In Memoriam

A part of my life over.

No more a daughter

No more a home

Where I have memories stored —

Of an old cane chair

A cat that suns itself

And sits on the rooftop of the car

Of honeysuckle wines

Drooping overladen with young blooms

Held up by aged yellow walls

Of my mother's roses,

Large and small

Vying in colours and shades

Of a plum blossom smiling

At honeybirds drinking from its depths

Of a father

Bent and old —

Grey haired and gnarled

But still there for me

As the house folds itself into papers

And exchanges hands,

I feel the sense, the smell fade

Into distant hills

That like stalwarts oversee

The now vacant lot...

Eventually,

To be inhabited by new bodies and new minds.

— New souls housed among the old brick walls—

Mitali Chakravarty's poetry has been published online and as part of anthologies. Her poetry has been translated into German and also been part of a recent PEN symposium.