O Beauteous one This is for you For all the times that you have bloomed When all around have burrowed deep Into the coolness of earth’s breast Hiding away, biding their time Until gentler, lighter climes Bestir them in their loamy beds But you, O Intrepid one You have always overcome You have worn your gem-like garb In ways that made me catch my breath Racing, chasing to my heart Wondering if you’d shimmer on Or if your time here too was done But you wore your jeweled crown Glittering in the scorching sun I looked at you, O Enchanting one As you cavorted with the breeze Those molten gusts upon my skin I gulped in then, the oxygen That sat timorously in the air But I was pulled By the oasis that surrounded you Perfect, paradisiacal Unsundered by the elements There you danced so full of joy I came to you pulled by the spell Of your vividness, O Alluring one You swayed your head Spangled whorls overspread Across the fretwork of your boughs Mesmerized I reached out Into your magic latticed web You pricked me then, O Bewitching one Your thorns were invisible, hidden I knew then that your glittering grace Your wild gumption to face the sun Aren’t just in the softness of your blooms But in the armor you have chiseled from The tempests - stormy and searing I looked at the ruby that had sprung On my fingertip that you had stung It dazzled on my glistening skin Its precious seams filling my lungs My essence and throb, O Wondrous one I found that day in the scorching sun.
Outside in the garden There’s a Passion flower vine Its little green tendrils Have curled here and there Where the shoots are fullest Lushest, most verdant They burgeon and grow Weaving circles of rapture Until they’ve spun around Seven times Lighting up the chakras of life And then just like that Their work done Of dancing in the sun They fall
Inside the house There’s a woman Her hair Is tied up in a bun She’s on the run With little tendrils escaping At the nape of her neck She’s rushing upstairs There’s a toddler emergency And then she races like the wind Into the kitchen To make breakfast And then she’s on the run again Appointments, to-do lists, errands To complete And then back to cook and clean To feed and coddle, kiss a bruised knee
The hours weave their set design Finite, regimented, organized But she has no sense Of their texture or lines The day is done and finally She sits down for a while Soft tendrils forming At the nape - one, two, three I hold my breath I count the whorls in the curls The longest one has six I look away A little thought flits up to me Unexpectedly, a sign Whispering secrets I don’t want to hear Of endings on the whorl-bearing vine
She smiles at me tiredly I wish, I wish fervently That the curls that gather Loosely around her neck Is just hair soaked in sweat In the labour of love I pray, I pray silently Into the depths of whatever’s out there God, the universe, ethereal energy For the moisture laden curls to weave Their mystical circles for a few more years Until they attest To a life well-lived, joyfully Until they wear their silver-grey majesty Before they finally Unspool in eternal rest.
Mahvash Mohtadullah 