Poetry

Tiny yellow flowers  Perfect little bulbs  Canary feather fairy lights  Strung up like crumpled gold  Yellow as Taylor’s acoustic dress Radiant daffodil poised for surprise Yellow as the messy crayon sun Children draw amidst blue skies  Tiny yellow flowers  Perfect little masts  I’ve been chasing yellow so long  And still can’t make it last

we tell horror stories holding one another’s hands, sitting around fires in the open air   for our houses have been destroyed.   the air is smoky, but that’s not from us bigger fires are burning elsewhere fires that end stories, fires that turn hands to dust.    we live now in white tents beneath a blackening sky, like a marshmallow held over flames for too long when will we crack?   there is sewerage in the streets, the water is dirty, my mobile phone signal flickers, my Instagram feed is not loading, we are falling off the grid, gradually

Coming back to myself was Your birthday Sitting at the counter, watching you all in a busy kitchen:  Faye Webster on speaker Pasta bubbling on the stove Cream & strawberry sponge cake in the oven  Frosting-licked fingers & paper people cake toppers  My hands in dishwater    Coming back to myself was  Nothing more than a knowing smile No ceremony, no discernible shift  Just new friends sitting on a new floor, watching Ratatouille together - Me, leaning with my back to the couch  Mug of tea cradled in my hands Thinking: this is right, This is me, again

“Mister Speaker,”  he said, “I rise” – amid the stare of waiting eyes he rose –  “to ask the Prime Minister-” saw the hungry journalists, “Sir- What’s the government position-” Can you feel naked ambition? “on this or that moral outrage?” Headline writers, op-eds engage, with heavy guns, artillery, turning shit into millinery, forcing ammunition onto heads. Every trace of trust that he sheds Is pleased, knowing soundbites secured - Media, public, all skewered, One simple piece of mockery.  Who really wants democracy? Please, forget your apprehensions. This is how we win elections.

sitting in the dark, i would wait hoping you’d come back heart on your sleeve, apology ready some semblance of guilt, empathy plenty crawling, tail between your legs back to our glass house, empty   desperate, i whispered eulogies months passed waiting by the phone entwined your name in prayers ‘just a temporary high’, she swears in every laugh, every torment i’m sure it’s there somewhere   always in my peripheral, yet never meeting the eye desire, the naked temptress  chased after it nevertheless marked for perpetuity, still you left better off they’d say? never, i protest   i stalk

And for the next, I worry. If the past is any indication of the future, My fears are justified. But we will see. May their efforts, our efforts, Make a difference. For if they don’t? What next.   When all is said and done, And the pieces lie scattered and broken, How far is the way back? How hard to search, blindfolded, bound, And dream of the sky.   So, I wrap myself in Country, In possum skins and the wisdom of my Elders. I soothe my scarred heart with the whisper of the wind in the gums, With a

You decide He says Anxiety rises in my chest like nails Do I have to? I don’t really care I say, or maybe I just don’t know And it seems overwhelming to Assess the options Have the conversations Read the books Reflect on my life And say the prayer   But not making a decision is a decision too And Love will not impose itself on you.

  It’s that time once again. Match Point.   I look over, across the net waiting for the gesture. Constant racing thoughts hoping to not succumb to this pressure.   Pacing around, every action I take is monumental to the outcome of this game.   A decisive decision that determines my fate.   Game. Set. Match.

There is  a tree in my  garden. Its branches strained – like me.   The day  I emerged, it too sprung, a wily shoot  of green.   Our limbs branched out together, one mobile, one still.   Soon it  mocked me, able to stand alone, as I stumbled.   Stiff grooves appeared, which I palmed, as it expanded above me.   Up the branches, I would clamber, foot in the forks, looking   up through  the leaves, and I’d dream of walking on clouds of white.   Until it surpassed me,  burgeoning boughs blocking  the light.   Playing  in the

Love and war lay tangled together, laughed at but the punishment was a failure being bare before them brought her no shame, she was the goddess of beauty seeing her marriage dissolve brought her no pain, she was goddess of love, not matrimony   She didn’t hate her husband because he was ugly but he demanded her hand and expected fidelity only choosing her because others lusted and fought over her frequently   But Ares didn't hesitate to remember that love finds the spot where it hurts and adds pressure she was older than the others and wilder finally, someone

Coming back to myself was Your birthday Sitting at the counter, watching you all in a busy kitchen:  Faye Webster on speaker Pasta bubbling on the stove Cream & strawberry sponge cake in the oven  Frosting-licked fingers & paper people cake toppers  My hands in dishwater    Coming back to myself was  Nothing more than a knowing smile No ceremony, no discernible shift  Just new friends sitting on a new floor, watching Ratatouille together – Me, leaning with my back to the couch  Mug of tea cradled in my hands Thinking: this is right, This is me, again

(a poem on intense female friendships, by Sheenam Sharma)   I put you on a pedestal, And now I look up at you looking down on me, like an enigma so forgettable… I told you where it hurts, And you didn’t hesitate to stab right there, like it was already rehearsed… You told me I meant everything to you, And I believe your words more than your eyes telling lies, behind the beautiful hazel hue.. I gave you my mind, my heart, and my soul, And you didn’t flinch a minute to turn that love into pain, taking a toll…