pragya-chawla - Hello Poetry

sand carved songs still embellish your ankles six-four twirls a hazel salt water dance dead love letters from when we once swam through the skin of the horizon with our two winged shadow morning funerals the sun apologetic; her knees kissing, our ashes float in her hanging furnace i’ve been peeling, unglueing cigarettes off my skin like flakes of rain scribbling prayer on every snowflake smoke festoons this passé system of patchwork breath kissing my cheekbones the way you used to under too many starless nights i’ve lost count of how long i’ve been addicted.

0

Sep 8, 2016

Sep 8, 2016 at 2:19 PM UTC

cigarette

sand carved songs still embellish your ankles six-four twirls a hazel salt water dance dead love letters from when we once swam through the skin of the horizon with our two winged shadow morning funerals the sun apologetic; her knees kissing, our ashes float in her hanging furnace i’ve been peeling, unglueing cigarettes off my skin like flakes of rain scribbling prayer on every snowflake smoke festoons this passé system of patchwork breath kissing my cheekbones the way you used to under too many starless nights i’ve lost count of how long i’ve been addicted.

25

i wanted to clench a lithe, flimsy sky in the thicket of my veins like preserved butterflies seize gale, glitter pollen, laughter between laced handcuffs quietly, lovingly beneath the tender protest of old stars i wanted to break something beautiful. i wanted to hold you between the rubble cluttered consonants on my tongue, your cracked glass soul, the constellations in your smile, i wanted to cradle you like a dream, and break you like a promise. The sky painted itself the color of candied raven and the tingle of your touch still flooded the river beds of my soul; false bravado tattooing its flaxen lies beneath my eyelids and blood stains on my wrists i crushed my own heart seventeen times a day but you were so beautiful with your hair dyed the color of freedom wings perched, loud crimson lips and hollow nightingale cages a sizzling sip of obliteration like pallid ceramic angels on forsaken attic shelves, teardrops from rusty faucets decaying family portraits swooned on glassy tables— i fell i dropped i cracked i shattered i broke along with you

0

Sep 8, 2016

Sep 8, 2016 at 2:17 PM UTC

break

i wanted to clench a lithe, flimsy sky in the thicket of my veins like preserved butterflies seize gale, glitter pollen, laughter between laced handcuffs quietly, lovingly beneath the tender protest of old stars i wanted to break something beautiful. i wanted to hold you between the rubble cluttered consonants on my tongue, your cracked glass soul, the constellations in your smile, i wanted to cradle you like a dream, and break you like a promise. The sky painted itself the color of candied raven and the tingle of your touch still flooded the river beds of my soul; false bravado tattooing its flaxen lies beneath my eyelids and blood stains on my wrists i crushed my own heart seventeen times a day but you were so beautiful with your hair dyed the color of freedom wings perched, loud crimson lips and hollow nightingale cages a sizzling sip of obliteration like pallid ceramic angels on forsaken attic shelves, teardrops from rusty faucets decaying family portraits swooned on glassy tables— i fell i dropped i cracked i shattered i broke along with you

41

in pealing season, she is a girl of lousy ingrowth she is an unkempt corner; kitchen sink. legs pulled like knives. phone call her curled tendons; isolation in grit and fibril she is women with wings. this is how we stymie the rapunzel. we carve the ugly into her. we teach her to wear skin like saran. skin like punishment cut-coin the rumpelstiltskin. how she is wound and string, paper-doll; bird-in-a-box how we wring the juice of her on washcloth. hung upturned from the ceiling fang; plucked and feathered like apology. cherry-picked; veins like mikado. how it is dark and she is blind-bat wind-warriors; waterboarded with no hands upturning the paper boats of her in every follicle; how the flipswitch insecurity eats her like pickle. in a storm she is neither nor tongue nor limb just breast, bone, the weight of mirrors how we jettison when the grief is heavy. abandon. thick, empty abandon. alone in grit-cusps when the monsoon has eaten into the white, wispy mortuary. dark in hallways; yet pale and slender. she is beautiful. we lift her ribbed corpse off the shoreline. we unload the offering like red carpet; this is how we wrap her in white and weary-eyed translucent. how unavoidable we become when we are the last hope. crippled. when we look hope in the eye. askance. how she will beg you to look at her with the heart in the honey-jar; torso in tourniquet how the walls are ripped in shades of askance. how we look away. how us, walls, look away. how, us, walls, askance. how we drip of askance; how the pink flesh and cherry-limb slips like matchstick on brushfire how there is purple and primrose and bruise there are some spots on the floor where it still reeks purple and yellow and bruise how we are lousy ingrowth here. how we try to pluck and erase

