Faiz,Fish and Feminism.

In no particular order,
like stream of consciousness writing,

like the endless afternoons and 2 AM silences,

Shared,as we sprawled ourselves,

under the ceiling fan

laid bare our most intimate ambiguities

 in the summer.

Played a poem on loop,

it rendered out a refrain that stuck with us,

it claimed to promise us a time in the future,

when we'll get to witness the

mountains of injustice that loom over us

blowing away with the wind like cotton wool.

I don't know how revolutions work,

but I've walked with fleecy cotton wool,

floating by my feet on a late summer evening,

lingering on the street,final attempts at shadowing

the seed from losing it's sheath.

I've seen dandelions losing their feathery tufts,

in the pattern that was printed on 

my sociology professor's cotton shirt,

like the plausible cover of a novel.

I realise that all those that are vulnerable 

are endangered because they're frail,but this very

vulnerability will become strength,

letting go of inhibitions,

even if it means letting go of the fleecy 

blanket they wear.

Her lapel has a tiny brooch,she wears a different one

everyday,today,it's a fish,mustard and red,

it's eye staring down at me,

like those fish filled with swirls of Madhubani strokes,

ubiquitous in folk art.

Is it a hilsa,a flying fish?
Is it koi,the fish that symbolize luck,
the ones my roomate yelped with excitement
at,the first fish she ever saw,
 realised the childhood dream she dreamt,
having grown up up in a desert.
Is it one of those tiny river fish,
I swam with in my father's hometown,
wild and free and slimy,they tickled my little feet.
Is it the kind of fish my sister grills

with basil,

its tender flesh dissolving on one's tongue

like a strip

of acid,

at least that's how they show it in the movies.

Look for love,

and you look for love,

but it's not where you're looking for it.

It's not about others

loving you,

or how much you deserve,

for that is just an age old way

of preserving

"who should be loved,how and how much",

pickled with salt,heirarchies and whatnot.
Often,in your confessional mode
you mete out poems
about love that is not a commodity,
about people that aren't commodified.

Saltwater fish swim in doodled seas,

sketched beside annotated texts,

clouds of cotton tumble past time,

what is sublime?

Felt tip feelings.

                                                  I like leafless trees.I know they look very bare and all that,but I think that's exactly why I like them-they are not afraid of being vulnerable.It could be argued that they don't have an option,but nonethelss,it builds character and the kind of sublime beauty all the hiding behind leaves and shade,playing it safe,never letting the soul even peep can never conquer.

                                                I also felt this  certain feeling while looking at one,latticed above me in a criss-cross dream,as I pretended to count all the dragonflies flying low,indicator of rain,they say.

I felt this great burden lift off of my chest,set me free from this imaginary pinion I myself had created,

There were pink flowers like inverted tutus,that day-the edge of spring,the beginning of summer,deceptive petrichor-one could barely tell anything apart.

I felt whole and free and full.Like after satiating a food craving.And at the same  time,light as a cool breeze,the air curtain breeze lifting an instant of a blizzard through your hair.

A niche I had carved so within the depths of mellow denial,I  did not realise endings could feel like drizzle on your face,when you're longing for the rain.

Pretty pictures are not pretty just because you make them out to be,it's because you look at them as nothing separate from a part of who you are-

And that's when I learned that fatigue could feel good,in dark bags below my eyes and tired fingers bleeding with ink.
And sometimes the more I think,the less I feel,secured tight into suffocating knots like a fishtail braid,but what overpowers is-

                                Love embraces you much before you make note of it.

Carnival.

And there he stood,
With the prettiest grey-green eyes you can think of.
And I laughed titling my head skyward,
to see fairy lights in-silver and green,merging,
 The strong affirmative motion of his eyes upon me.
Candyfloss like magic from oridinary pink crystals,
Fluffy thoughts spinning and flying,centrifugally.
That feeling again,the one I knew at four,
when I carried around a stuffed monkey on my back,
which could be velcro-ed together to be swung,
and I felt whole again,a part of the picture.
 

The consistency of change-The ballad of growth.

We watch a little girl walk away,
Disappear into the dark.
The last hint of her chubby calves,
grows into but a veil of winter's scarf.

The newness of hope tries to outdo
the oldness of nostalgia surrounding you.
You,who took my hand and lead me here,
A simple affair,but a great big deal.

My world has changed,shifted it's bounds,
Broken by people,and by very people rejoined.
The girl we watch,it's you,it's I-
Walking into a difficult goodbye.

Walking into newer joys and pains,
Souls reverberating with sadness and hope,
From  love to hate,and hate to love-
We watch each other grow,oh oh.

Into our hearts,we're disappearing,
Halfway there and yet,halfway not.
Somewhere in between-
It's the best place to be.