I. My god breathes in the smoke of a thousand incense And breathes out security That mothers with cataract crowded eyes And betel nut red tongue hastily collects And stores in moth-eaten bamboo canisters. In this hamlet, Time is a solemn video playing at point two five speed And inside that video, fathers watch sons and daughters leave home For neon cities.
II. Spring arrives flooding in sunbeams Like a stuck skylight window finally broke open While I watch the red of the rivers And the blue of the hills blend to lend purples to a foxtail orchid.
On winters the north wind descends dragging along a few faint stars from the last blue hour and I serve her A cold jar of homemade grief -A tablespoon of make-believe, a pinch of melancholy for the after taste.
III. Half of my dreams are soap bubble fallacies But I can tell you, God wears my grandma’s sandalwood for cologne and watches over with a halo shaped looking glass Someone said our hearts look like throbbing helium balloons from above When we die does it look like a carnival? Hundreds of hearts let loose Balloons soaring high, never crouching Never returning home.
by Durabikhya Gogoi