Teesta Review: A
Journal of Poetry, Volume 8, Number 2. November 2025. ISSN: 2581-7094
Assurance
--- Antara Mukherjee
No Body awaits my arrival except
an aroma in the wind.
Cuddling my existence, a mazy Sun
peeps through my teenage curtains.
The forbidden feelings and stubborn demands
of an era, returns.
I wonder whether
Past resides in the present-lap
Or
Present is past at the back!
Chaos reigns supreme.
I look for answers
in the smiling faces on the Walls.
An assurance floats down the eyes.
--- Antara
Mukherjee
Childhood
tiptoes into my adult sleeves.
I
caress it with guilt
of
being unmindful about you.
Girlhood
shines through my mid-life uncertainties.
I
pin through my ballooned pride
that
were blind to your insults.
Old
age breaks through your doors of silence.
My
life kneels and
longs
for your keys of mercy.
--- Antara
Mukherjee
I
pay tax for your toil
in
a chamber of books;
lament
of loss erupts out of the cracked voice
of
an old friend, waiting for his time to meet you,
until
then, legality, like the holy water,
is sprinkled on to your assets, keeping you
alive
as
a law-abiding citizen.
Over
the seas, in return, you deduct
taxing
thoughts from my lids and pat me to sleep
in a rain of security.
The
Wanderer
--- Antara Mukherjee
With the mid-day Sun in my satchel,
I sail beyond the habitation of cosmopolitanism;
trees sway on the saline shores,
boats sing folklores of yesteryears;
My childhood glistens through the soft currents,
steadily.
The natives sit with ease.
Their pink plastic fans,
symphonic with the vagaries of weather,
taunt the scorching heat.
Surely, they live life King size!
Here, in God’s residency, my heart leaps up:
like the tidal waves, the ebb and flow of my existence
appear mercurial.
High up, unidentified birds spread wings to cheer my
drooping self,
exhausted in spooky calculations of daily drudgeries.
Oh Life!
Will you lend me unmitigated ecstasy amidst the
waters?
I promise to
leave behind all ladders of success,
tucked up in
the jungle of deceit.
Notify the moon about my homecoming.
I'll surrender to its silvery sharpness...
unconditionally.
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Bio:
An editor of 3 books and a member of Review Boards of
International Journals, Dr Antara
Mukherjee has been a part of West Bengal Educational Service, Govt of
WB, for almost twenty years. She is presently teaching at the PG Dept. of
English, Taki Govt College, West Bengal. She has several National and
International publications to her credit and has presented extensively in India
and abroad. She has completed 3 international projects and has also tried her
hands at directing documentaries. She is currently engaged in exploring
Heritages in WB along with pursuing the creative aspects of her being. A
bilingual poet and short story writer, she loves to travel, observe, listen to
the sounds of winds and rain to medicate herself; her works have appeared in Setu,
The Gray Sparrow Journal, Kitaab, Boderless Journal, The Chakkar, Bombay Duck,
Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Café Dissensus, Prayas: Ei Somoy, Char Number
Platform, Dear O Deer! etc.
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