By Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla

An APWT publication

Listen quietly to your seer sitting cross-legged
with dark kohl eyes she discerns,
when the cyan of the skies shall tincture
the fig vines coiling all over the arbors of the backyard,
of the virus that will kill with human touch
nose, eyes threatened fugitively
unmasking the bizarre phenomenon
a crevice of death,
your once navigable life is jilted, comorbid
throbbing with utter abstinence.
Is there an antidote to fear?
A vial of promise.
Do not ignore the blind hierophant
he is your forefather from another life.
‘The ship of penance awaits you across the moonless harbor’, she says.
‘Embark in silence’
a fistful of fireflies sparks up the darkness.
Tethered to the dim gaslight
the ghost of the weary farmer looks on.

Gayatri Lakhiani Chawla is a poet, translator and French teacher from Mumbai. Her poems are featured in the anthology Modern English Poetry by Younger Indians by Sahitya Akademi, The Kali Project, Red River Book of Haibun and Open Your Eyes’. Her poem ‘Anagram' won the 2013 Commendation Prize at ‘The All India Poetry Competition (New Delhi). She is the author of two poetry collections, Invisible Eye and The Empress, which was Winner –II of the 2018 US National Poetry Contest by Ræd Leaf Foundation for Poetry & Allied Arts. Her poem won a special mention award by Architectural Journalism and Criticism 2020. She won the Panorama Special Jury Award at the Panorama International Literary Awards 2020. She won the Rahi Kadam Inspiration Award 2021

The banner image is by K. Kouchpeydeh and is downloaded from Unsplash.com