0

Apr 27, 2016

Apr 27, 2016 at 8:33 AM UTC

tweezers

in pealing season, she is a girl of lousy ingrowth she is an unkempt corner; kitchen sink. legs pulled like knives. phone call her curled tendons; isolation in grit and fibril she is women with wings. this is how we stymie the rapunzel. we carve the ugly into her. we teach her to wear skin like saran. skin like punishment cut-coin the rumpelstiltskin. how she is wound and string, paper-doll; bird-in-a-box how we wring the juice of her on washcloth. hung upturned from the ceiling fang; plucked and feathered like apology. cherry-picked; veins like mikado. how it is dark and she is blind-bat wind-warriors; waterboarded with no hands upturning the paper boats of her in every follicle; how the flipswitch insecurity eats her like pickle. in a storm she is neither nor tongue nor limb just breast, bone, the weight of mirrors how we jettison when the grief is heavy. abandon. thick, empty abandon. alone in grit-cusps when the monsoon has eaten into the white, wispy mortuary. dark in hallways; yet pale and slender. she is beautiful. we lift her ribbed corpse off the shoreline. we unload the offering like red carpet; this is how we wrap her in white and weary-eyed translucent. how unavoidable we become when we are the last hope. crippled. when we look hope in the eye. askance. how she will beg you to look at her with the heart in the honey-jar; torso in tourniquet how the walls are ripped in shades of askance. how we look away. how us, walls, look away. how, us, walls, askance. how we drip of askance; how the pink flesh and cherry-limb slips like matchstick on brushfire how there is purple and primrose and bruise there are some spots on the floor where it still reeks purple and yellow and bruise how we are lousy ingrowth here. how we try to pluck and erase

30

three two one. fade in. you are a dream time will molder. i return to you each arm. the wildfire of you; flew rubies. pitched; and scalded. moonless, we carried the night like flying-carpet fabric of our soul. the way your words shone, fluttered. clung to the frayed spine. radiance and immaturity. counting you in ribs; starved of stomach. crumbs like gratitude. the shades of you in detuned strings. you wanted to see slide. i dream of pulling focus and zoom but maybe it is better a dream. yours were those of emerald; mine, abstinence. i watch you fade fast fire gone grey fire famished trickle and then drowning; rhythms of limbs and limbs, downy limbs and waterlungs i close my eyes you are a dream time will drown and it feels right. a hollowed-out kind of right. fade out

0

Feb 14, 2016

Feb 14, 2016 at 3:50 AM UTC

director’s cut

three two one. fade in. you are a dream time will molder. i return to you each arm. the wildfire of you; flew rubies. pitched; and scalded. moonless, we carried the night like flying-carpet fabric of our soul. the way your words shone, fluttered. clung to the frayed spine. radiance and immaturity. counting you in ribs; starved of stomach. crumbs like gratitude. the shades of you in detuned strings. you wanted to see slide. i dream of pulling focus and zoom but maybe it is better a dream. yours were those of emerald; mine, abstinence. i watch you fade fast fire gone grey fire famished trickle and then drowning; rhythms of limbs and limbs, downy limbs and waterlungs i close my eyes you are a dream time will drown and it feels right. a hollowed-out kind of right. fade out

34