Wish Fountains

Paridhi Poddar, India

Mother told me that it was good to leave

sometimes it was absence that gripped
humans to make them feel present, to feel
the present like the pulse of a newborn
thriving, alive, clicking, and beating fresh
just like me years ago, when she saw me
and refused to give me away, she said that
I was her atoms, and hers only and so she
drew a line between me and this world,
my name meant limit, that this was it
In her arms, I would find the world
or holding me, she had found hers
and this was our little world,
where atoms that joined might collide
but they always stayed together
we had left the other ones behind
So when mother and I sit together
through the languorous summers
I can see clearly through the waters
We are just fountains stuck in one place,
waiting to flow somewhere with the tide
of eventfulness, we are just alabaster statues,
she is holding me in her arms, once again
wearing thin hospital robes, and sedge is climbing up
our feet to be tickled awake
from this slumber of television screens and travel shows
where Santorini is not so blue and not miles away
where life is not wasted like airplane fuel, it comes
at a cost, leaving needs pennies but the question
I see in my mother’s eyes is am I willing to pay?

Paridhi Poddar is an aspiring poet and student based out of Kolkata, India. Her work has previously appeared in Ayaskala, Mixed Mag, Chasing Shadows Magazine, orangepeel, Pop the Culture Pill, and elsewhere. It is also upcoming in streetcake magazine, celestite poetry, and Tabula Rasa Review.