Umbilicus
He spends long hours in a steam bath scrubbing clean each square inch of the skin and squeaky cleaning each nook of the digits as if attempting to froth away the neurochemicals of inheritance.. trying to wash away stubborn memories.
Memories of a mother whose dendrons came alive in her eyes as scarlet of branched veins when the tentacles of paranoia gripped her. If a scientist were to put electrodes in her brain he could measure the degree of her psychosis, the tautness of nerves that distorted her face, the crackle of tension at the synapses when she shrieked, the gushing of blood to her brain when she grew violent and the dose of sedative needed to reduce the frequency of thoughts. Acridity that burnt her youth and his childhood never got diluted.
Some sparks from her neurons passed the placental barrier, the redness brimming at the corner of his eyes in the mirror threatens to spill over too.
howling moon…
threadbare
the fabric of night
Yesha Shah
Untitled
Bruno Coelho
A list of entirely useless things I always keep handy
½ a teaspoon of dread
¾ cup of recycled words
½ a pinch of artificial flavouring/pleasantries
2 ½ cups of minced phrases
1 ½ cups of finely diced libido
1 litre of distilled feelings
sprigs of conversations from a decade ago
a bag full of I-told-you-so
¾ cup of recycled words
½ a pinch of artificial flavouring/pleasantries
2 ½ cups of minced phrases
1 ½ cups of finely diced libido
1 litre of distilled feelings
sprigs of conversations from a decade ago
a bag full of I-told-you-so
drawing a blank again crystal ball
Shloka Shankar
mood doom
The Night of San Lorenzo
Johannes S. H. Bjerg
Untitled
Vemod
CONCENTRICITY
The brain sways like a bob suspended on a nylon string between two worlds. Delirium. Anti-pyretics, anti-histamines and anti-biotics conjure up an obnoxious after-taste on the salivary glands. Vision of everything around spins like a reel of 70mm cinema strip. Senses drift into the alpha level of cognizance. Passing thoughts pour in at tandem. Lines demarking the real from the virtual start blurring. Surreal obscurity fills in. Fragile emotions come to surface, old regrets raise their vile heads.
Supposed to be a special rain drop that would fall upon a prism and splash out into a myriad of brilliant hues, here I am, getting carried away on a stray strand of destiny into sheer nothingness. The slide show of randomness continues till I wake up soaked in perspiration.
paradigm the fraying borders of an inkblot
Yesha Shah
Epitaph
“I’m dying.”
“Are you sure?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“This is the third time I’ve heard you say that this week.”
“It’s true! I feel like my brain is constipated!”
“Oh! Now I see where the shitty ideas are spewing from.” He smirks ironically.
“I’m going to die from writer’s block.”
“Nobody has ever died from writer’s block! Can you quit whining?”
I look away and continue to sulk. He traces the invisible wood grains on the table with his fingernail and hums under his breath.
Outside, rain clouds paint my epitaph.
on the same line as me silverfish
the other bunny 