Sambhu Ramachandran

Whorls

You unspool a playful lexicon
as I cut into the dome of an onion, 
the knife burying its lop-sided glint
deep in the pale-pink layers:

A. A bulbous shrine 
dedicated to emptiness.

B. An ecdysiast
whose nudity is all an elaborate lie.

C. Earth’s fattest tear.

D. Compulsive confessor
whispering a maudlin past—
from the chopping board 
to finger and skin.

I wait as the onion begins 
its internal monologue
of pungent scent—
nested ruminations on revelation
unfolding in the amber light 
that girds its turgescence
with a lover’s never-ending hands.

As the knife halves its swollen empire,
it retaliates with a vengeance.
The air is suddenly weighed down:
lachrymal glands give in 
to the flanking manoeuvre,
and eyes become pseudo-sentimental.

And I think of a certain look of yours
after your miscarriage
slicing deeper and deeper
into my silence,
many-whorled like the onion.

Only your tears were more than real.

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Sambhu Ramachandran is a bilingual poet, translator, short story writer, and academic from Kerala, India. He is currently working as Assistant Professor of English at N.S.S. College, Pandalam. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Another Chicago Magazine, Neon & Smoke, The Tiger Moth Review, Prosetrics, Plants and Poetry Journal, Qafiyah Review, The Alexander Review, The Bombay Literary Magazine, Wild Court, Madras Courier, The Alipore Post, Muse India, Setu, The Chakkar, Every Body Magazine, and Sextet, among others. You can reach out to him on Instagram: @sambhuramachandran