My Mind's Countryside

Lotuslands entwined with dust roads, pot-holed roads,
stony soil, stippled now
with pulsing sap greens turning inexorably into ochre browns,
brushed across pthalo blue hills and violet valleys;
the horizon etched like twisted wire fencing impasto starry nights.
Gnarled banyans with their snarled roots snaking into the subsoil,
glowing gulmohars spray their fiery flowers in unruly bouquets,
prickly thorn-brush pierce through paper thin top soil, un-named weeds,
un-tamed, tumble in the blowing breeze,
their smoky scent infusing silent forests.

Aqua-tinted daubs of dreams
stain Van Dyke brown plateaus where crimson poinsettias spread
their poisoned leaves that pretend to be flowers;
dancing datura, peppery capsicum, narcotic narcissus,
bursting bougainvilleas, writhe, grasp, burrow
in the underbrush.

Shadowy creatures silhouetted against painted memories.
Brittle bones lie strewn across dying river-beds. A path disappears
into the unknown.

A road sign says slow down, sharp turn ahead.

-by Rita Putatunda

Shades Of Grey

In shades of grey, the clouds
Fill the air with a breath caught in the throat
Hide the sky in fogs of silence
Wrap the mountains with tender tendrils of misty veil
Attire the flowering bush, the young sapling, the dead tree stump
surrounded by bursting shoots
In teardrops of pearls, diamonds, rubies and rust
Mirror themselves in shades of grey
On the crinkled face of the opaque lake