A salt-laden gust swoops through the grove and

wrings the ashok tree looming high, drains ruby petals

into a swirl of scarlet sweat, slays waves of sunken hair

and tresses of emerald grass like a visage of moonlit

murder, slashes jade leaves that plead to cotton clouds,

and bleeds the currents above my cheeks into Ganga’s

sacred delta, that carries sorrow as its sediment, as I

lay my head to rest against the rose-imbued trunk with

riven veins of the tree that wails like me: a queen

among the wretched. 

 

I caress the cherry chest of that wallowing wood

and whisper my goodbyes as I water its roots, tear

the auburn cloth that grazes my ankles, inhale the

taunting tendrils of scents once fragrant now sour

with sneer, sop up the salt as it runs around my

lips, and shriek a howl to echo pious Sati as she

fell to furious fire, which told the world what

womanhood was, as the ashok welcomes my

embrace and allows me to ascend its ravaged

arms and be what it cannot: free among the

bounded.