Wishing Upon a Tear

An invisible world 

Opens itself out to me

As if sharing a secret

When you smile;

That universe behind deep brown eyes

Waits, begs to disappear–

But 

I see you.

Like dry twigs that break under quick footsteps,

I see your heart break

With a resounding sound

that echoes in those tears

Transparent as dew

But not as pure:

For all your sufferings,

I offer a smile;

My hand is yours to hold

When you're scared at night

(Or during the cold winter day);

When you look up at the bright sky

And sigh with discontent,

I will shed some rainbow light on you

All in a blink;

Wish it away, if you want

But reluctantly, it will bring a smile to your frowning face.

Do you know?

You knit your eyebrows close together

When someone hurts you?

I saw, and disappeared 

Only to reappear as a soothing balm

Fragrant with a mother's love;

A bedtime story

Recited half in jest

You will find me 

In the pain behind that laugh

Yours to hold,

Yours to wish away

As quietly as your love for me

I will disappear

© Geetakshi Arora

December 24, 2013

Mocking Rainbows

One laughs at the folly of the butterfly
That fights each petal for hours
Only to fly to another one
And die
By the hand of some gentle one;
It is funny,
Life is.
Why should the disappearing bird
Remain invisible?
So tiny, that its tears are sprinkles of melted snow?
Why should it die unnamed, un-remembered?
This sorrow that sucks out love:
That poisonous manipulative tool,
Made only to imprison in thoughts
Happy and sad
The disgusting hypocricy wrapped gaily–
That sorrow laughs at its victory,
Dismissive of tears,
As those small rainbow prisms melt unmourned
Into wombs of cold, frozen Gods

© Geetakshi Arora
December 23, 2013

Periodic Thirst

When a forest sheds its leaves,

It’s a seasonal thing,

A periodic dropping of clothes;

An act of self-defence

Against the blow

Of pure, white snow

Dirtied as soon as it touches the brown soil:

It becomes soiled.

The muddy river doesn’t wash itself

It flows forward

Across the plains, across the hills

Across the cities,

Till dirtied to the core,

It finally loses itself

Into the arms of the waiting ocean stream

One of these days,

A dried up river will be bemoaned,

And a dry forest will be mourned;

Incessant snow freezes over soggy branches

Cold to the touch

Melting as it touches the ground:

A brown floor greedily gulps each melted drop of cold.

December 17, 2013

© Geetakshi Arora

A Knot

Threads of small, sand-covered dreams

Knitted into softest wool

Lie shaking under the cold, thundering sky:

An inky blue night

Unrelenting, harsh and dry;

Two knitting needles sunder and meet,

Clinking like glasses in joy

As unlined, tired hands

Ignore the pain and continue

Line by each patterned line:

Under and over;

Over and under

And on and on...

Here and there lie scattered

Pink dreams wrapped in gold,

A few simple loops of old-fashioned dawns,

And 

A reversal,

A patterned difficulty:

A guilty dream, painful and ignored;

A process complicated by sighs

From nearby trees: soft, deceitful

They ebb and flow,

Over and under;

Under and over

Sympathetic leaves fall to the ground

Like a red carpet uselessly laid out for the triumphant dead

And on and on

The yarn goes,

Over and under:

A long painful stretch

Of weak dream-carded wool

©Geetakshi Arora

December 11, 2013