My Silk Sonnets
I move my arms slowly through the air,
And imagine them as something spindly,
Something wild and wondrous,
Do I romanticize myself?
Very well, I romanticize,
My arms, that shimmers and moves with ethereal light,
Imagine my arms as long spider legs,
My eyes – as something devoid of light,
Pitch-pure black, a portal to a world of monsters,
And imagine even more as my mouth to be a dark alley,
From which emerges two eyes; glowing in the dark,
Coming closer and closer,
imagine , oh imagine,
As a snake leaps from my depths and takes my lovers on the neck;
Coils around them lovingly; quite fondly
And kisses them a long beautiful kiss of two poisonous bite marks,
( it hisses, it takes, it has no mercy, )
All my lovers die from my poison, all my lovers die a vicious, deadly death
I move my arms lazily through the air
And imagine them to be long spidery legs,
Can you see my mouth? Can you see my beautiful fangs?
Well, can you?
And my long-voluminous abdomen?
( I carry dark things within this spider-body. Do not come near me )
I intricate, I articulate, I release,
Silk threads, silk sonnets
Out into world from a black mysterious depth within my being
Can’t you see? My poetry is my home, my poetry in my web
And do you not know that I, a poet, am in fact a spider?
Dress of Light
A girl stands alone,
Buried deep beneath the looming canopy of an ancient tree; her skin, coated in charcoal darkness
Her arms begin to rise, as if led by invisible strings, and graze the darkness with a strange, lovely fondness,
And her eyes arch upwards, two bright sun blazing in the dark, burning for a hidden sky above her world,
Her body begins to move, sending shimmering ripples across the dark,
And her bare feet start to spin, stumble about each other in bewilderment, searching for some hidden meaning in the details of the cold marble floor,
The laughter of her payal echoes through the dark, and somewhere a breeze awaken and glides over the tree,
The overhead leaves begin to rustle and laugh along with the girl,
And all of a sudden, a thousand tiny skies appear in the dark world of the tree,
Light finally makes its way through it’s hollow hallways,
And falls like hundreds of waterfalls upon the ground, piercing through the dark
The dust begins to rise, enraptured in pure light, and dance along with the girl,
Who swirls in the darkness, dancing to her silent secret song,
Immersed in her ecstatic elation,
Her long flowing lehenga, failing to catch up to her ferocious speed,
Stealing bits of light in a cheerful mischief,
The ring of her nose, twinkling like a star, hiding and materializing in the dark,
The girl stops, all of a sudden, clad in a dress of light and darkness,
And reaches towards the hidden sky with desire,
A delicate shard of light lands silently upon the very tips of her fingers,
Glinting with secrets of the world above before her astonished eyes
And somewhere from deep within the darkness, lost birds begin to sing from chambers hidden in the green kingdom of the tree,
Singing her silent secret song,
The girl looks above in recognition, her olive face washed alight in the vibrant rays,
And the dark, green sky of her world gleams in the golden irises of her eyes,
A dark cathedral hiding her soul beneath
The girl dances on through the centuries, never tiring,
And the leaves of the tree grow crisp and crimson praising her fierce beauty
Until they fall, one by one,
Like defeated lovers at her feet,
And she stands alone, sunlight glistening upon her dark-untouched skin,
In her dress of light.
About the Author
Hurain Ghafoor was born in the city of Swat, Pakistan and now, resides in Islamabad. She wrote a book at the age of 13 and a few years later, discovered poetry. A few of her poems have already been published and she maintains a blog at: https://iamoutwithlantern.wordpress.com/
