Sometimes in dreams it
seems as if ancient memories roam through my consciousness, exposing the
temporary identity I call my: self.
This poem explores that identity and my
true spiritual identity, and it asks the question how did I get where I am
today?
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| Photographic art by the author, Janavi Held |
Forefit
by Janavi Held
Her solitude wraps round
her
like a lover, like God,
like an illness and its
remedy,
like shattered stone,
like insatiable waves,
like the blunt flash of
electricity
splintering the sky.
As her discarded heart
fractures
wet hands of ruined fears
reach for the only One who
will listen
the One who hears
when all humans are dead,
when oxygen stops
breathing,
and humiliated gravity has
lost her power.
It is in this death of
family
and all things impersonal
that she is seen at last
reaching for the
invincible echo
as she trembles with
ending stories,
personalities, and
discarded treasures
she can no longer remember
why
her eyes and hair are
brown
why she chose the burgundy
curtains
that hang in her bedroom
or why she prays for sleep
on endless nights.
She can no longer see
her mother’s face in her
eyes
nor hear her father’s deep
voice in her mind
she can’t imagine who this
is
as she stares at her
reflection,
as she gazes through a
pane of glass
at the blistering night
sky
the history of the earth
shakes
in her solar plexus,
drops from her hands,
secretes from her skin
splintering, dripping
and mixing
with rock,
and thoughts,
and time
and still she can’t
remember a believable
history,
can’t imagine
why
she forfeited
the eternal sky.
 |
| Photographic art by Janavi Held |
Janavi Held is the author of Letters to my Oldest Friend: A Book of Poetry and Photography. She has also contributed poems to two poetry anthologies, Bhakti Blossoms: A Collection of Contemporary Vaishnavi Poetry and GODDESS: When She Rules: Expressions by Contemporary Women. Two of her poems were shortlisted for the prestigious Hamilton House International Poetry Prize awarded by the University Centre Grimsby, and published in their anthology "Eternal". Janavi started writing poetry and wandering around with her father’s camera as a child. At the age of nineteen, she began practicing Bhakti yoga. She held a bachelor’s degree from Goddard College where she studied poetry, photography, and media studies. She passed away peacefully in December of 2018 after having battled a brutal illness. You may read more of her poems and view her artwork on her website here and Facebook page here.
Beautiful photographs and poem!! Thank you!
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