Tag: Nephrologist

Categories
Poetry

Expletive by Jyotish Chalil Gopinath

EXPLETIVE

The word arrives in my inbox 
screaming,
steam rising from its sizzling,
alone,
answering
a simple question. 
May I send you a poem?
or simply
May I?

An all-caps no.

You do wield 
your expletives
well.

But I do too.
I reply —
Thank you.

Jyotish Chalil Gopinathan is a nephrologist residing in Kozhikode, India. His poems have been published in several online journals including Muse India, Borderless Journal, Poems India, Madras Courier, The Punch Magazine, Annals of Internal Medicine, Ethos Literary Journal, Plato’s Cave Online, and The Chakkar. In August 2025 Hawakal published his second collection of poems, Almanac of the Sickle Moon.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Amazon International

Categories
Poetry

Poetry by Jyotish Chalil Gopinathan

Jyotish Chalil Gopinath
KOEBNER*     
                                                                                  
Obedient scales 
march up my body 
single file, where nails lodge.
 
It is not enough
for deformed skin 
to don the camouflage 
of silvery plaques, memorials.

Lift each up
and discover 
the changed base.
Unrecognisably worn,
undeniably torn, tissue.

Texture 
that has morphed.
Unbecoming, melded.
Little wellsprings spurt red
underneath the forgotten cause.
A scrawled signature of old blood lines.




*The Koebner phenomenon refers to the appearance of skin lesions, usually in linear crops, as a response to injury, in individuals with chronic skin conditions including psoriasis.

Jyotish Chalil Gopinathan is a nephrologist and researcher. The Coppiced House, his first collection of poems, was published by Writers Workshop in 2024. His poems have appeared in Poems India, The Punch Magazine and Poets for Science and are expected in 2025, in Muse India and the Annals of Internal Medicine.

.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Click here to access Monalisa No Longer Smiles on Kindle Amazon International