Bloom between drums | Kushal Poddar

Viktor Zaretsky
Ukrainian
Harvesting Flax, 1960

Peace Blooms

Peace blooms a complex flower; 
its petals rivulet in this light; 
I shiver in its impossible implosion. 
Something I lost becomes
almost a grief, albeit not quite. 

Not quite a whispering, and yet 
when you propose availing 
the blossom, say, "Let's use the peacetime,
piece together the pieces our bodies are." 
my ears giggle at your bad pun. 

The flower, if I play 'love/love-me-not' with,
yields a set of inconclusive results as if
we shall never know any better.

The Peacetime in Between

I try my hands at calligraphy.
The letters grow wings,
and some—a garden to sing in.

The expectations of a letter
hits a high note 
as they say, 'The net is restored'.
Yet, not a single mail,
and I close my eyes to envision

some bodies morphed into pebbles
on a foreign road.
The journey of the refugees looks like
a hyphen lettered with a stub nib.

The Drums Listen to Us

Evening beats a drum in the forest temple.
Everyday. I never see any devotee. 

Now I have nothing more to do at the shop,
I pull down the shutters, go home, eat alone,
watch a movie until sleep dawns on me,
and some time after the midnight one feline
with eight scratched-off lives leaps into the room.

The windows are still and sealed. Naked 
and in tight corsets. I try to recall the age 
of the ceasefire. The ethnic drums beat miles afar.
I have lone hands. I think. The milk has outrun its longevity.
I have nothing to do here, or there. Now in peace 
or then during the war.

Kushal Poddar…

…is an author and a father, editor of Words Surfacing, and author of eight books, the latest being Postmarked Quarantine. His works have been translated in eleven languages.

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