The Dream: A Pantoum
Eyes shut I saw you over me
You picked up the gun on the table
Pressed the barrel to your chest
Bang, bang. You were dead.
You picked up the gun on the table
Gun that belonged to another
Bang, bang. You were dead
You slipped away in the dark.
Gun that belonged to another
Man who sleeps in my bed
You slipped away in the dark
Like you did when we were together.
Man who sleeps in my bed
Pressed the barrel to your chest
Like you did when we were together
Eyes shut I saw you over me.
A Ghazal For My Mother
When the hours are heavy with my weight
I see you standing by the door, my shy mother
A shy stranger, gulping your meals in haste
To burrow child like in bed, my child mother
At the edge of bed, I read your childish dreams
Mapping places on your face, my wandering mother
If only I could shroud you, with anything and everything
If only I can stop thinking how you stopped my heart, mother
The day you bit off lipstick, knowing it chocolate
The daughter of Maya ceased, my heart mother.
Swati Rendon is an emerging poet based in Southwest Louisiana. Her writing explores the everyday human experience and memory.This is her first publication.
