Bamboozlement

Echinated transfers spike: a dystopian

tryst I wish on no one. Never happy as

a satisficer: this is my essence and ache.

For years I vocalized, may speechless-

ness fly where my drumming failed to.

A slow learner it took half a century to

read the cast in your eyes. Crushed  by

suppositiousness is blankety-blank worse

than straight out swindling. One can’t

even seek relief by rebuking oneself.

Colors

Whorls of your finger as fard on pinnate

of my brows. When appetence prods us

we peel ourselves of paint. Our lines, pauses,

intonations turn to autoschediasm, breaking

into brogue. Pilgrimage is a guilt-free holiday

in house-holds of humble bearings: flushing

with resin of restive beats our orison. Pan-

handlers of love: this calm, our wages.

Evoker

Auditory sensations from symphonette

initiated the much needed collyrium.

We never possessed musical skills for

a melisma, in essence that was the thrust

of our tie-in. Especially in the early part

when unilateral rulings hadn’t coerced

us to backslide from the constitution

of closeness. It unleashed a rum do

we failed to capitulate.

Burn Up

In our region there are no eglantines.

I inhale the dash from dustbins.  An

unanswered email hurts less than a

smile not returned. Demulcent fuel

packs distance. You volplane in my

mind’s home plate without signals.

I need to sack my ATS officials. I

will cashier from your ledger.

---

Sanjeev Sethi is the author of three books of poetry. His most recent collection is This Summer and That Summer (Bloomsbury, 2015). His poems are in venues around the world: The Broadkill Review, After the Pause, Chicago Record Magazine, Horror Sleaze and Trash, Former People, Stickman Review, Ann Arbor Review, Neologism Poetry Journal, Home Planet News, London Grip, Morphrog 16, Postcolonial Text, and elsewhere. He lives in Mumbai, India.