I want a crown of daisies
& seeds of joy that will Insha Allah
become flowers on my grave
& I want verdant auroras
& orange sunsets peeking from behind
black imprints of soaring trees
& I want a mellow metamorphosis,
a spicy serendipity
& to get lost in stranger lands,
unknown faces, unknown cafes,
white-walled libraries and brick paths
knitted along cottaged villages
& I want trips of consolation to see
that the world’s still a good place
& a great wealth that the infirmary doesn’t have
& I want childish carelessness
to spatter its pixie dust on me again
& I want to bid farewell to boats of pessimism
before resuming journey
on wiser footsteps
Note: ‘Insha Allah’ is an Arabic word meaning ‘if God wills.’
Anam Tariq is a poet/writer from India with an MA (English) and a poetry collection A Leaf upon a Book (Leadstart, 2022). She runs The Wordsridge Newsletter on Substack and writes for Writers’ Cafeteria and other publications. She is also a reader at West Trade Review and Culinary Origami Journal. Anam’s poems appear in The Punch Magazine, nether Quarterly, coalitionworks, SeaGlass Literary, The Amazine and elsewhere. In her free time Anam loves immersing herself in books.
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