Preeti Sali

“Heart; I named my lass sweetly;
She danced to the mundane tunes of daftness;
By nature she was midsummer madness;
Or rather a reckless, careless, devil-may-care colleen.

I pampered all her hefty desires;
Brain; my friend said treat her with caution;
For she is a child; doesn’t ruminate her action;
You are mother, with deep devotion.

And one fine day came the tempest darling;
She named him love, besotted and infatuated;
Enchanted by his charms, smelled the roses;
Failed to see the thorns that pricked.

And drip-drip-drip, the blood it dripped;
When her beloved tossed and crushed her core;
She knew not how to stand up straight;
I opened my eyes and the driblets fell.

Don’t nurse her; said my friend; my brain;
For she is a demented lass not worth the pain;
She will go away when her wounds are dried;
To her unmoved brutal hero, Love.

A mother cannot be unmoved, I cried;
For all this time, I held her high;
I knocked at your door, you flinty villain;
Not to hear, all that you said.

Call me a demon or a dragon;
For all I will say is don’t nurse the brat;
Let her bleed and cry for some more time;
She will get up; for she is your child.

All he said was unerred truth;
She bled and nursed her own wounds;
She drove me to her hero’s place; And said,

“This is where my poem stays.”
― Ranjani Ramachandran