Category: NaPoWriMo
NaPoWriMo 22 : Epitome of Friendship
Friendlessly yours
Holding hands across a screen
Tasting the tears that roll down your cheek
and trying not to let mine hurt you
Putting in smileys when cracks begin to show up
Connected but without being plugged in
© ReenaPrasad
NaPoWriMo 21 : Paper Dolls
Paper Dolls
They never knew a world
not shaped like a man
Born into an armful of sighs,
they grew up as responsibilities
living like mushrooms
lest they be ‘ruined’ before they could flower
Then deflowered by aged stamens
their remains were turned over
to motherhood
Sunken desert succulents,
they withered and flowered
with seasonal sprays
fattening meanwhile the next
‘of the same kind’ blooms
and one day their dry stems
were consignated to woody flames
A paper doll twin in a glass case
decorated with red garlands
was stuck on a wall with a light bulb’s
zero-watt glow under it,
infinitely better off
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 19 : Rara avis

Rara avis
I see no stones in my path to you
even though stone courtyards abandoned
by a forgotten race
these seem to be
All I see
is a rara avis take flight
from between the pages of a book
An avian lover’s delight
He soars, dips and
alights
on the branch
before me
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 18 : Joie de vivre

The last poem
And when the earth gave a mighty heave
and rested its last unbroken piece
on a jagged cliff, a sift occurred
Poets being more surefooted than the rest
were left on the narrowest of ledges
“Bring your best poem, only one. The best”
came the cry,
“See that red world floating on the ocean
that is where the best will survive!”
And I threw myself into the blue sea
for a poem you had made me
and within me were a thousand poems
of yours, each one the best
written with your breath
and there wasn’t between them
any comparison or enmity
What joie de vivre was in that fall!
The splash drenched this world
where I lay dreaming
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 15 : A Limerick

The smiling camels of Oman
Two camels in the country of Oman
had teeth larger than mouths and they felt wan
They met a nice orthodontist
who put the teeth in some wire twists
and soon they became part of a smiling clan
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 14 : Flirtations

Flirtations
Every word spoken unwraps the mystery
but why look too hard
when you can conjure up a sea, some sand
a archway of flowering climbers and walk through it
in ecstacy
All because of a dropped glance
©ReenaPrasad
NaPoWriMo 13 : Petrichor

Scent of renewal
Somewhere when it rains
a boy runs barefoot to a stream
A page is torn
and he beams at his little boat
pirouetting
to overcome a mound of roots
that threatens its passage
It breaks free
and bobs merrily for a while
enjoying the bumpy ride
till the rain plays traitor
and wets its fragile insides
He shouts with glee
insistant that all should leave
their irrelevant preoccupations
and come to see his warrior ship
fighting the elements to the death
Few bother to
They smile indulgently
and rebuke him gently
for abusing the hallowed notebook
not seeing
the greatest lesson that he would ever need
was being taught by the stream, the boat
and rain
forever to be remembered
rising from within him as petrichor
when in another time, place or season
he the boat, would move in circles
without rhyme or reason
unable to see the drift of things
Then the rain would come
drenching his arid mud
with the reassuring scent of a land
forgotten
and he would find the notebook again
and tear off another page
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 11 : Et tu Brute?

Seasons
In an afternoon that wore the garb of dawn
clouds sat upon their gold
and a lone gull upon the hull
As a gull-nado swept the skies,
the boat started to rock
The ones who came with me could not stay long
The ones I found were soon lost
The ones who agreed to row
were nowhere to be seen
I became the boat
and they all-
the sea
Into the storm I went
whirled around by the waters
that had floated me before
The season changed, the migrants left
The lone gull moulted
revealing a black head
Et tu Brute?
well then, let me drown
©Reena Prasad
NaPoWriMo 10: Where would you like the wind to take you?

Where would you like the wind to take you?
I never want to leave
leaving you under the sand
(What can the rain do for me?
Bring you back as petrichor?)
fervently wanting to believe
the small kerchief alone
would be ravaged by time
with burning feet I walk
relishing the heat
trying not to scatter sand
over your cherubic sleep
though under careless footfalls
you might lie
the sun miraculously
mining sweat from tears
trying to worm its way
to a frozen slab
I hide in my heart
dreamlessly cradled
shielded from every rain
except that of love
and cloudbursts of remembrances
forever doomed to extreme youth
Don’t take me, wind
ever away from this place
A baby must never be left alone
©Reena Prasad