Vismai Rao

Baggage

I haven’t seen it happen but I’m told
 
woolly bears bloom into Isabellas,
acorns explode into oaks, bodies
 
age—
 
In space astronauts weekly vacuum 
their dead skin out: can you believe 
 
each day so much 
dies in us?
 
If I could stay my eyes open 
 
maybe I’ll see how one form slips 
into another. Is it possible, I wonder
 
to travel a single inch 
without foregoing 
 
a single inch? In a dream
I disembowel
 
a suitcase with all my yesterdays 
crammed in it. 
 
I pen down the stories I’ve lived,
make little paperboats out of them
 
& feed them to the Ganges.
When I wake 
 
I shed cocoons
 
like snowflakes— I know each time 
I inhale, I ought to exhale:
 
in order to breathe, even breath
needs to be let go of—

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Vismai Rao's poems appear or are forthcoming in the Indianapolis Review, RHINO, Salamander, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Parentheses Journal & The Shore. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and the Orison Anthology. She lives in India.