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"Violoncello" & "That Scary Feeling Of The Being A Freed Balloon" by Kushal Poddar




Violoncello


In a Wednesday subway train,

undulating, the fresh boyfriend

tucks his girl in the U his hands make

supported against the handle rail.


They are music,

and then a man with a violoncello

comes aboard.

For a jiffy I imagine him playing out

a bollywood scene.

He mops his sweat, looks at the couple.

The crowd allows room for the musician

the way water accepts water.



That Scary Feeling Of The Being A Freed Balloon


Yeah, the balloon I let loose

has become a lone-star, recluse,

floating, art, two-way sadness

and a stoic in search


for my fingers still curled,

but when a breeze brings it

down to the tree we named a name

now unremembered in our childhood,

yeah, freedom has made it ascetic


as if the fright of its solo flight

has filled an immortal but wrong soul

into its rubber skin. At night it


is my moon, the south side of it,

asking 'why'. "I was scared too."

I murmur. Crickets form a vast

meadow around us.





The author of 'Postmarked Quarantine' has eight books to his credit. He is a journalist, father, and the editor of 'Words Surfacing’. His works have been translated into twelve languages, published across the globe.


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