Death, unknown

 

yes, yes, I know we come alone go alone but when we come may it be to the sounds of love

and arms roped in an embrace and when we go, and when we go may there be at least one

person next to us, the one who has loved us for an instant even, or someone who has maybe

one lonely night prodded the moon and broken a bit off for you

 

no one should have to die alone

 

but you did, and at that instant, what was happening outside? Were there birds in flight, those

tropical ones that disappear, a stroke of colour in a flash or did a half moon rise or did bats

speak to each other in sonic whispers or did a woman murmur in her lover’s ears not now not

today?

 

you didn’t have to die alone

 

and what about the others who knew you, the husband, the friend, the lover, lover turned

friend or friend turned lover, where was he? where was anyone? the mother the father the

sisters who are meant to love, the brothers who are meant to protect, the aunts, the uncles

where were they in their worlds not knowing, not knowing, you were slipping away

 

you cold and alone

 

and so we think, we wonder asunder, how did it come to this

did you call the moment or did the moment call you

illicit whispers from worlds away cracking the earth into two?

 

*****

 

The Healing

 

See, its autumn, then its winter

and when everything dies, they heal

under the earth

 

these little daffodils the bulbs I have planted

they grow don’t they every year every spring?

life within, life grows, it heals

so why not these wounds?

these ruptures will patch

skin, nerves, capillaries heal

 

everything changes

why not then this pain

that sits many splendoured

taking forms shape shifting

someday it will stop biting

and stop stinging, start scabbing

time it heals they say; hardens

the skin over these wounds, then heals

 

so will I

become myself, like yesterday again

before there was a you, before you

could rip in so deep, rip me so true

slowly, again, it will happen, I will heal

 

 

 

Mona Dash writes fiction and poetry. Her work includes: a novel ‘Untamed Heart’ (Tara India Research Press, 2016), two poetry collections, Dawn- Drops (Writer’s Workshop, 2001) and A certain way (Skylark Publications UK, 2016), and her memoir A Roll of the Dice: a story of loss, love and genetics (Linen Press, UK, 2019). A Roll of the Dice is currently a finalist for the Peoples Book Prize UK.

Mona was awarded a ‘Poet of excellence’ award in the House of Lords, London in 2016. Her work has been published and anthologised widely. She has been listed in various competitions such as The Asian Writer, Bath Short Story, Bristol Short Story, Fish Short story, Strand International, Words and Women, Leicester Writes, Momaya Press, to name some. Her (unpublished) short story collection Let us look elsewhere was shortlisted for the 2018 SI Leeds Literary Award. Mona leads a double life; a Telecoms Engineer and a MBA, she works as a sales manager in a global technology organisation. Originally from India, she lives in London. She is also a member of the British South Asian Writers Collective, The Whole Kahani, and is published in both their anthologies. www.monadash.net