Do you hear this?
The pause between my breaths,
and an annihilated heart chokes.
My anxiety is a side effect
of medicines piled up on my desk.
My anxiety is a freshwater fish
swimming in the ocean.
It is dead and non living,
Alternating like highs and lows.

I made a metaphor
And tore a piece of paper.
Can you see this?
My mind spreading itself on a paper,
Like a frog waiting to get dissected.
I am half as alive as a text message
in your archives.
If I had a sound,
It would be of silence choked in my throat.

I have an exam tomorrow,
and a weird superstition follows.
A day is a good,
A day goes bad
And life alternates.
No exceptions. Or maybe there are.
I have an exam tomorrow.
Bacteria jumps in my stomach.
I am in a resting stage.

I didn’t fear the exam.
I fear the things that preceded it.
The crowd of doubts in the room
The clicking of a pen.
The exchange answer sheets.
And a mind that can cheat.
The burden on my right shoulder
Outweighs the expectations on the left one.
And I write
On the paper
With a dissected mind
Just to balance my body.

Do you know this?
The fish in the fish tank at my home
Has committed a sin.
The fish in the pond
Is committing some now.
We will catch the later.
And punish.
I have an exam tomorrow
And my anxiety runs on the hour hand
As time passes by
Like a careless invigilator

©Sameera Mansuri 2020