hawkplay The Weight Of Elsewhere | Poem

Illustration Photo: Anupriya Yoga Illustration Photo: Anupriya Yoga

Morning slips through my sheer curtainshawkplay,

a fraud bearing light, peeling back its greys & azure,

My blanket’s been hogged, the alarms’ abuzz;

I pour the songs of my kettle into a mug

and then, sweep my way

through shimmering, slippery perspectives of being.

888 slots

Elsewhere,

Cinders drown in the black flood of oblivion.

The newspaper screams with a sharp edge.

Each headline splinters.

Each image a combustion.

Wars. Displacement. Hunger.

Names dissolving into numbers,

Numbers dissolving into dust.

But I’m still here…

The ordinary chattering of a day

growing in the background;

My son’s laughter as he cuddle-wrestles with his dad

The sound of conch shells from the temple nearby.

Is this delight a betrayal?

To breathe, to love, to hope?

Somewhere a mother,

builds a cradle from rubble,

A father waits in line for bread.

Way past the sirens, a defiant nurse,

whispers a prayer to the wind,

beneath the weight

of a razing hospital roof.

And yet, my son, now up and about

pulls me in for a piggyback ride,

My dog-child wags his whole body;

as it’s time for his walk.

There are meals to be served,

Bills to be paid.

The present demands me,

to reschedule my guilt

and remind myself

that the Earth, keeps spinning

even when it grieves.

“The final was really intense; the Chinese were breathing down our necks throughout the game and made it really difficult for us to create a clear goal scoring chance,” Harmanpreet said in a Hockey India release.

On Tuesday, deep inside Chinese Mongolia, the Harmanpreet Singh-led Men in Blue did just about enough to beat a spirited Chinese side. The occasion: the final of the Asian Champions Trophy 2024.

I gather the fractured pieces of my mind,

and put on some music.

I decide to trust Camus

and imagine Sisyphus to be happy.

(Shantashree Mohanty is a writerhawkplay, mother and legal professional)