Category: Poetry

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Poetry

Fragments by Mohammad Hussain Anqa

Translated from Balochi by Fazal Baloch

Mohammad Hussain Anqa (1907–1977) was a poet, historian, journalist, and political activist. He spent a significant portion of his life in prison because of his dissenting political views, an experience that is reflected throughout his poetry. Anqa’s most important contribution to Balochi literature was the introduction of a modern aesthetic sensibility into the Balochi ghazal. The selected fragments are drawn from various couplets in his ghazals, collected in Roken Poll (The Glowing Flower), a volume of his poetry published by the Balochi Academy in 2007.
 
(1)

Drop by drop, celestial honey flows into my ears— 
In midnight hours, when the chime of your bangles fills the air,
I wonder whence the angels brought you this grace and modesty; 
No moon glows so purely, no blossom blooms so fair.

(2)

Whenever, in prayer, I lifted my hands, they were scorched.
Like ember smouldering beneath ash was the sky.
Tyranny's flames sear the earth like a griddle.
I seek to rest a little while, but tell me, how could I?

(3)

If it bears not the fragrance of her perfumed tresses, 
Let this callous breeze fall dead — I do not care. 
In quest of my heart, I seek you — but you’re nowhere, 
My heart—may it lie tangled in a knot of your hair. 

(4)

If you have seized my forbearance, along with your grace, 
The joy of love and longing will fade, you must know. 
At dawn, Anqa whispered to the nightingale in the cage: 
“Most of my captive days are gone, just a few left to go.”

(5)

The cloud burst forth and showed you — 
Ask your tresses how blessings are bestowed. 
A home is where the heart finds peace, 
Cots and couches alone make no abode. 

(6)

I know not by what mysterious fashion, the Creator shaped this world— 
The shepherd dreads the wolf; the wolf fears the shepherd’s wrath. 
Anqa! I spilled my blood so blossoms might grace every garden in the land; 
Yet never once did I dive for pearls beneath the ocean’s path.

(7)

They crushed the only blossom I called my own
May every garden wither, far and nigh.
They show me not the path unto her abode
May God rend every star out of the sky.

(8)

He rends the garment, only to mend it whole again.
How artful this madness proves itself to be.
Why does autumn fall to me, while spring blossoms for you,
If from the selfsame clay are fashioned both you and me?

(9)

Like a night flower's fragrance adrift through the eerie darkness,
O butterfly of my love, when will you come to me silently?
Beside my pillow, there shimmered your outstretched hand.
I reached to steal a kiss, but the sword cut through me.

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Fazal Baloch is a Balochi writer and translator. He has translated many Balochi poems and short stories into English. His translations have been featured in Pakistani Literature published by Pakistan Academy of Letters and in the form of books and anthologies. 

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Poetry

Poetry by Jane Downing

Jane Downing
QUIET ON SET 

Light falls gold through the Ginko
or maybe it is the leaves
themselves in their seasonal drop

The lemon gum shrugs its skin
into creases at the junctions of its boughs
scenting the air fresh

The lull before the stab at Shakespeare
performed in glade
on lawn between the ponds

In the wings the bats unfurl
their leather coats
shake and rustle like the assembling players

No need to bring down the lights
the earth’s turn
will stage manage that well enough

The stars strut the stage
outshone by their celestial counterparts
await their audience’s hush

Jane Downing’s work has been published around the world including in Meanjin, Rabbit, Social Alternatives, Live Encounters, e.ratio, Last Stanza, and Best Australian Poems. Her collection is When Figs Fly (Close-Up Books, 2019).

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Poetry

The Separation

By Deepa Srivastava

THE SEPARATION

The school bus is waiting for you
Ready to take you away from mum
As your soft hands leave my palm
I bid you goodbye! My son

You climb the steps with an effort
Clutching your school bag and bottle tight
Your big watery eyes gazing at me
As I bid you goodbye! My son

We communicate scores in that moment
Sharing the pangs of separation
Waiting to reunite after the school hours
I bid you goodbye! My son

Deepa Srivastava is a freelance writer. She has performed on diverse literary platforms.

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Poetry

Butterfly in the Graveyard

By Tanisha Tanwar

BUTTERFLY IN THE GRAVEYARD

I planted two flowers to attract her
But she never appeared.
I would never know, what frightened her.
I always loved and admired her with my whole heart,
But she always taught only --
The art of leaving, the art of parting,
The art of tears and the art of fear.
She was so beautiful, full of love, 
She loved every flower truly,
But mine were never enough. 
Maybe I chose the wrong seed for her;
But for me, he was always vibrant. 
My emotions are buried under the grave, under which she lies.

