I'm just Melanin—Innocent, tranquil, harmless

Beyond the tapestries of conviction,
I'm the farmlands of courage,
For I've survived many hurricanes like you
To the eyes of museum visitors,
I'm the earthen artefact,
A fragment of this land
Esoteric.
Beyond the cultural norms,
I'm made up of red signals of fate
And black holes of misery,
When the sun casts light on the east
The western shadow engulfs
My very existence with scorching agony
But never are my bare arms and waist
sunburnt.
I'm an unwanted child of society,
Forced to be insignificant from the beginning
A mockery of nature,
The soft target of narcissists,
The salvation of the exiles,
Beyond the beauty standards,
Beyond cruelty lurking in mass approval
I'm just an heirloom,
Belonging to people of colour,
A skin cinnamon, a golden sheen
Star anise, a flavour of the indigenous
Beyond the eyes colourist,
I'm just Melanin
Innocent, tranquil, harmless.

My femininity is the aisle of the temple,
Leading your feet to
The celestial divinity of
The Womanhood.
I'm not an idol
Consecrated by the society,
I live outside the sanctum
Roam on the mundane streets,
In my tank top and torn jeans
I change vibes
With my outfits
Like the shadow of my youth
The misogyny gropes me,
Hysterically I laugh as it claims,
How the devil would've worshipped me
If I would've behaved like the Goddess
It loves to fantasize.
All dressed up in pink,
flowers and perfumes
My feminity is a doll,
Who carries a sword,
Without replacing it
With the shoulder bag
I'm not gullible if I am girly,
If I love silver earrings,
In my heels, I walk on the piano tiles
Rhythmic and rebellious
Like the black widow venomous.
My smile, my curves
Still sensual
My feminity is the obscure mist
It settles on both
the sidewalks and the tall buildings,
Why should disown it?
If you only find me powerful
When I'm behaving like a man
Then watch me,
Cherishing my individuality,
Cause even in the skirt
I can fight back!
Autumn by Anjali Suroshe
The wind is Midas these days
Every leaf he has touched is gold,
Heavy with the burden of privilege
Homeless heart stares at his crumbled paradise
Numb, neglected, nauseous
Self lies inside me,
Nestled in the arms of slumber
Pain is lost in some dream
Missing or misleading — either way.
I am ready to escape
on the wind too,
Yet there's something
Which even wind can't carry
As heavy as my detached heart,
As light as these golden leaves,
Forevermore my soul's yearning,
— Happiness.

Reminiscing the times,
when I used to be a stream
Strait, dainty and noisy
My agile heart used to
babble with the stones
At the meanders
When the only aim of
my shallow world
was to survive the sunburns-
I wanted to exist!
I kept flowing,
Miles passed
and I became a river
Two-faced and ambiguous
Elegant, steady yet gullible
Struggling between the dams,
Carrying fish of ambitions,
I took another turn and,
Horizontal became vertical,
My life became a downfall,
But I met the stones again
Who called me
a beautiful waterfall,
I survived!
Miles passed
and I became a sea,
Full of wisdom, alive and free,
I am vast and deep,
Everything I ever wanted to be
My voyage has finally ceased,
And I have managed to exist.
Miles stopped to pass
My skin is still and calm,
I look for the stones
but they all have gone.
The seashore is mine yet
only waves can reach there,
I try to escape but
My existence is lost somewhere,
My world is so large yet
I feel lonely,
So many stories to tell but
no one to listen remotely
So I ask myself,
Is this how I wanted to exist?
Perhaps, I miss that innocence
I left miles behind,
When the stream inside me was
worried about its scarcely faded
existence in summer draughts...
Because right now,
I'm the sea,
But can you find that
stream inside me?