Mrittika Das' Poems

I wish the burial of our love was a kiss. 

To gulp some breaths 

I climbed the terrace 

where I caught sight 

of a dead butterfly. 

I felt lamentable 

and decided to turn 

away—

I kept struggling to breathe,

Irrespective of the pricky 

discomfort of the dead butterfly, 

lying on the scorching surface of 

the terrace, in the middle of 

suffocating South Asian summer. 

Her deadness was alive in me; 

stirring my blood. 

I picked her up for burial, 

In soft mud of my bougainvillia tree 

and thus, I homed her, 

dead indeed needs a home. 

I wish when our togetherness came to an end, 

when life decided to decay us 

I had not screamed, and 

scratched walls of my chest. 

No oceans drop by drop shed 

Nor had I butchered my breaths 

I wish the burial of our love was a kiss.

Shall we? 

The revolting Nature locking us to our nests 

Swells-up questions in my un-locked heart. 

It questions, shall we? 

It questions shall we be able to overcome our lost conscience? 

The one which is lost in the volumnous smoke of progress clouding out of factory chimneys.

It keeps asking shall we choose a bouquet of plucked flowers or decide to plant one

and pluck none? 

The dim lights, the lone streets perpetuate the queries of my heart.

It asks weren't we emotionally quarantined when we were allowed to social gatherings? 

When we shall overcome,

Will the shadows beneath my eyes still look out for a touch of make-up due to social embarrassment? 

Are we again going to walk on the streets disregarding the child begging for a meal? 

It echoes, shall we be able to overcome our lost conscience? 

Shall we be able to restore the wrecked humanity in us? 

Shall we? 

I say—I hope So!

Somewhere in the Universe. ( A bird's prayer) 

In every nerve of my wings; 

I carry the scream of trauma beneath stitched lips;

echoing inside a living body who stands clueless 

with a dead soul, somewhere in Syria- 

On the distorted path of one's own home.

Which is somewhere in the Universe.

I am the scream of a Yazidi woman,

escaping rape from ISIS. 

I am the scream of inherent fear of a fearless journalist in Afghanistan. 

I am the screaming eyes of a refugee at a Gurudwara in Delhi.

I have fled long to the detention camps of Assam—I have seen them talking to darkness about one's ethnicity,

Country.

I have seen her singing lullabies to feel her lost charm;

Questing identity in her voice with an acid-pellet attacked face.

In the depth of Sindh; I have heard a crying woman forced to change her religion. 

From Bindi to hijab every cloth is questioned.

I have seen a child swinging alone in a park; glancing at the colour of skin—thinking if it is the reason behind bruises on the arms while they were playing. 

I have seen her helpless eyes looking out of the Car at children who want to visit Shopping Malls. 

I have seen the drowsiness of a man working extra-hours to get a diamond ring for her girl-friend. 

Someone running all around the government hospitals to save their child. 

I have seen the desires of a prostitute who dreams if she could be on periods all her life.

I have seen them making understand about their depression to people who don't understand. 

I have seen him leaving the one who loved her. I have seen her dying and re-incarnating as a stone.

I saw him jumping off the roof in the void of her absence. 

I have also sensed hopes who tucked stories of Fatima and Savitribai to their hearts.

A psychologist who wants to heal a wounded heart. 

I have also seen some see

a better Universe. 

I have coughed in the smoke; I am soaked in the ashes of creatures by wild-fires. 

I have fled higher than the LOC's 

I have been to distant lands,

to distant skies...

But everywhere in the Universe,

every creature is food to a power sitting with the map of Universe—

Wanting to monarch. 

My flight has often bumped into your flights 

over the sky. 

My plight often goes deaf to you. 

I have seen you going to Masjids, Mandirs, Dargahs, Churches, adorned by astonishing towers.

Praying, mourning for your own sake. 

But my place of prostration is where I get tired—

This twilight at one's Porch 

Which is somewhere in the Universe.

Silhouettes 

Our silhouettes are alive 

unlike me. 

They appear on the walls 

of a metro station, 

holding each other passionately 

when my corpse passes by. 

They appear when the candles are lit on moonless nights,

melting my comatose organs 

on the bed, 

diluted in the frenzy of sleeping pills.  

They appear on the surface of my terrace 

when I lit a cigar to cremate 

every inch of my flesh, 

which claims to be invaded 

by the thoughts yours

and mine silhouettes 

still entangled to each other. 

They appear and keep appearing 

on every land I visit, 

like natives.

On the prompt "ecstasy"

The songs of Nusrat. 

The songs of Nusrat                      which celebrate

despair 

is like an age old wine 

streaming down the chest. 

What else can be ecstasy 

If not the tunes consoling 

the wounds of heart, 

referring it to be beautiful?

A Sketch 

You are a sketch, 

drawn and hidden away

inside a book 

in the shelf

no one reads, 

molded in the dust.

I open it 

in perplexity, 

when windows and 

doors are closed, 

all deep asleep and 

I morbid awake;

as I turn the leaves 

your face appears 

like a sudden pearl 

inside an oyster. 

Waves rise 

as huge as mountains 

in your eyes, 

it drenches me 

entirely, your voice 

reaches me, 

with your lips stiff, 

your bearded face 

makes me remember 

someone unknown 

with his unacceptable 

nonexistence. 

You are a sketch,

drawn and hidden away

inside a book 

in me, 

deep, forever, 

which no one reads.

Stirring her tea with a spoon in the morning she waits for the day to end. She wants to sleep and dream of him again. Sleeping pills floating down her throat throws her to a trance, paralyzing her shoulders to bed. As she shut her eyes, she gets transported to that very afternoon where the twanging melody of his carding tool blooms cotton clouds; some blow carelessly and some rests on his body. 

It seems like she wakes up everyday to reach the hour of sleep where she could be hypnotized by a Carder. The sight of this episode makes her reach above despair of separation, insult, chaos and eases her love-starved heart. The tanned walls against the milk white cotton salves her eyes, swollen by depression. She wants it never to end. 

It's not truth vs lie, reality vs dream but somewhere in between. A place where she attains moksha. Away, far away from the un-healable blisters of life.