Cold Neck

This world is feeling extremely cold.
The sweater I wear isn’t nearly enough.
Should I add a few more layers to my freezing self?
Or sit and stutter in conversations.

It is raining outside.
It is sunny outside.
No matter what, this cold gust of air never ends.
On my neck, my head, and back.
I sit, hunched, wanting to protect myself.
My identity from dissolving into this space.

I want to absorb all the people I love,
Some warmth from them into my skin.
So that when I feel I just can’t, with them
Or a memory of warmth from them, I am able to
Able to move and move on.

Unlike what it feels, this cold does end. Only to begin yet another day.
But right now, I am thankful for this evening.
A smile I don’t have to share with the world. A glimpse of the sky I carry with me.
In the flow of traffic back home.

~insight07

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Copyright ©Devika Todi. All rights reserved.

Miss Flower

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Miss Flower sits on the verandah, looking at the world outside.
Not much has changed for her. Each day, she wishes to fly, but she knows she can’t.
She accepts the sunlight and water with grace, her leaves full and shapely.
She is not worshipped like her neighbour Mrs Basil. But she doesn’t mind.
She was sold with the promise of yielding flowers which had forcefully been taped to her body by the seller.
Now, she feels like a joke.
Swaying her entire body to the air that the fan blows, she tries to flap her leaves a bit more.
Mr Torkato across from her, growing with his roots in the ground, is a legend in this locality.
Unlike her, he has never left his place. She wonders what being rooted to the ground feels like. •
Yesterday, she made a new friend
Today, she gifted her some seeds.
She hopes her new friend sees her waving her leaf in the morning!
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~insight07
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Copyright ©Devika Todi. All rights reserved.

Cube

I never tried putting a shape to my life
Earlier, maybe it used to be a flower, a cloud, a feather on a bird flying free
All my stories, experiences, feelings
Sunlight and fairy lights
Have been reduced to a cube of thickness 1 inch on each side.
Over the sharp edges I tumble as
A chance is played, and a move is decided.
Falling face first, I notice blood everywhere on the white ground
Marble does not absorb, but slips.
A layer above my skin, increasingly so
I am told to not take things personally.
What remains mine, then?
Not the victory, not the words, not the time
Just exhaustion.
I sleep in a blanket of tired only to wake up to
My body giving in to the demands of the city air-
There is no air.
This pandemic is global
But it feels so personal as it seeps into every crevice and pore of my life.
All my stories, experiences, feelings.
A dice on my screen, I play ludo with my sister before sleep, sometimes
To calm her and myself.
(Our cube room holds both of us together).
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~insight07
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Copyright ©Devika Todi. All rights reserved.

Tied Hands

My hands are tied.
Nothing I say is enough.
Nothing I do is enough.
My actions feel useless as I pile them to build a room, a house.
I keep whispering in the structure.
There is no echo. No ears to walls.
City spaces have efforts of a civilization to run.
They run.
What have I done?
Stayed quiet while there were screams.
Tried existing while there were enough characters in a play.

A silent spectator. I watch.
I listen.
I gasp.
I cry. I do.
But my love is a leaking tap in a washroom. Wetting a floor that is already always wet.

I must be. But sometimes I forget I am a being
No matter how much I hold my breath, my lungs burn with the effort to breathe.
No matter how much I limit myself in a square centimeter,
The human in me bursts.
I might not like humans. But humanity is in me.

Anger and love and claws
Kindness and kisses and warmth
Smiles. So many smiles.
Sunshine. Night.
Escape my skin. Lining clouds with silver.
I draw with a callous hand.

My hands are tied.
But I pick a pen to write. And for those few minutes.
My existence and humanness make sense to my limited mind.

~insight07
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Copyright ©Devika Todi. All rights reserved.