When Blood Becomes a Lullaby
by Susmita Aryal
POEMS’ TRANSCRIPTIONS
GOD COLOR
And there’s this beauty,
I am never reaching.
Last evening,
we both went missing
in the forest like the day break from its girl.
My hair like a wildfire,
I ran & screamed so I could hear myself. Once I fell in love with
a girl that I picked the paper & leaves and I colored it.
I spoke to her as if,
she knows: why beauty so much looks like you and
still not enough to become beautiful?
And why when we see
each other, do we see the only body first?
How when people
saw me, they widened in awe & stood too
little for amen.
How many times did this body fall only to pick up her day.
How many times did my hands try killing, then found their fingers—
and I literally dipped in deep red
like the sunset viewed through a bottle hole, that dropped the red color
like blood dripping from my body.
How it quickly spread to my skin—
red made me all of a sudden woman?
If this blood holds so much weight, Then why does my body hurt?
Maybe the color I carried
was never mine alone.
Maybe my blood spoke the same shade that painted my mother’s silence.
THE NIGHT LULLABIES
Allegedly what they left you is what you could live after.
Remember,
leaving is also to living when dying is to living.
Like a forest without leaves— What of leaves without trees?
Like a mother’s shade without a daughter.
Last night, my mama cuddled me
into her arms. With a handful of tears, she caressed me long, so she could zip
my lips & let the wind outside howl—
until all the leaves fall off the trees, and like Fall, her feet turning into white nudes
from the purple circle ruin that now everyday rings in the morning.
When she bruised her body for price, She had no choice.
Her skin too learnt to run quickly.
Or maybe... I still am.
Misfired by her black speaking balls,
I remember how her hands often loved me during the night—
that my eyes too waited for her sight.
When she was leaving me
in dawn like a rain, there was
just nobody—only me & empty house.
I could understand
how she paid her only sweat that glinted bright
because she paid for the light.
When grandma left us,
it feels still—like an air, like a season in a year.
To kiss her just once
is about a blue moon
that sparkled kerosene underneath my socket—
far off the room, when
my hands soft but drought with cold, and I spoke out of sweats,
looking at my mama, I said:
How about growing up
in a room worn for the ink for her mother?
A leaf pressed inside a paper
that waves even without a wind.
It may be a drop but not inferior to the ocean.
Even for a granddaughter without grandma—
a daughter’s shade could be permanent for her mother, just enough
to hear, the unheard—
The Night Lullabies.
About
Susmita Aryal is a Kathmandu based published Author and an Independent Journalist. She is a dedicated communications professional with years of writing and publishing experiences. She brings 4.5 years of writing and reporting experiences - working with various digital and media organizations. She has two years of volunteering experience with The Pad Project as an Ambassador/Advisor advocating for menstrual equity. She is also a current Ambassador for Their World that centers its work around child's education. Meanwhile, she is looking forward to working with Nepal Climate Hub as a Climate Storyteller.