PANKHURI SINHA

PANKHURI SINHA

Love Is

Love is

Certainly not

Suffering together

Causing more suffering

More pain

Inflicting more pain

On oneself

And one’s other

On one another

Taking a perverse pleasure in misery

In inflicting misery

Putting each other through trial

Putting each other through

A jury made up of people

Weighing each other’s actions

On a scale set by others

Asking the other to come back

After making them go

Someplace else

Asking them to come back

Like presenting an option

Within a time frame

While it existed

Making a choice out of their own things

Making choices come up

Where none needed to be made

Love is never assuming

A position so tall

It simply dwarfs the other person

Drowns them

In a sea of people

Applauding the lover.

The Crisis Of The Third Person

The crisis of the third person

Meant that somebody else

Was pulling the strings always

In whatever was going on in our lives

And around it

Near by

In the vicinity

In close proximity

And outside our lives

Close by at times

At times, far away

But the most problematic thing was

As soon as I laid a claim

To having given a ride to a friend

In my car

For example

The company

His company arrived

To say

Not your car

Your husband’s

So eager was the company

In staking out its claim

To all we had

That we could not have anything together

So eager was it in making sure

The house had only his signature

That we almost couldn’t live in it

But the climax was

That as soon as it was built

As soon as I had cleaned it

For the first time

As soon as I had taken my first shower

The girl ancestrally Spanish

Who had been arriving at all wrong times

Arrived

But the most political statement

Was reserved for him

It said

How we ate at home

Without a fork and a spoon

Or even a knife

There were strange political statements being made

And I was being told to stand up

For all I had

It was more

Than a crisis of the third person.

The Market Of Love

Its exciting to meet people

And talk

She had said

She, who had always believed in taking that bold step

That great big step

Of loving

And living life

As it came

Grabbing it by the horns somewhat

The giant leap

That defined for her

The changing spirit

The changing times

The freeing of women

All of it was over

Her wings had been clipped forever

She had obediently registered

For the match making website

Where her country’s

Elitest immigrant work force

Socialized

People whose shirts were white and blue collored

Though not always

But life was made up of smooth clicks of laptop

Also the cell phone

And its myriad cousins

Even the fresh air seemed to be thick with electronic signals

Wire tapping seemed to walk with people

Some were more tracked than others

The ale houses were not going to be hers.

The Great Stalemate

The great stalemate

Within that situation

That I needed to tell them about

The stalemate they just could not see

Or could not fathom

Or simply did not accept

Despite its visibility

Or said

It wasn’t visible enough

Was a stalemate made up of strange suspicions

And actions emanating from there

Or elsewhere

But

Having suspected

That she was going to leave him

Was going to eventually leave

Although

Why would a girl do that?

Or how could a girl do that?

And if he had a time for her leaving in mind

For girls ran out of time

Something, even she forgot

Living in that stalemate

Living the suspect’s life

Being quizzed on daily things

Being quizzed on basic things

As though, to find out

Where it all was going

You see

Living a life

Where all doings

Seemed to be doings inside the props of a set

That one day

Had to be taken down

Where all living

Was living on a stage

Within the script of it

Being written

Very funnily

For having said

That his baby

Would be very fat

Fat indeed

Fat and healthy

He receded into total distance

Not just distance

But withdrawal

Into a coldness of not doing anything

After making a mockery of doing anything

Anything physical

That had to do with love

Or lovemaking

At every single moment

Where it could have been possible.

That this was the result

Of a one time denial

Was a reaction

Out of proportion

For comprehension.

There was

Had to be

Another conspiracy

Behind it.

And that I had to somehow break

The perpetuating stalemate

With all the praises

Coming just for him

Was an inhuman task.

Capitalism’s Crisis

About them cars

That followed her that day

At almost every single turn

That came on way

Cars of that same color

The color of the car

That was first in question

The car that had created the problem

The car that had the encounter

The driver that just refused to see

Right in front

The driver that reminded her

Of the force

Of the power

Of the car’s engine

The driver that reminded her

Of what it meant to hit the gas pedal

Very softly, very slowly

Just coming close in one very small

But gigantic way

Just coming so close

As to rattle the ground underneath your feet

To send a signal to your knees

A devastating signal

For that’s about how tall

The car came

It was a woman actually

Sitting behind the wheels

Yes, sitting

For its not possible to stand

And drive

Unless you are water skiing

Which is a sport

And driving is not

Driving is transport

Of course

It is much more

There is definitely such a thing called aggressive driving

Aggressive to the extent of killing people

And there are minor hits and runs

And then there is the car show

With the woman

Behind the steering wheel

And behind the glass

Saying with the sign of read my lips

Sorry, I didn’t see you

Saying with a big wave of her arms

Reminding you of some power talks

Where the gap between the two parties is enormous

Is created and made enormous

Reminding you of what it had meant to be behind that glass

Reminding you of how cold this last winter was

Without that glass

And on your own two feet

Reminding you of how you had loved driving

But what a coordinated statement it was

Cars of every single make

And of that colour

Had followed her

It was hard to decide

If it was a friendly gesture

Or one of consolation

It had snowed again

Was cold again

And this was the second incident

Of this nature

The first had been in bright daylight

In sunshine very spring like

And the woman had simply been looking away

At the road

And not at the footpath at all

She had actually hit the gas pedal harder

And while refusing to go to court

Was another offer of friendship

Everything reminded her of that table talk

That had completely slipped past

The table

Fallen off of it

Had spilled off of the table

Like so many diplomatic

And international talks do

This particularly had been a talk about international recruitment

Gone very bad.

PANKHURI SINHA

PANKHURI SINHA: Bilingual young poet and story writer. Two books of poems published in English, two collections of stories published in Hindi, and four collections of poetries published in Hindi, and many more of both are lined up. Has won many prestigious, national-international awards. Her writing is dominated by themes of exile and immigration, gender equality and environmental concerns.