Just Before Birth

By Jacob Silkstone
Maria's Baby by Amra Khan
Maria’s Baby by Amra Khan

A canvas

empty of colour

a body

kissed by death

 

A long silent wait

of the foetus

floating in

backwaters of

existence

 

undefined

 

before the cry

of anguish

 

I remain in half light,

listen to hidden songs

 

Strain to hear the ebb and flow

of tides and seas

 

In the coming darkness

 

I read you

as the blind read braille.

~Sukrita Paul Kumar

Sukrita Paul Kumar, born and brought up in Kenya, is a poet and critic, teaching literature in Delhi University. Formerly, a Fellow of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla, she is an Honorary Fellow of the International Writing Programme, University of Iowa (USA), as also of Hong Kong Baptist University and Cambridge Seminars. She is honorary faculty at the Durrell Centre at Corfu (Greece).

She has published several collections of poems and many critical books.

Next Read
Literature.Mar 12, 2014

Just Before Birth

“A canvas/ empty of colour/ a body/ kissed by death.”
Poem of the Week (March 11), by Sukrita Paul Kumar.

By Jacob Silkstone