#pratyusha

I walk along the ravines of my childhood until the sloping pines begin to fade into alpine scrub. I direct my gaze across time.

Drink rosewater before you sleep, cautions my grandmother. Nothing happens—not even perfuming inside my dreams.

I associate you with honey, bees, wildflowers, dryads (of course!), and Elytis ♡💫

what is it like to write this story again in stagnant water    in deep water  in mirrors   I still see the wounds inside filmy cloth    like woven music  of thread and survival

Clouds of pale blossom are becoming more visible at night.  I cup my cheeks with both hands when the wind moves through me.  Somewhere you are standing in a flooded field in bright sunlight. 

A poison-flower, bright and pink like the sky late at night. It is 'toxic in all its parts', but produces no poison nectar. The poison-heat from the oleander (after dark, one can sense a faint narcotic smoke) rises into the night, twinning itself around the cherry tree—