not the heart's colour
TRANSCRIPT
Sahitya Akademi
Not the Heart's ColourAuthor(s): Usha AkellaSource: Indian Literature, Vol. 52, No. 1 (243) (January-February 2008), p. 81Published by: Sahitya AkademiStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23347557 .
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Is a beat/bead alive? Is your ear the hand through which sounds
drop as a rosary? Is your poem beating its words? Is the poem alive?
Not the Heart's Colour
This morning I watched the rain, its song, its random alphabet on pane, its pulsating streams, the pane warped and straightened, outside the tree melted like an inkblot, like the sorrow of a child,
when the rain stopped the tree appeared again like a sharpened pencil point, I saw two branches with leaves
the colour of dried chrysanthemums, the raindrops were clean, empty,
Why is the heart not like this?
a.m.
The home is a lake at 5 a.m.
The things reflected; *
dried irises with long necks and
dark puckered mouths, the protective plastic's striated shadows
and smooth planes of light, the dark chocolate buffet, the yellow daffodils in oil, olive
and cream drapes, a bowl of cherries
and cranberries, red, maroon, the palette of reds from a hint of colour
to its farthest deepening,
the reflection of a poet writing about reflections.
Wine bottles, their cool tongues curved around
dark secrets, Beaujolais, Chardonnay, Zinfandel, Merbt,
This content downloaded from 185.44.77.128 on Tue, 24 Jun 2014 23:41:58 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions