September 2018 Vol. III No. VIII
Not your ordinary poetry magazine!
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International Poetry الشعر শ্লোক ကဗျာ ליבע ਪਿਆਰ өлүм
guest editor Michael R. Burch
Confessions of a Philophile
A new ecstasy takes root every time I think of you
blooming into a jungle of exhilaration
redolent with shenanigans
Stripping subterfuge on muggy afternoons
we plunge into ourselves
let go of the world as we know it
Hold our breath as we explore our allness
right from the shallowness of our skin
to the deepest end of our beings
Unfettered by fears of going under
we fondle the precious in us
unleashing the joy in spurts
You were not the first
you won’t be last
for I become love
every time I think of you
Love Conquers All
I did not believe it, for
though I tried hard, love did not love me back
and I was resigned to writing
poems of unrequited loves for the rest of my life
just about then I fell hard
for a man who almost made me shut him out
of my world for grossing me out with his proposition
but that would have been unfair
mostly to me ‘cause he was a moon
and what I had glimpsed was only a sliver
a whole unlit side of him remained to be explored
and by gad, I am nothing if not adventurous!
So we explore
ourselves and each other
terra incognita waiting for us with
a wealth of passion and tenderness
one day at a time, unsure what tomorrow holds
always glad we return
to mine more
unravel another dimension
find new ardour
peeling back layers of past agonies
to heal and rejuvenate
loving what we become in togetherness
molded by what we love
we face what we hate and survive
love, as they say, does conquer all.
Paramkeni Dawn
For Carlo Pizzati
Anchored in the middle of spilled gold
under an inverted piece of heaven
they are hard at work
to make a living from life that thrives
in that bowl with a hundred shades of blue
every time you visit balmy Paramkeni
to inhale the salinity of Coromandel in silence
before returning to menageries of words
clamoring for your attention.
Like clockwork that winds itself
the sight of fishing barges with humming
open-carburetor engines offers strange repose to
a traveler whose head never rests twice on same pillow
time has a way of tip-toeing back and forth
stirring anticipation with recollection
into that morsel of life on this crisp February morn
which is bound to slip and lodge between the
folds of all tomorrows resting in your hand.
Nalini Priyadarshni has been writing poetry and other stuff for almost a decade and has been published worldwide in literary magazines and journals. Her poems have been widely anthologized and collected in Doppleganger in My House and Lines Across Oceans, which she co-authored with the late D. Russel Micnhimer.
Evening vignettes
I
someone calls out my name
faint
distant
inaudible
as if lost
a hundred miles
beneath the earth
II
yet another dull face
lit up on discovering
a heap of stars on the road
III
even the tables and chairs
dim in the twilight;
a butterfly ascends and ascends
unfolding its two wings
to eclipse a few fresh stars
IV
at the edge of the world
the hands of winds shook my leaves;
we separated outside space or time
late evening —
the door left slightly ajar
three cuckoos chirping at the window beam
and i have been staring
at my right hand fingernails or the wall behind
for quite some time now
V
the grass fields
stretch across seasons and beyond
and the trees are falling from their fruits
come with me —
the world today is just a big wooden chair
let us simply sit and stare deep into space
for there is nothing else to do
VI
later in the night,
a whisper shall rise
from the bottom of the seas
and erase the exhausted lines
from all our faces
THE FUNERAL THAT DOESN’T END
in the night
to dream
of a gleaming grave of the dead sun
and below, the world: an emptiness with burning lips
the stars were snatched from my palms
the birds stayed forgotten
and in the garden, all the men that ever existed,
arrived one after other,
to weep at a death so strange
Faiz Ahmad is a final year student pursuing his Bachelors-Masters in Biological Sciences at IIT Madras, India. He believes in poetry as the ground of bewilderment, of amazement at simply 'being’. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in Salamander, Off the Coast, Indian Literature, Anima and others.
A Caged Bird
Having kissed the pinnacle of freedom,
The poor bird now cries in her cage;
Her captors are proud to have saved her,
But she wishes she dies in her cage.
She envies the kites flying high;
She had tried flying, many times, in her cage . . .
But now, with her bruised bones and soul,
And a hopeless hope, she lies in her cage.
Prasang Agarwal is the English editor of Lotus Valley International School, Noida, and has been previously published by Better Than Starbucks and Writer’s Pocket, among others.
WHERE IS THE PROMISE NOT BRUTALLY KILLED?
Every drop parts and rains
Along with the broken promise of the sun.
Thunder threatens the world of sleep
Where children dream with their mother’s fancy.
The lamp’s dead cotton sits lost in thoughts
Only to peep again with blazing eyes.
You, my love, also forgot me!
Who now rules the kingdom of destruction?
When the light withdrew from the lamp’s lips,
I sat and counted promises of the day.
Who keeps his words precious forever . . . ?
Where is the promise not brutally killed . . . ?
Muhammed Rafeek E graduated from the University of Calicut, Kerala with a BA and B.Ed in English and earned an MA in English Language and Literature from Periyar University, Selam. He now works as an Asst. Professor at a private college. This is his first formal publication.
