Saheli Mitra writes

MY GYPSY SOUL

How often I thought I would
make love to you
like a gypsy does
to whistling winds.
Twinkling stars shining in your eyes,
moulding into freedom of
my warm breath.

How often I thought you would
pour the nectar on my throbbing soul,
like the gypsy does
to a beaming moon,
swimming across the rivulet.

How often I wondered
if she plucked strawberries,
that you juiced out on
my luscious lips.
And bought them from her
by the bent of that road
that held my moments of ecstasy.

How often I thought if you
robbed her hunger and played
them on in your hungry eyes,
to devour me up
in a lightning strike.

But I never thought I would
dance in freedom
across your captive sighs.
To make my devils hide in shadows
like the gypsy did to the earth and sky,
to the brook and marshes,
to whispering branches.

Till darkness fell,
when I would make love again,
like her.
To the freedom of our
unholy bonds,
and to the pleasure of that
maiden sky, that saw
the peeping sun for one last time.

 

A Gypsy Swell (A Spanish Gypsy) -- William Merritt Chase

Saheli Mitra writes

FORGOTTEN MEMORY

My memory is indeed a liar. 

When my heart speaks, 

my head conceals.

Like weft of fears one branch felt

On a wintry night, laid bare

When the other bough burst into pink blossoms 

ready to share wishes  

and conflicts 

Of my memory. 

That tried hard to remember  

What lay at the bottom of the deep. 

Even shadows dare not form. 

A magician whispered to a saint:

"My memory is indeed a liar." 

You wove a cloth of magical nights  

filled with stars and gossamers. 

Making love on slopes 

Trekking past rolling stones, 

the boughs forgot. 

They whisper words of a saint today. 

Fading into obscurity 

Diffusing your presence. 

Even your shadow was concealed. 

Did my memory of you 

Lie to me again?

St. Peter and Simon Magnus disputing with Simon Magus before Nero; the fall of Somon Magus [mosaic, Cappella Palatina, Palermo, 1140-1170]

Saheli Mitra writes

MY LOST WOMB

Yes you blinded me.

Your rainbow halo lay
a farewell wreath on
my lost womb.
And your mid-noon ring
Flashed on my wrinkled thumb
that a baby could have sucked 
someday in joyful mirth.

Yes you had blinded me decades back,
when you fled along clouds
Painting my dreamy dawns
With frozen stones leaving a trailing tail,
A passing comet burning
a desire in my unripe loins.

I travelled with you
Past centuries of
dust and loss
Love and lust.
Towards your blinding light.
Many a road had I tread
Many a peak I scaled
Many a shore I made love on
Many a desert I crossed.

Blinded by the halo
I left all behind,
Memories and grief
Laughter and merriment.
Riding on your missing tail
That would take me away
To your universe
Where your milky way would
Give refuge to a blinded heart
Lonely as a cloud who you
kissed yesterday.

Yes, I wish to be blinded by you again
And lie down in that grave
That never speaks of death
But would bury my thoughts instead.