By Anushka Verma
sisters, us two-headed calf, dying under the sun,
raking broken fingers through the rot left behind
does one linger in the pages, or in the staining brine?
will time kill the dead? will the tides subside?
if death an offence, when is surrender sacrifice?
beheaded sisters mourn, preying on those who pry.
if skin an heirloom, would i see the past smile?
find the prayers in silence but don't pray,
for the belief not in, but around
which sea held its god on the shore?
with religion in its stretched reach,
for what it reached drowned
angels at brim feed wishes in vain,
tracing along what to be,
for water are only the footprints,
see the light that it meets,
life seen unseen,
return to the sand, 1 am, 1 am.
for the greed or the fate,
for what ones before prayed,
for hunger and thirst,
for raging peace sewn in spine,
heaved on some petty crust,
what for,
1 return, 1 am.
is it when the day decays, a silver line,
cold reflections of gray, whispers of crime,
they sleep all quiet, they leave all quiet,
rue the time, forgive the rued,
submit, succumb, subdue, forget the i,
ends in the end, whats after one survives?
just heaved on the petty crust, what for,
i return, i am.
never the same and to wish in vain,
to be a little more human, a little less in debt,
i return, i am.