By: Andal Srivatsan

I Wonder What I’d Do If I Were Invisible For One Day

In my head, I’d be a samaritan –

take on exigent issues of the day,
like poverty. The other day, I spotted
a young girl in the arms of a woman asking
for alms. Her hair was dirty brown, frayed,
sprinkled with the years’ soot. I would oil,
and wash her hair.

castigate the ones who litter, but with effectual
humour; juvenile pranks, however pleasing,
like toss their trash back at them, or pull the
strands of their hair like they were puppets and
I, an acting god.

catch the miscreants at the electoral banks in
the acts, expose them, and transform the
democratic milieu of my country.

skip over to where creators of genocide stay,
hide their ammunition, confuse them into
thinking that god does not want what they
want to inflict.

My wishful thinking gets ahead of me;
here I am before the mirror, somewhat
diffident, somewhat frantic, censorious
towards myself.

If truth be told, I would –

wear all those smaller sized blouses
I keep wrapped in my wardrobe, and
step outside, not compelled to pull
at the fabric, or carry a jacket that
would hide my figure.

leave that sparse tuft of hair on my upper
lip, and that intractable fuzz between my
two eyebrows, leave that grey that has
begun to run through my scalp’s territory.

stand atop a parapet in my land, and
admonish their noxious, reactionary
points of view.

Capes go to those who have the power to
end the world’s turmoil, but what must
I do for the turmoil within?

I must embrace my foibles, my impuissance –

to infinity and beyond.

Algernon; Yoda

(1)

My excitation is the lone derivative of my consistent
use of stimulant X – a lofty, futuristic and formidable
potion that mushroomed in its finite timeframe through
the extent of my veins and up to my inflated encephalon.

It is an unfamiliar feeling – the kind that puts me in the
centre of Floyd’s song, infected with amusement and
hot air balloons. My notes are illegible under my scribbles
that then became doodles about condensation.

In my wonderment, I wondered if suddenly is spelt with
two Ls or one. The Professor places me by his desk and
dusts his sphygmomanometer.

(2)

Suddenlly professor looks funny with his comically large
nose and thick-rimmed glasses as he takes notes from the
sphygma….eter.

he looks at my doodles and points at the cloud that has
googly eyes.

the sun has thick eyebrows and a smile like an upward
C.

(3)

my pupils dilate even before he puts a torch before my
eyes. they are hazel like my mom’s. he tells me that i
have begin to lose my genius.

i doodel me in this funy room with metal walls. my
stomac is a line that becomes legs. i wear red sandels

he show me sheep. he click finger and he sing a song.
he look like ma

(4)

a genus am i. feeling sleepy am i.

a good night have

I Saw Camus Waiting On Platform 3

I waved, so did he
while cradling a thin cigarette between his two fingers,
peering into the newspaper stand and probably
wondering why the influenza shines on page 1. His forehead
scrunches up, and here I stand, reading between the lines
and clutching onto a tattered copy of The Plague
close to my chest. He offered to sign it, and I know now
that I should’ve paid attention in my French classes
a few years ago; je regrette.

“Lo, Albert, I hear you were the goalkeeper of the Algerian
University Racing club.”

He is now consumed
in his bottle of memories, and off he goes,
where the rail may lead, tipping his beige
ivy cap in my direction and spitting the cigarette bud
into the trash barrel.

I see now, how a plague comes running
in times of the flu.

###

Andal Srivatsan is a writer first, and a financial professional, based out of Bangalore. She writes book reviews and poetry on her Instagram handle every now and again, and has been published in places like TBLM.