 Tanisha Tanwar is an undergraduate from Himachal Pradesh (Solan). She enjoys poetry and creative writing, using words to explore emotions, experiences, and everyday reflections.

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Poetry

Ever After by Shamim Akhtar

EVER AFTER

In the weary hues of a setting sun,
Another evening set to quietly fade away.
Dimly lit candles, their flames in the breeze,
Will once more breathe, sigh, melt, and sway.
The night will cradle all its stars,
As memories drift along the Milky Way.
And then this night, too, shall pass –
Like all nights, day after day.

Dr. Shamim Akhtar is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management at ICFAI University Mizoram. He is also a researcher, writer, songwriter, and poet whose work blends lyrical sensitivity, playful wit, and deep introspection. He is the author of the book Smoke and Society: The Culture, Consumption and Control of Tobacco in Mizoram.

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Poetry

Poems for July by Snehaprava Das

From Public Domain 
 JULY CLOUDS

Night descends grudgingly 
Over my town.
In smoky July,
The breeze is a rustling 
Scrape of sand paper 
Rubbing against the face of 
A barren sky.

Like bored coquettes,
Stars lean against the walls of night
Faking a smile on their made up faces
And whispering light.

The evasive clouds
Drift away sheepishly 
Beyond the distant cliffs,
I don't know why --
But clouds have turned here
Strangely  reclusive
This July.

They say that the warm ocean-currents 
Have sucked them dry,
Leaving them ineffectual, hollow,
So, the clouds now sail languidly
Across a grey July sky --

Declaring their presence 
In impotent rumbles, stray gusts,
In spiralling dust columns,  
And scarce drops that become vapour
Against my window pane
Before the clouds slinked by! 

I know not why
But the clouds seem to 
Elude my town this July!!


AT LAST THE RAINS CAME

At last the rains came on a July midday 
In mild currents first,
And then in angry torrents, 
Washing the paan stains 
And the blotchy paints off the walls,

Filling the potholes on the
Bruised streets,
Overflowing the gutters,
Cleansing polythene and plastics
It cluttered on the sidewalks.

The rain came finally,
Carrying the smell of rotten garbage 
Dead leaves, sodden earth, and
Soaked paper boats in
Stale puddles.

At last, the rain spilled from a leaden sky
In tiny spikes of molten warmth
Pricking the skin, travelling
Into my blood, like a coaxing reptile,
Looping my parched desires
And my desiccated dreams.

At last the July clouds broke over
The row of bald hills,
And rain came down to my thirsting window
In  driving grey spills.

 
 *paan -- betel leaf

Snehaprava Das is an academic, translator and writer. She has multiple translations, three collections of stories and five anthologies of poetry to her credit. She has been published in Indian Literature, Oxford University Press, Speaking Tiger, Penguin and Black Eagle Books.

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Poetry

Invasive by Jyotish Chalil Gopinathan

Sambar deer: From Public Domain 
INVASIVE

The stench of our days
on our skin
and dripping from these old leaves 
in the rainforest —
diesel breath, city-vapour,
polythene wraps that melt
like easy cheese in the dump, 
sticky in the sun.
Animals sense it hanging dense 
in the air, the guide informs.

From the jeep we count 
our game —
a sambar bolting from the trail,
white-rumped vultures on the Irul,
like avian art on a monument arch,
a peacock tail folding in the undergrowth.
Ask him about the Senna trees,
she nudges me,
ask him whether he knows
they are invasive.

Sena tree. From Public Domain

Jyotish Chalil Gopinathan is a nephrologist, clinician-educator, and researcher based in Kozhikode. His debut poetry collection, The Coppiced House, was followed by Almanac of the Sickle Moon. His poems have appeared in several journals and magazines as well as anthologies, including the Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English 2024-25. 

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Poetry

Census of Centaurs

By Rhys Hughes


Because a strict bureaucratic state
wanted to know
how many mythological creatures
still existed,
wistful and wise,
on a certain island in the sea
in a state of nature raw,
they sent an inspector named Hector
to find out for sure.

He bypassed temples, skipped the shrines,
rode the northern railway lines,
determined to dispatch his duty
upon the Isle of Tutti Frutti.
He crossed the strait, hummed a tune,
walked into the afternoon.

Past empty huts and dusty trees,
defying heat with tropic breeze,
and near a mysterious ruined fort,
just tumbled stones, he sat to rest,
as evening slipped into the west.

