By: Mini Babu

Once you nearly die
you turn unafraid,
you request for two days,
to assort life.

Trust me,
you do not focus on
what people think you would. . .

Rather,
you recall your first love,
you retrieve the day
you drew near
your best friend
brushing sides,
you recollect the moment
you side-glanced
your neighbour’s lunch at school
and marveled
for the rest of the day
how she untangled
the long ribbons of rice
to squeeze gracefully
into her mouth.

And then,
you go home
to your mother and father
and your eyes
swell in delight,
you remember
your grandmother
who said she was afraid
to die
and you laugh softly.

And then you repent
not collecting
your notes to modern poetry
from the student
you gave it to,
those papers smelled
your womanhood.

Meanwhile,
you make way
and walk ahead,
ahead is the path to death.
Some say, you recede in death,
how could you now tell
them otherwise.

Once you nearly die,
you turn unafraid
and laugh softly
at your grandmother
who said
she was afraid to die.

###

Dr Mini Babu is working as Associate Professor of English with the Department of Collegiate Education, Government of Kerala and now working at BJM Govt. College, Chavara, Kollam. Her poems have been featured in anthologies, journals and magazines. Her collections of poems are Kaleidoscope (2020), Shorelines (2021) and Memory Cells (2022). Her co-edited collection of poems is Meraki (2021).