Teesta Review: A Journal of Poetry, Volume 6, Number 1. May 2023. ISSN: 2581-7094
Four Poems by Smitha
Sehgal
Poem 1: In Kiev
Teti, Tetiana,* I hope you will find this poem
on the sidewalk of your red-bricked apartment,
an abandoned crumpled page, or cloud that
refuses to move on till it has washed the
sins of warmongers and rained
enough to bring out tulips
gone into hiding, blinded, deafened.
I smell cider vinegar,
a turquoise sun on our palette,
beneath my skin, a colony of
ant tribes,
on green rock, the flesh of limpet
wagons tumble along a country road; we hung our
legs,
early stalks, fringes of your straw-matted hair
muted into clusters of stars
my words convulse into schizophrenic shades
of hunger and cold
the estuary of Dnieper empties them into the Black
Sea.
*Tetiana is a friend who went missing after Ukraine
War
Poem 2: La Poderosa
Cloud
bursts
languid
rumble on
tongue of
Malabar,
Charcoal
sketches
bereted
summers, sprouting on
whitewashed
walls,
Moss of
unruly curls
set fire
of defiance by -
pale
shores of the Arabian Sea,
In our
tea stalls, bus stations,
Outer
walls of gardens, the pause of vena cava,
Che
Guevara breathes, infinite moons,
In
dissipating rings of bidi smoke
waiting
explodes into a revolution
green
nausea turns wet,
Sun
unfurls trumpet flowers
luminous
joys multiply as
San
Pablo’s lepers sing
Dung
beetles roll up
Nude days,
Sunset
flush on farm hand’s eyelids
Night
before journeying
across
Latin American by lanes
on la
Poderosa,
We
tangoed late
beneath
coconut trees
laughing,
‘shoot, coward’.
Poem 3: Killing War
The
evening Charles Bukowski came to dine,
I was in
rancour; having chosen
to slice
and serve, my peppered heart,
I know I
look blizzard after a siesta of
wine
fever, some say; ‘Nasheeli’
I always
clarify, overslept.
He would
arrive by Metro,
coming
all the way in a crammed coach
on a
Saturday Autumn evening,
Never
read his poems,
much less
did I know he got drunk
on
stringed body parts, beer cans and played piano,
You see,
I happen to know his sister-
Queen’s Counsel,
she
solved riddles like a pound of sugar clouds,
Ladling
the soup pot of endurance,
I changed
to starched iron diction
not
knowing to roll out music.
He came
with a Japanese tea set
blue sky
with cherry flowers
‘Lila
loved blue,’ he said,
‘and ducks’
A
sculpted pendant from scales
of fish and
seeds, to plant a lawn
worn out
left eyelid, twitching,
acne vulgaris scooped potholes on his face.
Turning
on radio
we both
wanted to kill war,
Toddy
laced with plum, in earthen pots,
feasting
on steamed rice and curry in banana leaves
and side dish
of fried okra too, with fish,
golden
syrup of milk pudding
but no,
not roti
I do
distinctly remember.
‘The
crowd is intense,’
precisely the way he liked them,
raucous
on Pico boulevard
he sang
some good old tunes, mostly Chet Baker,
I rolled
out ripening psalms
of failed
love, ‘no love’ he says
‘can cure
wandering hobos.’
Soon it
was midnight,
he
blubbered; he didn’t know Delhi rains,
bidding
adieu, he vanished into smoke
and
that’s how I loved
Charles
Bukowski; aka dear Hank,
I haven’t
read Hot Water Music.
Poem 4: The Pathans
Our
neighbours, the Pathans
by
the shoreline of Arabian sea, north Malabar-
if
you ask
a
long way from your home and theirs
they
whisper Mysore, beyond sunflower walls
of
Gundelpet, coffee vapor clouding, undulating,
mingling
by our geographies
long-limbed
women in their house wore Shalwar -suits,
lazy
Dupattas of embroidered cluster of gold flowers,
plaited
hair, turmeric skin, glittering nose pins
their
nimble fingers plucked Moringa leaves,
nails
scratched buried sap
a
strange fragrance lingered after their words,
unlike
mother’s flame drunk starched sarees
and
mathematical riddles.
Younger
Pathan fondly named in the local dialect
lowered
light grey eyes, sifting iris, he squatted by
our
red glazed veranda
a
forgotten smile playing on unusual cherry blossom lips,
Before
the mirror, I bit my earthen lips to bring colour.
Older
Pathan’s weathered skin drank the tropical sun
sunken
eyes, a breath of ancient rivers
handed
down by proud, beautiful grandmothers
their
long Chand-Bali* earrings drip emeralds, tales of
Tipu
Sultan and Anglo-Mysore wars, their valorous men
who
went outto never return
siege
of Tellicherry* and beyond, thronging into the
heart
of inland Malabar
armies
that retreated in flood,
a
gory end, war always defeating both sides, all sides, altering
women
irreconcilably in DNA,
when
the sea withdraws leaving conch shells that decide to stay back
becoming
one with the earth they choose to root in,
Sweet
cloud of Sheer Qorma, * glow of Eid in their kohled eyes.
Father
never forgot to converse with Pathans in Hindustani —
their
shared mother tongue in the wake of wars on our subcontinent.
*Chand
Bali – round moon danglers
*
Tellicherry- district in north Malabar, also known as Thalassery
*
Sheer Qorma- sweet milk pudding
****************