My Best Friend

To Menika Sitalia

By Pallavi Mishra

I know you since those days when black and white were your favorite colours.

Some 65 kgs you were, but your smile was still worth million dollars.

A high bun and baggy capris were your trade mark then.

And your tick tock walk was perfect and exactly ten on ten.

You were almost always sick but I was never sick of you.

I am still as crazy for my Meni as I was before thin you grew.

There was some divine connection that I just can’t explain

You always loved me so much without expecting any gain

We don’t talk for days and don’t see each other for months in whole

But whenever we reunite, it’s like we are two bodies and one soul

You are one person who inspires me more than all the people in trend.

Meni my love, you are an angel sent from heaven for me as my Best Friend.

The Exploration

By Pallavi

I counted all mile stones, all trees and all sign boards.

Baffled by the coequal symphony, I broke the reckoning cords.

How much far have I come and how much more I have to cover.

There must be a speed limit; there must be a route more sober.

The distance seems uncalculative, the route looks latterly unearthed.

The winds smell crude and land cluttered with fictions obnoxiously versed.

Scared I run on the inescapable road, finally I sit to catch some breath.

I fall asleep only to wake up in arms of one who holds all the wealth.

A Calamity Level Hatred

So much hatred that a calamity level it has reached.

We talk about Gaza and cry but our home is no more different as it earlier seemed.

“Madam you are from which state? UP or Bihar?”

Well, Mishra is my name and I am not from a state very far.

He went on and said he is happy that the roads are empty

“The only good things about Eid-ul-Fitr is that there is less traffic at this hour”

“Why can’t these Muslims fight amongst themselves and die”

“Why can’t we be a Hindu state and flaunt our cultural tie”

I was sitting at the back seat, shun as a robot and quiet as a toy

Couldn’t digest the fact that my driver has just broke into my ‘peaceful India’ coy.

“I hate these people” and he kept staring at the road ahead in wheeze.

When asked his reason for hate, he could only say this

“We go to Dargah but they never visit a Temple. They live on a lie”

And I said: I am a Hindu and I never go to temple. Do I deserve to die?

He looked back and smiled and then turned to his loving road with his mouth mum.

The pang in my stomach remained and I still don’t know what is in our kitty in the days to come.