An Incubation

Loosening her poke bonnet, Kathy sat there in red velvet-laced overalls, observing the chaos outside. No respectable young girl in her right mind should stand witness to an open-aired brawl.

A man of colour was being graced by a volley of stamps, blows and kicks by a riotous mob of angry white men.

“He had the audacity to bring flowers to Jonathan’s daughter!” exclaimed Mrs. Faulkner as she looked disdainfully outside the window. She stared towards Kathy and Anne with tears of concerned fury, and gulped her tea with intended impoliteness.

“Put a halt to your thoughts! I will not have any of my girls bring such scandals into our honest home. Do not even think of disgracing your father’s honour, young ladies,” she warned with a scornful index finger in their faces.

Anne excused herself lackadaisically from the breakfast table. Kathy continued eating silently, as the blood rushed to redden her Caucasian cheeks. She cut her omelette with precision, but had suddenly lost her appetite.

James did differ from all the other men in the village. He treated her like a lady and caressed her like she was a queen. His queen. As an artist, his dark inventive hands were accustomed to creating magic on any surface. Sometimes he’d paint her, sometimes for her. Moulding love on a potter’s wheel, his hues brought his muse to life. They would spend hours imagining a future that was freed from the shackles of race; of colour that bound them in separate, unblended water-tight niches of an artist’s abandoned palette.

Floating back from her thoughts she readjusted her bodice and walked towards her room. Tears flowed over her corset as she lifted her dress to touch his inked art on her canvassed skin.

She pulled down the layers on her tea gown, stood up and wiped the traces of heart-ache from her face.

The little black girl inside hadn’t yet found a way to face the world.

'Blessed' by Ray Caesar

* For 3WW
** An attempt at applying a Pre-Victorian style of flair and fluff.

*** Photo Credit: Ray Caesar

Beyond Ferraris

His fast red bullet of fire on four wheels,

Was abandoned in the middle of a highway lane.

Ye canst not ignore heartstrings on pinwheels,

When the epiphany of a beggar hath driven him insane.

The workings of karma befuddled his domain,

So he went to seek answers from an old abbot.

Giving up his fast car, the monk learned to sustain,

By finding nirvana on his newly bought yacht.

* For imaginary garden with real toads

** An attempt at the Huitain form of poetry, also called The Monk's Stanza

She Waited

Photo Credit: Maria Sardari

So she’d wait there after midnight, behind a curtained wall frame
Stealthily whispering whistles to call out my name
Dragging fearful memories with every stride
I’d take refuge in an old cupboard and hide
Peeking through the chink as she came

Her silhouette would burn with a platinum flame
Long soggy hair-strands would veil her shame
Soft sobs broke into screams as she cried
So she’d wait there after midnight.

This was the home she had hoped to claim
One that was etched with her future last name
Black-sooted droplets of tears had dried
She had longed to be an army man’s bride
He’d promised her the stars, but he never came
So she’d wait there after midnight.





* For imaginary garden with real toads
** My attempt at Rondeau Poetry rhyming, dedicated to Friday the Thirteenth 

Dream Stealers

Photo by Maria Sardari

Crisp, dry, rumpled autumn foliage served as a buttress to buffer her stance.
She stood there for hours, shuffling feet in rustling sounds.
But there was no way out.

Hours transitioned into weeks.
Weeks into habits.

Tight fishnet ropes of her limited mind left blue bruised criss-cross clots on limp ivory arms.

Thoughts that dressed in soldier clothes came rushing in from eight directions. They barricaded her from all sides and punctured the earth with shining silver switchblades. Standing in unity they threatened to pierce her hopes for change.

She glanced at them with fear-stricken eyes, almost resigning to her destiny.
But her Wheel of Fortune was at arm's reach, waiting for a fleety spin.
Pulling herself up she propped her feet on the ground choosing to fight and conquer self worth. With little strength and a lot of courage she commanded the mind: “Let’s wage war on the soldiers of YouCannot.”

Cannon balls of fire flew with that decision. Fears were bludgeoned. Insecurities were stabbed.  Determination and will power gave a tough fight. White flags were raised. The battle was over.

While unravelling the last few strands that bound her wrists, she looked around to confront a hidden enemy if she must.

There was nothing left of the Eight of Swords.





* For 3WW
** For the love of Tarot.
*** Photo Credit: Maria Sardari

Invisible Ideas

My mind
reads like
the open canvas
of a New
Word Doc.
Barren blankness
spread out thinly.
I rummage through
the recesses
of my brain
and hack hard
at the keyboard
without a flow
of thought.
Stream of
Consciousness
is a dwindling
brook with
spurts of water.
Little winged
black birds
dip into this rivulet
and splash across
the parched screen
with a voracious
appetite for
vocabulary.
Strung by the
invisible chord
of syntax
and the unused
facets of grammar,
they cluster
in seeming
randomness,
forming syllables
in a sharp
unbold typeface.
The birds are
backspaced
while other
clusters are
pasted elsewhere,
flapping wings
to stay together
as a whole.
Forced to migrate
from a different
starting point,
they fly across
with meaning
on their backs.
But where
the heck
is the damn
punchline?



* For imaginary garden with real toads
** An attempt to parody one's own style

Geisha Repainted

Porcelain perfection had managed to white-wash some of the grief. Wrinkles of helplessness that were cracking across her sallow skin now seemed like a chalky blur. The ghastly pale outlines of her moon-face were intercepted by two craters of sighted sadness. 

She poked open a new box of pomegranate red, and pulverized other shades of ruby, granite and plum into one thick paste of promised happiness. The brush strands dipped generously into that bloodied concoction, outlining new lips of joy over that stoic face.

He was her only son. She cringed at the thought of holding his lifeless 12-year-old body. Flashes of his drowning face kept clouding her eyes. 

She had busied herself all morning, preparing his favourite Oyakodon and Makizushi. But it sat there untouched, cold and listless, screaming to be fetched from the dining table. There was nothing more that could hamper her already broken spirit. 

Looking back into the mirror, she had lost herself. The mask taunted her world, thwarting every feeling that clotted and festered in her heart. Her caked happiness just sat there unchanged, quietly protecting the turmoil within from the pretense without.

The next client was still waiting for her, shaking his legs with uncontrolled anxiousness.

She wore her pretty clown face, and got back to work.

* For 3WW

An Afternoon Stroll

She rolled up her hair as she walked through a garden patch.
Beautiful tresses of black silk were fastened in place by sticks.
The groggy green frog sat there croaking by the road side.
Cutlery unwound to click away on unsuspecting street food.

* For imaginary garden with real toads

** An attempt at the Koan style of Chinese poetry