Poem 8 (8.1)

 

Teesta Review: A Journal of Poetry, Volume 8, Number 1. May 2025. ISSN: 2581-7094

 

 Imagining Varanasi

--- Mrittika Das

 

Dear Varanasi, Kashi, Avimukta, Anandavana, Rudravasa-

I don’t know how to name you.

 

I don’t know which name is dear to you.

I have never been to you.

But I have endless questions to ask you.

If you are Avimukta- will you let me live in your abode?

If you are Kashi- will you lit the clay lamp of                                                                                                

my heart, half-damp and doused in the storm of life?

If you are Varanasi- will you throw light to the

fertile lands of the world which grows the crops

of love- long lost and rotten?

If you are Anandavana- will you let the clouds burst

into droplets of hope over the starving leaves of desire?

Will you give me the bliss of Moksha?

If you are Avimukta- will you give me the divine strength

to not let lose myself to anger and to the disgrace

where Kalyug conspires me to destruct?

If you are Rudravasa- will you let me arrive to see the eternal?

Will you assimilate my sorrow in the supreme and

transform it into un-materialistic joys?

Will you let me cremate all my darkness in your

Mahashamshana- so it could never reincarnate to reach me?

If yes, then let me embark to quest my soul in order to

unite to its lover- divinity.

 

There are more questions I want to ask you and

I will embark to know you

I will embark to reach knowledge

I will embark to reach you.


 

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Bio:

 Mrittika Das is an English Teacher at Skill Stork International School, Telengana and poetry is her passion.

 

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