• Vol. 04
  • Chapter 02
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Flash Burn

At night, memories strike and dreams
become a funicular on a precarious descent. Years ago
in Goa, my foremothers knelt at the shore, let down their hair and carved
their pain into the rocks.
And there are days
when I feel I still carry their grief in my bones.
These women from whom I have inherited my eyes, the tilt of my head, a sudden flash of irritation.
These women whomI have never known, but whose embers I carry in my soul.
What were they thinking when they prayed for sons?
It was their daughters who carried them home. And they left us
with nothing but a razor edged past
heavy as stone and a ferocity
to endure. To burn through nights eclipsed in pain.
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