A Self-Portrait

By Diksha Mishra

Drains clogged with sewage—

                her eyes,

                staring back at me.

Vacant.

In vain.

Reverberating

               the lament in my gaze.

I watch—

The kohl I wore today

                 bleeds down her cheeks

                                     in ashen grey.

My sorrows sink

                       into the cracks

of her skin,

tears melting

                as they seep

within.

My lipstick—too red—

                smears across her lips,

                              in uneven streaks,

splitting open like wounds

                  I do not know

                  how to stitch.

                             I long to look away.

But she strikes first,

                  holding me still in place—

                            her stare tightening

                      like a leash,

         reeling me in,

a whispered plea.

To watch—

as she crumbles,

               buckling under the weight

of me,

the burning mass of my flesh

                               spilling past

                              what her bones

could hold in.

Even in collapse, her beauty remains.

             How then could I look away?

In quiet anticipation,

                           so I watch—

                  Her body

quivering in protest.

Because if not me,

who else would dare

                     watch her fall

                         with such reverence?

If only she were not me,

                   watching her watch me—

Narcissus, reborn—

                       cursed to gaze forever

at my own face,

reflected in a mirror

                 that mirrors back my state.

Because if not me,

             who else

is there

           to watch me fall 

                                        with 

                                                such

reverence?

By Diksha Mishra