Monday, November 25, 2019

FIVE POEMS BY REENA R

Reena Prasad’s poems have been published in The Copperfield ReviewFirst Literary Review-East, Angle Journal, Poetry Quarterly, York Literary Review, Lakeview International Journal, Duane’s Poe Tree, Mad Swirl, etc. She is also the Destiny Poets UK’s Poet of the year for 2014 and one of the editors of The Significant Anthology released in July 2015. She was adjudged second in the ‘World Union Of Poet’s’ poetry competition, 2016 and won an award for poetry in 2016 As ‘You Like It International Poetry Contest’, commemorating the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare. She won the Reuel International Prize for poetry, 2018.




NaPoWriMo 6/if


If…
A tough terrain that stretches yesterday into tomorrow is where ifs thrive as burrs. There are some on the faded jeans I treasure. If you could pull out the ones you wear upon yours, give them away, cross a few continents and wait for me in that narrow lane between the middle-class homes where the tulsis grow like weeds and pink roses bloom like teen love, we could hear the gong once more and if the gray hairs and the loose folds could be erased by the receding waves of time tugging at the blankets of moss that grow over human joys, we would still be smiling, brave and earnest. We could walk back a year in a step and cross the words that parted us, crushing them under our shoes if .. if ifs were our tomorrows, ours to hold, to cherish and to let go, there would be an if before every breath that left in search for yours and before every breath that returned vanquished, bereft of warmth
©reenar

NaPoWriMo 5/Sun and shade


Sun and shade
The gentle art of melancholy
is to see “print as light and white paper, shadow”
There is an end, beyond every horizon
The Wandering Jew thrives though pot bound
The moss rose blooms where it is flung, but we practice
the gentle art of melancholy
Too much sun within, to meander out of the soil
The sea salt, like happiness leeches out of underwatered pots
There is an end, beyond every horizon
too faint to discern too vivid if dreamt, the rays converge
and we are parchment, then flame, then ash, simple soot black. Behold
the gentle art of melancholy
Breeze-blown paper caught by a nib, sails without a ship
Ocean depths of promises, undying hope a never-ending misery
There is an end, beyond every horizon
Sun, the cross, cosmic omissions, shade,
the lovely creepy crawlies, spring flies in with
the gentle art of melancholy
There is an end, beyond every horizon
©reenar

refer
Light & Shadow bAnne Waldman

NaPoWriMo 3/ Pebbles


Smooth pebbles under my feet
and in my heart
you fill my sieve when I skinny dip my senses
into time’s muddy pool
Inheritances never forgotten
never realised
have accumulated over mindless existence
There I am in my mother’s eyes
as she looks at hope through a window
newly chiseled by a man
walking in from several storms
And then time rippled its skin once more
shook off the fireflies hovering over
bright eyes
and poured black tar over the living
It filled the lungs of an era
with the hatred of co-existence
and brought forth babies dipped in vengeance
fed from breasts that heaved in rhythm to chants of revenge
At the pinnacle of it
carried over by the butterfly effect of  waves
dashing against cliffs of shores far away,
a land lies wasting
Its trees
singing of blood and ignorance
kills sparrows with their apathy
and below them
hungry powers wrestle for dominance
I am still in your eyes, mother
refusing to be part of the scenery
to be a fringe element in this landscape
to be a visual representative of an era
that promises nothing but delivers hate
Unbidden
Let me look hard at the faint outlines
in the distance
conjure up the mountain passes
too feeble to be the truth
and cross over the bridges of time
Time after time
till I find the parallel river that matches my inner one
Till then
tell no one, Mother
that you conceived me on your own
and I named myself Hope
©reenar

NaPoWriMo 2/where are the answers?

Where are the answers?
What if they forgot to ask the girl if she could sing?
Would her music cease
Would she no longer knit their afternoons into a mellow sunset?
Or would she burst into her own song
singing as if the summer would never end
And the house would rattle along to her sound
Eager to hear every note that came unbidden to her lips
Which song could be better?
reenar ©

5 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Thank you Satbir Ji. It is overwhelming to read such a comment from a poet whom I so admire. Much love.

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  2. Excellent poetry like Only Reena Prasad can pen !

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you dearest Santhosh. You have been a pillar of strength always. Love you.

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  3. She always has the knack of stunning me into speechlessness by her poetry.

    ReplyDelete