You, me and ...... maybe you

Your hands trace the contours

I smile

You softly let your fingers scroll

on my warm skin

I smell green apples

what is it?

Your perfume or incense?

In the quiet

I can hear your heartbeat

and you can touch mine.

Each scar, each mark,

has a tale to tell!

you gently brush

a stray strand of hair

from my face

tuck it behind my ear

and trace

a gushing stream of cold water

down my neck,

I release my stiff shoulders

my breast bone loosens

the binoculars of my heart

read every line in your palm!

In a small salon

two women

share their stories

without a word

and give each other

the gift of empathy.

“This post is a part of ‘UMeU’ Poetry Blog Hop #UMeUBlogHop organized by Manas Mukul . The Event is sponsored by Soul Craft and You, Me & The Universe.”

Zalatwic #NewNormal #A2Z

 Zalatwic 

(Polish)

to get done any how 

Everyone staggering to help

Staggering struggling

Fighting, wanting

defeating, receding

scampering

nobody knows the right way

everyone just clawing their way

through this wasteland

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Ya'aburnee #NewNormal #A2Z

Ya'aburnee

(Arabic)

A way to declare your hope that your loved one will outlive you because of how unbearable it would be to live without them.

Death and mourning 

so much grief 

heartbreaking

to see a loved one depart

is tearing us all apart 

this is not the world we wished

this is not .....

may nobody lose a loved one 

may nobody bear this pain alone.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

XO #NewNormal #A2Z

 XO

abbreviation (hugs and kisses)

Remember once upon a time

We would hug people

we would kiss loved ones

we would touch without fear

we would cherish the warmth 

now we have a scarcity

and most scarce is 

what we took for granted

"Human Touch"

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Wabi-Sabi #NewNormal #A2Z

 Wabi-Sabi 

(Japanese)

 A Japanese concept and art of imperfect beauty

So it is what it is 

will you let it be?

yes, maybe

try to be kind

try to be helpful

accept the new reality

but make it easy for everybody

wabi sabi!

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Vaitrishnya #NewNormal #A2Z

 Vaitrishnya 

(Sanskrit) Non-attachment, being in a state of no craving

What is this time 

a dream has gone wrong

a nightmare

despair, death 

or woe begone

where are we 

is all lost 

from detached attached

to now 

complete non -attached

the era of 

letting go and passing on.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Ubuntu #NewNormal #A2Z

 Ubuntu 

(African) I am because you are. 

The belief that we are defined by our compassion and kindness for others.

How we wish and maybe

sometimes cherish

that we do it all alone! 

but the fact remains

no human can be an island

at best we are walls

or bridges

held together by

all the other bricks and mortar

life lived 

collectively and together 

is the best by far.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Toska #NewNormal #A2Z

 Toska

 
(Russian) A sensation of great spiritual anguish without any specific cause

I think of hands

hands of people 

textures, colors, fragrances

tastes, times

and a blur, a cloud

an entire future in a fog

the heart like an old fort

abandoned yet existing

hope like a heartbeat

there yet not felt.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Safarnama #NewNormal #A2Z

Safarnama 

(su-fur-nama) (Persian)

Travelogue; An account of the travels

Safar & Humsafar

journey and companion for it

A strange year 

shattered those hopes

Nowhere to go

nobody to go with

An invisible prison

no safar

no safarnama

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Retrouvailles #NewNormal #A2Z

 

Retrouvailles 

Pronunciation (ruh-troov-eye) (French)

The happiness of meeting again after a long time

Oh how I miss

holding a hand 

skin on skin

the warmth of another beating heart

next to mine

these were regular

normal things

and now 

it is a desire

a privilege

a longing....

a hope.....

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Quandry of Quarantine #NewNormal #A2Z

 

Quandry

(English) Dilemma 

Someone said 

What keeps something out 

also shuts you in 

a door can be a pathway 

it can also be a prison gate 

and then there was a new Q

Q as in Quarantine

the quandry of staying in 

and staying apart

The chasm that grows and fades

quandry to quandry

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Parea #NewNormal #A2Z

Parea

(Greek) A group of friends who gather to share life experiences

It started as chats

random in abandon

and then 

in groups

we would listen 

to sorrow

to loss

 to loneliness

till one day all we had

a link, time and schedule

people in windows 

looking at other windows

no hope of a hug 

or a pat on the back 

or holding a hand 

only a face on a screen 

only a longing for  a Parea

in a parea we made!

