Featured Poet - Proma Gulshan

LIAR LIAR

The devil is in the detail

The sound of birds

The tinkling of teacups

Something said in hushed tones

Hush, hush little darling

All is well, she said,

As the world collapsed around them.

Don’t worry, he is just a friend

She said to him

Men and women can be friends, right?

Hush, hush little darling,

Everything is just fine

I am just another liar

In this broken world of ours.

HOPE

I can see you are in pain

Awake late at night

You heave a breath

A heart filled with sorrows

A darkness behind the eyes

Once filled with light.

I focus

Try to turn my thoughts into energy

But all I do is grapple with reality

As I try to visualize a better outcome

Give me your pain

If not all, but some

I close my eyes

I am you, you are me

Maybe this is empathy

The clock ticks closer to dawn

I don’t know what to do when you are so withdrawn

Picture. Visualize. Manifest.

Yes, that’s what I was doing

Failure is difficult to accept

Yet that’s what I feel like I am doing

Failing you

Failing this

Failing at failing too

Because even I fail 

I don’t really,

Not as long as I have hope.

Hope is like a rope

That you can use to climb out of darkness

And as I sit beside you

In the dark

I know this darkness

Will leave its mark

Yet the dawn will bring light

And try as we might,

We can’t give up hope.

STOLEN BEAUTY

I stole some of your beauty

Not stole maybe, borrowed

I stole some of your beauty 

Dear sister

I like the way you do things

The way you wear saree

Apply kajal and lipstick

The way you put on perfume

I notice everything

So one day I decided I am going to be like you

I am going to be a woman

I was a child before and I stayed that way for as long as I could

Until today when I decided to dress up like you

I stole some of your beauty sister,

But only the beauty that’s in your heart.

TEARS AND RAIN

Her teardrops mixed with the rain

What is pleasure?

Without a little pain?

What is love without hate?

What is life, without fate?

Still the grief does not abate

Her teardrops mixed with the rain

She told herself

Love is never in vain

Love without fear 

Or hope of any gain

If given the chance

Yes, she’d do it all again.