testimony of march

“GOLDEN WATTLE” by Deb Brown

as the days turn longer, all the silent moments are now punctuated with a realization that the darkness is receding. things are all the more apparent in the lasting light. on a brief walk through the nearly empty streets of an upscale neighborhood, i ponder over the sight of the golden trumpet vine on an expansive property that has taken over the metal handrails and old red bricks, seemingly growing even further with every passing second, as if it is going to consume the entire form and structure of this house. i wonder what its occupants would think of it. this March, i am not going to look for answers.

March comes like madness —
the bright golden flowers glare
at the passerby

~

 March’s mad weather —
a frail little bud drops down
by a sudden breeze

.
© Anmol Arora

For Haibun Monday: March Madness at dVerse

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a spring evening

Spring Evening with a Full Moon by Kyujin Yamamoto

spring evenings are cold like the ghostly feeling left after you’ve taken your hand back from my hand. they’re as if a thing gone amiss, a loss that can’t be mapped or measured in its tragedy. the spring skies are as violet as the mark you left on my neck, painful and gratifying at once. as i walk the path towards home, i pick a tattered leaf and place it as a keepsake in my thoughts. i have a few more steps to go.

the spring moon appears —
a worm-eaten leaf still clings
to the old peepal

.
© Anmol Arora

For Season Your Poetry Part II at WRT
Also read a dawn song and day-breaking

a dawn song

as dawn breaks and starts spreading its blush through the dark eyes of a distant cloud-riddled sky, i pick at my skin and hair, trying to be at ease with the chill penetrating me, in more ways than one. the music of early morning routine starts flourishing — the shrill of the water motor, the flush of the sink, the naivety of the kitchen song, the singular bark of the street mutt — gradually the night becomes one with the day, the day becoming one with my insomniac breaths. the bristly winds carry the taste and touch and sound of an impending cold, a sulfur-infused smog, a trilling bird’s sorrow. it is unlike any other wind, any other gust of air that passes through the seasons, through the reverberations of living. i am still pinching myself conscious, the wind is still playing its solemn instrument.

picking at my grief —
the early winds of raw cold
raise the sky in red

~

dawn arrives singing
notes of a known winter’s song —
lights seen through the haze

.

© Anmol Arora

For Heeding Haiku With Chèvrefeuille at MLM Menagerie
Image source (City at dawn Painting by Barbara Pastorino)

vicissitudes of the moon

it’s funny how the half-bitten moon takes me back to those cold winter nights when i would stand outside, my arms shivering, trying to get a glimpse of the celestial body through the fog — a kind of restive peace descending all over me, blood in my hands, seemingly more blue than red. i was a witness to the change of every breath and every distant sound that would make its presence known to me.

now as i stand outside looking at the same half-bitten moon, i am not shivering and i am not under the spell of the quiet and peace, that may prevail elsewhere. but it is not the same moon; i am not the same eye or arm or form. every change received and given courses through me, through my blood that is in and not out, the night in me deeper, the music a darker hue of blue. this transition is alright. i am alright tonight.

a waning moon —
memories of lonely nights
flowing through me
~
a change in the backdrop —
the milk-white moon sturdier
in the lasting cold

© Anmol Arora 2018

Image source (Windy Landscape With Waning Moon by Rachel Fenner)
For dVerse Haibun Monday

 

Repository

Within the twisted lanes of insanity, there exist such wide and glorious fields of understanding and clarity, which are but a product of a resounding confusion clouding the eyes, shattering the peace of the mind, almost killing normalcy. Almost.

You feel most alive when you are nearest to death. Similarly, you are most sane when you are close to insanity.

tilting sideways
the glorious fields of gold-
like his mind

I remember standing close to a mustard field, inhaling pollen and exhaling my last attempt at keeping myself sane. I had this desire to fish. To capture a fish from somewhere in that river of yellow and gold. The sun burnt my left cheek and I kept on waiting for someone to bring me a fishing rod.

No one ever came. I am still waiting. In some alternative world. I know that I am still waiting there after these four long years. Because I still want that fish in this world. I lost everything because I never captured that fish. And thus, things can never be right.

I caress the burnt mark on my left cheek.

remembering-
calm of mustard fields before
the onslaught of frost

Within the twisted lanes of insanity, I exist. I am a smiling figure atop that beautiful building you see from afar and you miss out on the spectacle as your line of sight changes. You miss out on the spectacle of how that smiling figure takes a leap from that beautiful building, burdening the air with all his weight.

You do feel that weight with every breath you take.

small buds protrude
out of the damp, heavy soil-
the cold wind picks up speed

~

taking in a whiff
of the remnants of warmth-
I feel cold in my bones

.

Inspired from Bjorn’s Haibun Monday prompt at dVerse. I have molded it in my own way.
This is Poem # 2 for my goal/challenge to write and post a poem every day of this month. The painting depicts the wide, sprawling fields of wheat, but somehow, the yellow/gold reminded me of a mustard field sparkling in the winter sunshine.
Image source: View of the Church of Saint-Paul-de-Mausole by Vincent van Gogh.