A Desert Flower* Poem by indira babbellapati

Just four or five months

If only you bear with my unsightliness

There, yonder on the frame of this rugged body

I give birth to an amazing flower



That flower with its fleeting prettiness

Will balance your months of tolerance

With utmost ease

The flower will swing at the end of the creeper

With joy you can never get at



My body may gash the fingers that touch me

But within me I bring to life a dainty flower

That turns red just at mere touch



Within, I bear a wondrous beauty

To give shape to an amazing beauty

Beyond your imagination



Your eyes’ thirst for color do I quench

With a handful of good looks

I’ve drawn from my desert inheritance



Flower may wither

But with memories fresh

I make you savor the experience

Of a love eternal, for me



Just four or five months

If only you bear with my unsightliness

There, yonder on the frame of this rugged body

I give birth to an amazing flower



*Original in Telugu by Vinnakota Ravishankar



06 Oct 2010

23.27hrs