Cups of Clay...

Bubbling tea

Ginger laced steam

Tingling nerves

Innocent smile

Cups of clay...

I ask

Where is it?

 Your piece of celebration?

Shy laughter

Crinkling crowfeet

I melt it

She says

And sell it to you

In these cups of clay...

Limitless riches

Blown in moments

Aimless glitter

My celebration

Endless nights

Relentless labour

A bag full of coins

Hers.

All of it

She drains down

In those little cups of clay...

Bokeh...

As the embers of my last cigarette

Are quietened by the wind

I look through the mist

Of nicotine ghosts....

A world cluttered with hexagons

The lives and the lifeless

All in one frame....

Like chips of coloured glass

In a playful kaleidoscope....

While my hung up mind

Chooses to surrender....

To the balmy peace

Of a consummated moon....

The wilderness sways

In my silent adoration

Of one scar- less instance

That man has failed to molest....

And I’m one

With her presence....

Whether it is her beckoning

Or a drugged nerve wreck

I know not.....

For now, I decide

To blindfold my being

In her tender embrace...

And brush off the shreds

Of worldly affliction....

To carve out the essence

Of those fathomless bokehs....

I'm Okay...

Every morning

I frame my vision

In the demon- like mirror

Through the sun bathed picture

Of a normal girl

I see me and my skin

Through the stencils of convention

I touch me

And I rub my face

I reassemble my hair

And wash myself

Over and over

Till the softness of fabric

Burns against my skin

Do I look any better?

I don’t know

A dab of smelly substances

That claim to transport me

To larger than life posters

I had smeared heavily

Before a hunger- troubled slumber

Blissfully hoping

It would overcome

All my inlaid insecurities

Overnight

But of course

Magic is cooked up

In cauldrons of imagination

I walk out of the door

Tugging at my clothes

With inherent discomfort

Because this angle

And that fold

Makes my facade

......Acceptable

And yet I don’t spare

A single rear view mirror

Or a glass pane

Or even the darkened windows of cars

To reassure that nagging voice

That bullies me in my head

And every time I walk past

Those pretty boots

On skinny legs

Those sleazy skirts

That audacious dress

I tuck my tummy in

And for those few blissful moments

With reality withdrawn

And my skin pulled tight

I replicate every plastic smile

And answer every hollow greeting

With an empty, evasive

“I’m okay”...

On woman's day

To every woman who has a body image issue...