our world has no appetite / for speech
unencrypted on paper / erupting
in loose parlance / most of my realm is
unfamiliar with my tongue / slipping
from my lips, my thoughts: translating / sindhi
never quite makes it to most fingertips / erratic
but a demise from re-routing / re-scripting
for a world that spares one food for night / the self:
a clown of a million norms / an unsettling
mischief of color / drifting through
a marketplace of identities / each dent
is familiar / but never complete
ly severed from skin / when
jewels, homes, and kin fall off
ships, deeds, and history / since my beginning,
i have only known endings / in fact
my nerves lose their tails / trillions
abruptly off the radar / when i can’t
read or write (to) her / ashamed,
unrecorded / our fuzzy lore of shame
binds us / resilient, gullible
oblivious, or unafraid / when maa
doesn’t point anywhere
to an inquiry of homeland / i look
at the koki1 on my plate / all traces
tease time please fate
dry hunger for the written
disappointing that nobody is ever looking
at the lines in her palm, as she wanders,
grasping at everything that leaves a crease.
a traditional sindhi flatbread made from whole wheat, with onions, chillies and spices
Madhuri Lalwani is an Indian poet from Chennai. She holds a masters in English Literature from Ashoka University and is a recipient of their 2022 English M.A. Prize for her scholarly growth. She is an alumna of the International Writing Program’s Summer Institute in 2021 and 2022, hosted by the University of Iowa. Her interests are at the intersection of writing, research, and education. She explores her Sindhi identity in both academic and creative capacities. Some of her poems have appeared in anthologies such as Swansong, Crosswalks, and Verse of Silence. She currently works in the Office of Admissions at Ashoka University and is based in New Delhi.