Then in the dark, a thrumming sound!
One hundred hooves upon the ground
or so he counted with his ear
until the silver moon shone clear
and he was able to see with startled eyes
a truly Ancient Greek surprise.

Standing on the long-parched land
were creatures wondrous and grand,
a herd of centaurs, noble beasts,
with coconut shells in every hand!
 
Clip-clop! clip-clop! clip-clop!
Those hard halves were bashed
as if hooves at high speed dashed
over the packed sand of the shore.

One declared, “Don’t be scared,
our intentions are mild enough.
If centaur statistics start to drop,
your government will never stop
harassing the imaginary past
and stripping the myths away.”

Hector listened with attention
as the centaur eased the tension
with kind and musical words,
the sweetest he had ever heard:

“The paperwork demands a throng
of healthy centaurs to make it wrong
for developers to invade our island
and spoil the pristine beauty
of the fabled Tutti Frutti,
and so we double what is real
with melodramatic, sonic zeal.
Fifty centaurs with coconut shells
sound one hundred strong.”

Hector smiled to hear the plot,
a simple multiplication of trots.
“But why reveal to me the joke?”
he asked, because he couldn’t see
his value to the centaur folk.

The centaur smiled, calm and tame:
“Because you are here. Write a report
that will help us to defend our home,
a paper in which the truth can hide.
For unless you fiddle the figures
the bureaucrats will push us aside.”

The herd dispersed into the night,
a magnificent but deceptive sight,
and hurrying back to his home,
Hector planned to construct a spell
of deception for this noble cause,
forever charmed by moonlit swells,
and centaurs playing coconut shells.
From Public Domain

Rhys Hughes has lived in many countries. He graduated as an engineer but currently works as a tutor of mathematics. Since his first book was published in 1995 he has had fifty other books published and his work has been translated into ten languages.

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Poetry

Poetry by Erik Kennedy

Erik Kennedy
I Like Rich People, but I Couldn’t Eat a Whole One Myself



Never tell yourself that the megarich
aren’t like you and me.
Billionaires are just ordinary people
who throw away
their electric toothbrushes
every night.

Believe it or not,
genetically speaking,
you have more in common with an oligarch
than with an aardvark
or a sea turtle
or a red-collared lorikeet.

I know this is bitter news,
but that’s what news is—
an acrid, tacky sap
that sticks together the days.
Whoever invented knowledge
was on some sort of sick power trip.

The point is
we all throb with worry
about something.
We all hum on common frequencies
of dread and guilt
and superficial decency.

It’s worth bearing this in mind
next time you read about 
some cute little plutocrats
who will be ensconced safely,
post apocalypse,
in a secret alpine bolthole:

remember the commandment
to love them
as you
track down
their bunkers
and overrun them.

 
How a Year Ends


A year is a road
that ends at the sea
in an afterthought of a town,
just a few weatherbeaten houses,
some indifferent trees,
a small picnic area,
and a one-eyed cat
wandering around proprietorially.
You drove here
because it is here.

The sky is orange and purple,
like a burning vineyard.
And you put your foot down
and plunge off the road.
You drive through the spinifex,
down the shifting dune slope,
across the tide line,
and into the surf,
gunning it into the waves.

The footwell fills up,
the seawater pours in,
the engine is flooding,
the cabin is all foam and confusion,
you’re losing consciousness,
you’re losing consciousness,
and you wake up
parked at the kerb
where you started last year,
soaking wet.

(These poems have been excerpted from Sick Power Trip )

Erik Kennedy is a poet, critic, editor, and performer in Christchurch in Aotearoa New Zealand. His three books are There’s No Place Like the Internet in Springtime (2018), Another Beautiful Day Indoors (2022), and Sick Power Trip (2025), all with Te Herenga Waka University. His first and third books were shortlisted for best book of poetry in New Zealand’s national book awards, the Ockhams. He also co-edited an anthology of climate change poetry from Aotearoa and the Pacific called No Other Place to Stand (Auckland University Press, 2022).

You can read Erik Kennedy’s interview by clicking here.

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Poetry

Dragonfly 2 by Ihlwha Choi

Poetry and translation from Korean by Ihlwha Choi

From Public Domain 

DRAGONFLY 2

A dragonfly
is flying before a spider’s web.

It is in danger,
like a child playing beside a puddle.

“Hey! Hey! Watch out!”
I cry out in alarm,

but the dragonfly pays no attention.
Perhaps dragonflies have no ears.


hlwha Choi is a South Korean poet. He has published multiple poetry collections, such as Until the Time When Our Love will Flourish, The Color of Time, His Song and The Last Rehearsal.

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