By Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla

Surviving the Red

The woman is perfected and how
her hair tied back in a flat bun
an apron tied around her slender waist
the ends tied into a knot,
a Western saddle with a strong girth
holding back a wild mare.
Outside, the roads are empty
“Is everyone dead”? She thinks
maybe a little
She is masked
She is supposed to be
She has death written all over her cutting board.
Adorning her finest wings of attunement
she reaches for the bottle of vinegar
It helps to preserve the flesh longer.
“Days they all look the same,” she thinks
sharpening her kitchen knives for the next kill.

Hunger

Does a place or age qualify as an aphrodisiac?
Go wild fantasize there is truth in the warmth of two legs
This blue indolent town.

Is love real or an illusion?
Do lovers really exist or live in each other’s heads
Now they are lovers.

Did you feel guilty watching her naked
In between the sheets of a passionate afternoon
Crayfish is an ecstasy.

How does one wash away the smells of a lover’s body
Dilute the pain, switch words
Strong language, violence, sex, nudity
Ne me fait pas mal—beaucoup

Dementia is not deliberate
just a broken bottle of perfume
One should not believe too easily in a life which can easily vanish.

*A found poem from the book A sport and a Pastime by James Salter.

Poet, translator, and French teacher from Mumbai, Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla’s poems have been published in international anthologies. Her poems feature in ‘Modern English Poetry by Younger Indians’ published by Sahitya Akademi and Red River Book of Haibun. Her poem 'Anagram' won the 2013 Commendation Prize at The All India Poetry Competition(New Delhi, India). She was a featured writer for Wordweavers Poetry Contest 2015/16. She is the author of two poetry books, Invisible Eye and The Empress. Invisible Eye was longlisted for Cochin Lit Fest Poetry Prize 2018. The Empress was Winner –II of the 2018 US National Poetry Contest by Ræd Leaf Foundation for Poetry & Allied Arts. The Empress also won the Write Publish Publicize Contest at the Bengaluru Poetry Festival 2019. Her poem is sold as Poetry in Pamphlet by Verse of Silence.  

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