravity
isn’t lost on us
since the words, otherwise
also heavy, such as
at what age did your parents like you
the most
(until I was eleven
I listened to my father & spoke well
to my mother)
or what is the wait-time, really,
for forgiveness that must be given daily;
to grow a stomach for the bellyaches, &
carry safely the six eggs on the way back.
Afterwards at a grocery store,
looking for something
I can’t put a finger on,
humming an unreasonable song, &
scratching my ass —
wishing I were
a tote bag man.
The park must be covered in rainwater now
and the subjectless swings must be wobbling in the breeze still,
continuing to describe
the afterthought of being uncertain.
(v)
stems, branches, your arm hanging off a pyre, season smoke, i remember again.
a few leaves, some things to forget.
well-behaved skies, quiet pollution
lifting in backyards, mother-tended
plastic curling under;
3 quads of the year gone, like the vestigial blacks
from old scalps repaired in henna.
the worst of months, but the worst
of year gone. i repeat like a grief song.
i’ve heard from the grapevines that
— adjectives; cadaverous. nerve-wracking.
empty.
grape-harvest intern, I fatten the fox.
roost under its protection,
’til it’s too plump to protect.
’til the halcyon beast jumps into the smoke,
its fur-coat limbs stirring,
dangling from the pyre.
(vi)
break your august
in two bites of chocolate
one for june, other for july
but here, see for yourself! the way you ran
cuffs, foils, wrapper, brains, aluminium in hand
I could tell you were happy
it showed, because you smiled, almost nefariously
and you were soaked, because the rain knew everyone the same
your teeth— they were busy, speaking in tongues of clatter
the umbrella, inverted, couldn’t keep up with your pace,
because when you ran, you licked your flesh, rudely so
but what if this was just another attempt
to put cocoa to sleep.
Lonav is a twenty-one-year-old writer, currently pursuing a Master’s in Language, Literature, Media and Culture at EFLU, Hyderabad. He is primarily interested in the intersections of disability, queerness, ethnicity and loneliness. A selection of his work can be found at https://linktr.ee/lonavojha
