Hrishikesh Srinivas


Five divided

I. Graced

The aching and the meaning of a brief balm
some say to be applied in lieu of true union
every last one questions be driven be driver
rushing of stream all searching akin distinct
only distant thrum of gorge’s surrender past

amongst others we yearn for ourselves
yet when in solitude in solidarity with us
disturbing noise disturbed in turn by myself
continual opening closing – individuality adds in a
silent garden no discerned fall nor δοξα, none knocking none shut out.


II. Missed

When I spoke to you last after light you
were there where I was not like a ¢ustom
sorely since have I missed that train
and its recurrent arrival of thouɠht

haunts the remaining wasteful w wait
as you fly further to your fate
and much of time is the ɧeart leaping in
the saltimbanques’ ͼircle, more more to come.


III. Grounded

Forgot that words are mere work
and not place but could have done a l o    t
worse than to remind of that sensuality   l o s t

because every street corner finds┌ you
and all drone footage reveals ¯\_ the world _/¯
to be bound in and ripped from                      Ɐagabond heart.


IV. Followed

Those who flee seeking to forget those who fly to affirm origins
the rest forgotten still here to be to feel their nuisant necessity it was

and it wasn’t us is and isn’t as it is a symptom of sickness the world’s
discourse lies on doorsteps, and human atrocities still have hiding places.


V. Messaged

Stranger’s inflection come forward to kiss the land stepped back into self

Dare afterwards hold onto that necked smile for heart’s every blind saudade?

They pack their belongings At their circle Tree branches Lighted Catch Pass the masks Johari windows The depth of it Against all Are wilful And shared Falling Social and emotional Mediated virtual spaces Where they found Whittling away Conversation Will so what do you do Apart from remain afraid Saturdays’ suns find They wonder Wonder that Trying to carve out In rainy aureole In seasonal weeks The hands restless Even face to face The moves Far more con brio than Relied on Stocked How many?

Draw Blinds And look Before going home Thin and wet and glistening In the light rain The drops and dribble Of those Unnatural shadows Containment months Counsel Starved Secure in Wind as the ground holds onto Distancing As of yet Remarks prepared earlier Televised All too often Become Of people and Families and pets About their fellows and debts So much depends on The tide of cases The sunlight a smoke and Worse to come Packing it in Even overcome By people on the street Let go As sense always second guessed With tears How many?

Last To shelter in place That day Transmitting the afternoon sun Them twinkling Watching The mirror bends They are told The freest feeling Unemployed fraud charged The chill of Despair Not one and the same At capacity for this And made to order Nightly tail offs An innocuous host A nonstarter Their hangings on In wait lines Read livelihoods A combative enterprise As the bow the fore wave In porthole the face a love Harvest years Rolls running Even tapes of Plying instruments By sight Alone By beds How many?

Hrishikesh Srinivas hails from Sydney, Australia. He enjoys reading and writing poetry, with poems having appeared or forthcoming in UNSWeetened Literary Journal, Hemingway's Playpen, Otoliths and Mantis. He was awarded the Dorothea Mackellar National Poetry Award in 2011 and the Nillumbik Ekphrasis Poetry Youth Award in 2013, also being included in the 'Laughing Waters Road: Art, Landscape and Memory in Eltham' 2016 exhibition catalogue. He is currently a graduate student in electrical engineering at Stanford University, USA.
 
 
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