Four Clover Life- By Namrata Shailendra Singh

In a world of ephemeral, or what we also know as MAYA(largely rooted in the Indian philosophical concept of Māyā, Maya means "illusion"), the loss feels real; the loss feels permanent. How? Why? "How does it feel to wake up to the Date Palms its shamrock fingers wrapped in marigold rays Does it leave its hue on the busy canvas a magic that visits you every day. To the bells of church and kinder songs and cinnamon wafting from the rolls that rise a bakery of hope to hold you strong you look forward to the familiar surprise. The lullaby of the placid waves as you sleep with the Pacific in your eyes Does it rock you to a world so far Where dreams and desires crystallize. And yet, the palms, the waves, the bells that ring Is winter forever without your spring for when you lose the one you loved you lose a piece, your everything. and that is just how love operates and that is how loss communicates the canary song that once felt so right mourns silently in the charcoal night...

Cooing, cuddling, cajoling, commanding... A mother's modus operandi changes, but her love for her child does not. At a subterranean level, her child continues to be in her womb, even with long limbs that can't fit in her embrace. Her enduring love, juxtapositioned against the changing ripples and tides of time as the child grows, presents a complicated predicament- hold on or let go. Eventually, she knows her destiny; however, she cannot deny that she feels betrayed, not by her child but by what she believed in when she held him for the first time- he will forever be mine. Torn between the autonomy that the child craves and the many small and big separations that result as a consequence, makes her sometimes feel abandoned, remorseful, and lost. The poem is about that moment in a mother's life and can almost sound like an elegy to what once was. The usage of words like cyclone, to some readers, may appear hyperbolic, but to her, the absence of a miniature motion of love is n...

I keep my "i" small— allowing it to sit on the rustic fence of life, inhaling the dalliance of the zephyr, the daisies, and the daffodils, knowing well, any time it can teeter and fall by words and worry, anger and anxiety. That our hearts—with their entangled crimson arteries— have an even more entangled life— mysterious and mischievous. We can never be too sure, too certain of its beats. One time black metal, and the other time lullabies. I keep my "i" small— the path on which I walk wasn't carved out only for me. The medallion sun did not single me out for bees' bounties. Millions have walked on the stony ballast, winning and losing their valuable something along. Millions will continue to traverse long after I have ended my song. The small "i" in me makes room for mistakes. I know I am capable of, and I am sure I did commit— indisputably so— that while I can present, I can also paralyze; while I can dream, I can also destroy; while I can conc...

 

 

  "I have a lot of dead people in my family now. They inhabited the stories my father regaled us( my sister and I) with as we went about not minding our own business. Stories of uncles and aunts far and near, stories of childhood squabbles and village life, stories of growing up, marriage, and becoming distant, stories of give and take, property disputes, and stories of gold jewelry and silk sarees during nieces’ weddings. Then many of them died, and I let them die in my thoughts too. But, you won’t find him here. Imagine a 12-inch pizza, a Neapolitan crust with your favorite toppings ( you could choose jalapenos, basil, olives, or bell pepper)  divided into eight slices, four sides loaded with fresh mozzarella, hot, and lip-smacking. For me, he represented the four slices: the richest, the creamiest, and umami.  The day he died, I made love to my husband, the newlywed groom. Frightened by his death, though I knew it was coming any time, I found solace on a beige-colore...