Portrait Of The Poet

July 25, 2018

 

Her hair
Freshly harvested dreadlocks
Unedited gospel of love
Off limits to combs.

Tresses like streams
Of eternal fire-
From the arsenal of her body.

Poems conceived in a celestial tongue
When stars align with cesarean precision.
It is our own language.

Her verses
Are neither left nor right aligned
Time zones hinge at every line break
Like sunflowers – UN-aligned to the scorching heat.

Every evening, on her terrace,
she lets her hair down and flies kites,
Her verses tell vivid stories
Stitched together in myriad colours.

Her verses gurgle like a river let loose.
She never braids them
With her bare hands
Before a poetry reading.

When her poems are read
No boyfriend or pimp is allowed
Inside the reading hall.

Her kite untethered to her surname,
Soars high, till it gets entangled with the stars.

Attempting to translate her poems
Is like making love to a capricious mistress.

Her curly, kinky stream of verses
Sway to the rhythm of her gait
Untamed by the clanging of her anklets.

Her book of poems,
a treatise on dishevelled hair
and tresses on fire.

 

Chandramohan S

Chandramohan Sathyanathan is a poet from India. He is the author of poetry collections Warscape Verses (2014) and Letters to NamdeoDhasal (2016). He was shortlisted for Srinivas Rayaprol Poetry Prize and the Harish Govind Memorial Prize. Sathyanathan coordinates English-language poetry readings in Kerala as well as a subaltern cultural collective; in 2016 Outlook Magazine listed him as the Dalit Achiever of the Year.

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