- Trembling Time
Trembling Time
Opened up his doors
And I sashayed into his all encompassing embrace
A few windows were ajar in his castle
Enough to show me a kaleidoscopic flashback
Of my dreamy yesteryears
A gleeful childhood
A blundering youth
A roughly knotted bundle of memories
Perched delicately
On his washerwoman’s head
Time never stopped beckoning
With his hoary locks
And mysterious promises of future
Unchartered pathways
Kept flashing their charms
I let him seduce me
For I was always up for adventure!
- Hopeless Love
Holding on to the last vestiges of respect
She traversed the long lonely corridors of longing
The curse morphed into
Billowing smoky clouds of ominous fog
Misting her eyes with unpredictable showers
The embrace that healed was not hers
You can’t snatch from destiny
No neither necklaces nor arms
She gulped back the perennial lump
And heard the same songs for the nth time
The ones he sent her on sound waves of hopeless love
- Only in my Head
When I keep your innermost feelings
Wrapped in the soft white muslin of my memory
Safe from the thunder and lightning of a heartless world
When you hesitantly revealed what had made you cry
On an ebony night as you watched a heart breaking film
Yes! The only time that you did as a grown man
The things that draw out your ire and angst
From beneath the rumpled wool of your warm pheran
Then I silently pray for the kohl hued clouds to part above your head
To let the cerise tulips energise your disgruntled garden
My conversation with you is only in my head
Aa I temper the curry with fragrant cumin and asafoetida
The sizzle from the wok shakes my reverie
As I hum an old dust smothered melody
Bikhra ke zulfein chaman mein na jaana
Ke sharma na jaayein phoolon ke saaye
- Bewildered Arms
The sunlight bled into the darkness painfully
Streaking it with passionate pink, plum purple and perky peach
Delicate blooms of promises slipped out of his mouth in scented splendour
A glimmering pebble of hope ignited in her gloomy heart
Bayonets of doubt had often lacerated her indomitable will
Her eyes were fireflies today
Playing hide and seek with the gossiping branches
Dawn softly kissed the blushing horizons
Nuzzling the necks of rosy sun-rays
She turned towards him slowly And peacefully moved on to another realm
Breathing her last in his bewildered arms
- Things I never want to do
Never
I never want to let the juiciest mango of the season slip from my greedy grasp
Or gag my uproarious laughter with an artificial modicum of propriety
Just as I never want to let a paedophile escape without stringent punishment
Or a body shaming human walk away with his hurtful jibes
I never want to drink a cool tumbler of water
Without wishing for safe drinking water for every human
It’s sad to see ladies walk in the scalding summer sun
With matkas stacked on their delicate heads
I never want to imprison birds in cages by clipping their wings
Imagine if someone kept us like that!
Or watch women being physically abused without a murmur
I will not condone the forceful
Mutilation of women’s bodily parts for any reason whatsoever
I never want to ride a giant Ferris Wheel even if I’m lured with riches
I never want to sign on for dare devilry stunts and challenges
For I’m happy to be alive and kicking
I never want to say no to a genuine friend when they need me
For I know they’d do the same for me
And while I’m being honest , I might as well say
I never want to lose faith in the mysterious mechanisms of this universe .
- A July Thunderstorm
There is a web of unspoken words
Meticulously woven into the warp and weft
Of silences that hang like rain laden monsoon clouds
Ominously greyish ebony
The colour of my grandma’s surma antimony
There is a July thunderstorm lying in ambush
In the corners of my searching eyes
The horizon is taunting me with flaming gashes
Your presence permeates the weeping springs in the hills
Which become muddy and angry in the plains
The earth caves in
A ravine yawns in scorn
Thatched roofs fly off
I know you are there
Mingled in my soggy being
Lily Swarn, International Beat Poet Laureate for India in 2023-2024 and recipient of Caesar Vallejo Award for literary excellence by UHE, is an internationally acclaimed, multilingual poet, novelist, essayist, columnist, gold medalist, university colour holder, radio show host, and Peace and Humanity ambassador. She and has over 70 international and national awards including the Chandigarh Sahitya Akademi award. Her poetry is translated into 21 languages. She can be reached at su*******@***il.com