A Nest of Juniper

Written by Bala Menon

Search, search, search

Let me seek

Let me speak it thrice

Let me whisper my pale

desire for belonging

Tumbling, tumbling, tumbling

over shoulders and down backs

hummingbird you have no place

feathers entwined in wire

neither sultry skies

nor frozen dusk

You have no place

among palms or firs

You have no place

among concrete jungles

You have no place

in hamlets small and simple, still

Nay you cannot hunt your home

in waves of midnight

But you covet your place

in mulberry welkins

So will you settle,

my hummingbird, beloved

for a nest of Juniper?

Or are you meant

for the solitary sails

and landless heavens