The Other World

• Zebaa Shaikh, Grade 12
• Poetry
• 2018

The dupatta whispers across your skin
As the city cleaves dark into light
The dupatta coils around your mouth
As you lurch along a sea of smog.
This dupatta is an emblem of your home
That has woven a civilisation
But sometimes you unwind it,
Note its frays and loose ends
In those moments, your neck feels naked
Yet free like an unravelling thread
And you look through your window, over
Sticky heat and the pulse of a billion bodies,
Wondering why it isn't enough.