Tag Archives: courage

Onset of Illness

Posted on by akanksha gupta

I can breathe,
But with each breath
Unease
Sweeps through

Guts twist and churn,
Conscious thrums the chest
Off beat
At every turn

When empty,
Hunger gnaws
With claws
That painfully feed

When bloated,
Even the rot of despair
Clots
To never weep

And when breathless,
Though gusts of air
Flail piteously

I can still breathe

I can always breathe

But the still in the air
Waylays the mind
Distills the spirits
Consumes the soul

Dreary dispassion
Threatens
To possess
The body whole

Eventually, it weaves
A frighteningly hypnotic trance
That grips the unwitting senses
In its maddeningly deathless dance

– Akanksha Gupta

Shaky First Steps

Posted on by akanksha gupta
Sky Diving from the Macau Tower
Near the Temple of Na Tcha

Smirking, the shards of your rainbow
Cut deep my days and my nights
Folding the blades of my elbows
I stare at the edge of alright

Reason curdles at my fingertips
Toes burrow into hot sands
Cold gains foothold in my stomach
Winds blow ice from distant lands

Flickering, the shadows gather
Black clouds dance in my sight
Rain pelts reality at blind spots
Whetting with caution my appetite

– Akanksha Gupta

Making History

Posted on by akanksha gupta

My bones are black
Chapped with the ashes of my past
They stack up like a house of cards
The soot dribbles from their sinews
No gust of wind can whisk asunder
The faith that bids them continue
And weave the tapestry of time –
Oh weave a tapestry of time
That steals all my blunder away
Until the victory is all mine
And I am the captain of my fate

Cobbled streets,
Paved roads,
Pedestrians abound,
En route to the
Ruins of St. Paul,
Macau

– Akanksha Gupta

I am

Posted on by akanksha gupta 
I am what I am 
Exactly the way I am
Varnished, unvarnished, 
Tarnished by tide
I gleam in the morrow
Swim in the today
The night is nigh
Tomorrow is another day
And unlike yourself
You might find me staid
But I am happy to keep up
With me at my own pace

The race never dies
Fatigue sets in sometimes
And I kip in the boulevard 
Of my mind
There right across the corner
Between sun-kissed trees
Where the hammock stretches 
Oh so invitingly
I lie in thought
In waking dream
And knock upon my reveries

You knock upon my reveries
I curl, and sigh
And squeeze shut my eyes
But the reel escapes 
My memory
I groan and rise
You needn’t knock twice
Tomorrow has come
I know
Life beckons only once 

– Akanksha Gupta

Lock and Key

Posted on by akanksha gupta

Lurking in the depths of my soul
The hunger unfettered, growls and roars

I grab it tight with both my arms
With fingers unclenched from clammy palms

Yet fear threatens to swallow all sound
The muted ringing of silence surrounds

I dare not open my eyes, and stare
Into the very eyes of despair

On a face that could so easily mirror my own
Had it not been wildly unkempt and so very old

Dazed, startled, I uncurl again, and again glimpse
The future that spins anew with every blink

~ Akanksha Gupta (poem)

Betwixt the Shallows of my Depths

Posted on by akanksha gupta
Does One 'Compromise' Fit All?

These are tears of yesteryear
Trailing the frowns etched ‘cross a lifetime
This is a mess of bitter words
That ego-clenched hearts left behind

Tracing the passage of the years
I cast every sulfurous word aside –
An attempt to conciliate maturity
That leaves my sanity mortified

Inside, a storm brews strong and fierce
Unrelenting in its intensity
Whilst my lips purse in a smile
And uncrease my brows with acridity

– Akanksha Gupta (poem)

Fearless

Posted on by akanksha gupta

The stars are in your eyes
The clouds under your feet
And at your fingertips
The skies seemingly breathe

Their breath tickles your face
With sprays of sand and salt
As the clouds disintegrate
And into the sea you fall

The sea’s swallowed the sun
And the tears of the night
Now the night is on the run
Here creeps in the morning light

Through the canopy of leaves
The netted sunbeams prance
They prick away the sleep
And fill awe in every glance

– Akanksha Gupta

Beautiful

Posted on by akanksha gupta

The Night is mine;
Its tranquil undergrowth
Its eerie loveliness
Its wayward melody
Whose every haunting note
Hides
The silent screams
That seize my lungs,
That claw out but in vain,
Clinging onto sheer desperation
In the madness of this moment
That seems to have
Frozen
Into a brief ‘forever’ –
One of the many
That sulk and skulk
About the sidewalks of my nights
Casting their shadows smooth
Upon the dark and the deep
That glide
Into its mystery –
Like friends of old
They greet
To meet before,
Again, they part
There is a stark comfort
In this that though the Day’s
Disguise is yours,
The Night is mine,
For me, mine alone –
Its louring scaffolding
Its liberating anonymity
Its untold lore of yore
Its unabashed beauty

– Akanksha Gupta