Poetry is borrowed existence,
Buried emotion finding its surface,
I steal from another and will be stolen from soon enough,
Such is human dignity, such is human disgrace.
We write to show heart, to save face,
No thought exclusive, no word before unspoken,
Yet the way I marry one sentence with another
Is my sworn testimony to experience;
Poetry is borrowed sense,
So, take a backseat, take no offence.
I see four walls I once built for myself,
There are regrets in there on a standalone shelf,
And a whole stack of sad poets that came before me,
Gathering dust, growing forever older,
Making me wonder if I’m warmer or colder
Since I started out,
And when I look underneath my dreams,
It seems all sense has slipped away.
But if not for those sad and euphoric extremes,
I would be on my knees to pray
For the lightning to strike
And take me away.
I was struck —
All of a sudden, all in true luck,
And the words? They moved by themselves.
They were true; through and through,
And they were lies; gullible yet wise,
And when all I was left with was a sense of calm,
I separated pen from palm,
Poetry from pain,
And all was silent once again.
There’s a limitless kind of dark now to my drink,
The poison swirls, not yet visible to my naked eye,
But I understand it, I live and breathe just to think,
And now that I’m bleeding ink,
I know why I crave a final drink
On a hot day in mid-July —
Swallow, slow, sigh, goodbye.
Taira Deshpande is a student of psychology and literature, and an aspiring writer and poet. Her poetry is a medium through which she reaches the extent of her curiosity about nature, emotion, loss, behaviour, and everything in between.
Featured image: Hannah Olinger / Unsplash