Window to her soul
Eyes, they say, are the windows to your soul
half-open/half-closed
light pushing again the soft eyelids
features so patiently drawn with utmost care
as if a misdrawn wrinkle or lone crease on pale skin
will taint this story for every
a story so pristine and pure
passed like folklore from generation to generation
along with the bay laced fingers of my granny
who skillfully translates
his face every night
in her rustic accent,
saved precariously for her grandkids
infused with the ethereal scent of her village soil
the story which seeps through your soul
beats the lullaby of all the centuries
even if you listen to night after night
like a soothing image of seeing your mother
gently wringing her long hair after a bath, every day
How once wide-eyed innocent boy
with eyes laced with the innocence of a generation
the transient phase between a boy and a man
the locks still curling as it gently
touched his supple skin
How a fleeting glance of this face
brought the crimson tinge to her cheeks
a tourniquet for her worries;
the only face which mattered to her then,
the only face which is the window to her soul now.
Nobody can suck the passion out of my prayers
Nobody can unseed the silence
in the roots of my pores
they hold the distance
between the unspoken and the untold:
the words swirls and leaps from
my deepest end of the desires
a lexicon of passion and hunger
a story untold.
Nobody can cartograph the
length and breadth of my longings
they cannot mark the boundaries
between my need and wants
there exists an unspoken alliance
between me and my god
Every time I scrape my knees
to kneel on the scratched pews
I redeem myself a little more
to that exalted god
Nobody can suck the passion
out of my prayers
the ecstasy with which
my consonants rise in the air
they leap and swirl
like a swirling dervish
air thickening with
the sweat of my passion
darkening a bit more with every churn.
Megha Sood lives in Jersey City, New Jersey, USA. She is an Assistant Poetry Editor for the UK based Arts and Literary Journal MookyChick.She is a contributing member at Free Verse Revolution, Heretics, Lovers and Madmen, Sudden Denouement, Whisper and the Roar, GoDogGoCafe. Over 440+ works in journals including Better than Starbucks, Gothamist. Poetry Society of New York, WNYC Studios, Kissing Dynamite, American Writers Review, FIVE:2: ONE, Quail Bell, Dime show review, etc. and Works featured/upcoming in 48 other print anthologies by the US, UK, Australian, and Canadian Press. Three-time State-level Winner NAMI Dara Axelrod NJ Poetry Contest 2018/2019/2020.National Winner Spring Robinson Lit Prize 2020, Finalist in Pangolin Poetry Prize 2019, Adelaide Literary Award 2019 and Erbacce Prize 2020, Nominated for the iWomanGlobalAwards 2020, Works selected numerous times by Jersey City Writers group and Department of Cultural Affairs for the Arts House Festival. Currently co-editing an anthology celebrating the 100 years of the Woman's suffrage movement in the US. She blogs at https://meghasworldsite.wordpress.com/ and tweets at @meghasood16.
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