Poetry by Deepika Rani

Edited by Mohammad “Moh” Samhouri

In this house of words 

Rests an Almirah 

A portal replete with memories

My aashiyana, my refuge

Better shut, some doors appear

Like a showpiece

Insulated from harm 

Read this account from time’s quill

It’s been 7 minutes

It’s been 7 years

Since I’ve let it remain 

With me, it walked like a shadow

As deep as the flesh

Closed it may be, 

But its pain still enters me like an image in a mirror

Immediate and piercing like birth pangs

I’m no woman that can hide her emotions behind a veil

So why pretend

If an old pain wants to trespass my road

Why not welcome it again

It’s been so many moons since I opened your almirah

knocked on its door

inhaled the Persian wine stains

Picked on them like scabs

And felt the lines on my fingers ignite and burn away

From the seething heat of memory emanating from it

I withdrew my hand, startled

But then I met him

Nestled within the shelves

Your footfall

That familiar shift in gravity

The icy touch of your talisman

The tattered Pashmina

My monsoon drenched black saree

The poems I kept boxed in a safe 

I felt the dust on my eyelashes fall upon them like a feather

They are there when I open it

Alive and waiting 

Listening without judgment

There is nothing they ask for

They simply remain seated

As if they were expecting me

I see the lines on their visage

The withered ink of kismet

Like Hafez’s wine so sweet

Both aged with grace

I embrace it to my chest

And break like glass in its shelter

For a moment, the stories remain written in the air

They do not breathe

Even so, they remain alive

In your Almirah, they reside

When I open it they speak in whispers

When I close it, they echo in silence

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Artist Statement: Almirah is a lone word from the Arabic “almara”, meaning armoire or place of storage. In my poem “Echoes from my Almirah” I aim to explore the memories we collect in our mental almirahs and how they stay with us throughout our lives. Memories aren’t solely tied to physical events; they also stem from our own imagination and projections. Perhaps it’s a human tendency to inflate and imagine people and experiences to mean more than what they actually do. They nevertheless leave an indelible mark on our lives. It’s painful but a beautiful thing to be able to craft our own memories, to take something so ordinary and imbue it with life. It may mean nothing to anyone else but it means everything to you.

This poem invites you to meditate upon the intricate dance between what is reality and what transpires in the recesses of the mind. I welcome you to a peek into my almirah. I encourage you to open your own and speak to it. Whether you decide to empty out or keep the memories in your almirah is up to you. Either way, I wish you liberation and peace within yourself.