Rochelle Potkar Poems

At the time of my birth, my small town Kalyan, did not have a library.

It had no road rage, few beggars, one defunct traffic signal at Murbad Road,
and fewer cars.
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Memory is… images of a prepubescent boy cycling home,
Parag milk packets in one of his arms,
feeding biscuits to a stray gaggle of brown dogs, wagging their shins.
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Goa is a leitmotif of childhood May holidays
A quartet of perspiring aunts cirlicuing their liquid syllables

Small washed rooms opening to orchestras of husk and coir
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Not remembering sleep or the winter of her skin
she dozes and wakes, taking away your burning
with the single-most thought of
salt-water towels on your back and forehead
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Light over sea, beach light, window light, moonlight,
jaguar-eyed moments,
cloud-bitten biscuit suns,
large white bed sheets…
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His father's shadow rises every night with the silhouettes of knives, blades, sickles, belts, and whips, growing and looming over his mother's face.

These rise into his dreams too with Amar Chitra Katha, Super Commando Dhruva, Superman, Batman, Bone, The Dark Knight Returns, Sandman, X-Men, and Watchman. They rise into his mother's screams in voice bubbles from Robot, Final Fantasy, Star Wars, and Avtaar.
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Life after death is not about soul-recycling, incarnations. Before the soul pulls away to ether through 10 dimensions, the realms of knowledge to the feet of light, it leaves behind its old coat, jacket, garment in dirt, mud, grit. Glove slips from finger, rings from toe, tongue from cheek, energy from promises, love from hope, hope from memory.

In this dark abyss, cells emit CO2 in a stream like steam from a train, smoke from a chimney. It turns into glue what was once your beauty. Bacteria, fungi, microbes melt your nationality, color of skin. Sulphur, freon, benzine, carbon tetrachloride evaporate your caste, creed, religion. Maggots, beetles eat your Easter flesh, identity. Bones divide protein into dust and your once-ago body breeds trees. Then, the soul sings in a mynah bird, a parakeet, a guava fruit seed, a Newton's apple.
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