Psychedelic
by Ankita Anand
Blonde heads, red lipstick, gloves, cigars, kimchi salad, Singapore noodles:
Prepare to enter my dreams
as I ready myself for
how the night will be projected
on the screen today.
There's laughter and vagueness in that party.
A desperate search for Xanax begins in my anxiety—
I don't know what it looks like,
but foreign cinema has taught me
what popping the pill can do.
How trembling fingers struggle with the clasp of the clutch
to find something to clutch at
cool, cylindrical glass, that fits into a fist
promising determination and firmness
once the pill enters the fortress of the dry mouth.
Dare I enter?
They have cameras—and my sleep seeking eyes
Go aflutter—even at the click of the shutter:
The cue for the lightbulb to take centre stage in the room I inhabit
Within my low voltage, similar vantage, municipal ward.
Ankita Anand is an Indian poet and writer whose works have travelled through India, Pakistan, Singapore, Ireland, South Africa, Canada, the US and the UK. She is also a journalist, and has been supported and awarded by multiple fellowships and awards in India and outside.