Valentines: Two Poems by Suchita Senthil Kumar

Three syllables

tw: mentions of blood

Your name sits firm betwixt
the cartilages in my throat
like a benign tumour.
It does not rend or shred,
but the knowledge that
those three syllables 
bathe in my blood and bone,
that is enough to tie my muscles
in uncomfortable knots everywhere.
I drink charcoal in clay pots 
hoping it'll leave me coughing out
blood and illness and two syllables
of your name because one 
I'd like to keep for myself 
for reasons I don't voice out.

First Whiplash

The first boy that ever claimed he loved me
followed that up with a your hair is too curly, 
straighten it and then you'll look good. 

His text message made its way from chat bubble
to the lens of the front camera to leer at me
with a say cheese! every time I click a photograph.

Yet, I didn't tie my hair into taut braids with oil dripping down,
creating shallow pools of ichor for this young boy 
to swim in until he could say you look good now.

Your hair is too curly, straighten it and then you'll look good. 

I wonder today, if he feared the radiant noir mane,
glorious around my face like a charcoal halo
made of the dried blood of all the women before me. 

I wonder what would remain of me today, if back then,
I had pressed the locks streaming down my face 
between hot metal arms to straighten them.

The first boy that ever claimed he loved me
followed that up with a you're also good at writing
I don't understand anything, but I'm sure it's good. 

About Suchita Senthil Kumar

Suchita Senthil Kumar is a writer creating chaos. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Live Wire India, Jaden Magazine and Hooligan Magazine among others. She was a student of UNICEF's Voices of Youth Mediathon '21. She makes life decisions asking herself one question: Will Sirius Black be proud?