I sort out my luggage before this trip
The bookshelves of knowledge
I no longer have any need for
The bundles of love
Tied up with kisses
The friends with whom I laughed
And fell silent on mountain hikes
while I puffed and panted up
For the view, the neighbourhood of stars
Those precious ones with different
smiles and sadness, the skies wore
like designer outfits
I no longer seek the fairy dust
the world sprinkles
With strobe lights
flashing approval
I no longer seek remote corners
to sit and meditate
I have myself become
the cold snow mountain
the desert heat
trapped in shifting sands
As the wind riffles through
seeking liquid lava in the grains
Your silver hair is a rope I cling on to
as you take me water skiing
while tsunamis roll away
from the beach, leaving decoy wavelets
You take me to the heart of the ocean
Where the foam is black
In the brine, white and heaving
I prove my infidelity to life
Yet, refuse to drown
Chaste women far better than I
have entered and exited
fire pyres, unscathed
Their reputation glowing
down darkened generations
There in the valley of waves
we lie, I inhale the sweat gathered
under the curve of your breast
You are the femme fatale
making those who love you
Into gibbering idiots
who remember nothing
save the downward sweeping
Of Your eyelashes, which fall
On the upward rushing of Your blush
You have made me a jigsaw puzzle
that only you can reassemble
On your footstool, where Gods lounge
Kali annihilate me
for this love will not go
Give me life by killing me
With your exquisite hands
You forever
my only love
. —Lakshmi Bayi