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Onism #NewNormal #A2Z

Onism

(Danish) The awareness of how little of the world you’ll experience; 

The frustration of being stuck in just one body that inhabits only one place at a time

YOLO is the keyword is it 

But is once enough

is this one time enough

the years subtracted in sleep

in illness, in fear, in heartbreak

and now pandemic

is it not subtracting 

from my once a lifetime 

chance at life!

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Nadir #NewNormal #A2Z

 Nadir

(Arabic) the worst moment of a particular situation

the Zenith is never fixed

humans always strive for higher, bigger, better

and hence nothing is hated 

as hated as the nadir

the lowest, worst and last.

Humanity went through it all

in the spam of a pandemic

the philanthropy

and the apathy

the hope and the grief

again and again

the wave 

up and down

life itself.

**************************

This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Marasim #NewNormal #A2Z

 Marasim 

(Urdu) Relations

People meet all the time

and get entangled like woolen threads

a knot here, a twist there

some even fading and some 

leaving a shade on the other 

And sometimes people break  too

Like tense strings 

snap!

memory of a marasim 

and if they join again 

the knot remains.

Tough times 

are expensive

They cost a lot

sometimes sanity, health

sometimes a few precious marasim.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Layogenic #NewNormal #A2Z

Layogenic

(Tagalog) 

The experience of seeing something that looks good far away but really bad close up.

It looked like a vacation first

time to pause

to slow down

to look around

and then it got stagnant

so still that it began to stink 

the robotic routine

the monotonous din

what looked like a freedom 

was a prison within.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Kummerspeck #NewNormal #A2Z

 Kummerspeck 

(German)

Excess weight gained from emotional overeating. Literally "grief bacon."

Some of us have the privileges

so many that we lose count

and we fail to identify

often when and how 

A privilege

becomes a cage

Food not for survival

but food to satiate this rage

this sadness

The hopelessness of this plague

What is on your plate?

Is it just food?

or an opiate.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Jijivisha #NewNormal #A2Z

 Jijivisha

(Hindi)  The Strange eternal desire to live and continue living

 

In the worse situation too 

the urge to survive

one more day maybe

to let the hope thrive 

People go through so much

they say the grief of death

is shed at the crematorium gate

when people return

because how else 

does one survive?

pain, heartbreak, and death

the dystopia that we live in

how else do we accept 

one more day

one more time.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Iktsuarpok #NewNormal #A2Z

 Iktsuarpok 

(Inuit) (pronounced eek-soow-uhr-pohk)

excited for someone's arrival

Look up at the shiny apartments

Stacked like shiny matchboxes

One atop the other

or the small huts huddled together

the bungalows far apart

or the small houses on farms

a work of art!

Look at them after sunset

when the lights come on

it seems 

all of them wait 

for someone to be home

for a warm meal

a conversation

a place to belong.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Hitoritabi #NewNormal #A2Z

Hitoritabi 

(Japanese)- Traveling alone, solitary journey

When there was nowhere to go outside

no arrivals and departures

the entire journey had to be 

turned inside

to the never-ending quest

who am I?

Do I really need all that I thought I did?

Do I really love all that I assumed I must?

What are the essentials?

What are the frills?

A solo trip like no other

alone with myself

in my own knowing

for the first time

I delved.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Ghodar-dim #NewNormal #A2Z

Ghodar-dim (ঘোড়ার ডিম) 
(Bengali– Pronounced [gho-rar-deem])

A sarcastic term for ‘nothing’ or false hope. It literally means ‘horse’s egg’, therefore representing something that doesn’t exist.

First, they said the summer would cure it

 

Then they said let's think of us as a herd

Later they hoped it will cure itself

Then they looked for miracle divine

places of worship, or some shrine

Then we hoped against hope

If horses could lay eggs

and elephants could fly 

we all loved to believe

it can't touch us

someone else will die.

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021

Fernweh #NewNormal #AtoZ

 Fernweh 

(German) An Ache for distant places

Humans since time immemorial

needed more than

shelter, bread, and sex

home, hearth, and safety

the urge that made them

conquer mountains

sail the seas

look for life beyond this blue dot

and now 

this sense of adventure

lies caged

in fear.

Mechanical human wings

oars and wheels

are now chained

but has the Fernweh 

been fueled 

or has it ceased?

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This is my 6th #AtoZ, read the posts from previous challenges HERE.

Find a List of all my 2021 AtoZ posts HERE.

This post is part of #BlogchatterA2Z

This post is also part of the global Blogging from A to Z 2021