Leapfrog Poem by Arundhathi Subramaniam

(“Anyone who has sufficient language nurses ambitions of writing a scripture” – Sadhguru)

Not scripture, no,
but grant me the gasp
of bridged synapse,
the lightning alignment
of marrow, mind and blood
that allows words
to spring

from the cusp of breathsong,
from a place radiant
with birdflight and rivergreen.

Not the certainty
of stone, but grant me
the quiet logic
of rain,
of love,
of the simple calendars of my childhood
of saints aureoled by overripe lemons.

Grant me the fierce tenderness
of watching
word slither into word,
into the miraculous algae
of language,
untamed by doubt
or gravity,

words careening,
diving,
swarming, un-
forming, wilder
than snowstorms in Antarctica, wetter
than days in Cherrapunjee,

alighting on paper, only
for a moment,
tenuous, breathing,
amphibious,
before
leaping
to some place the voice
is still learning

to reach.

Not scripture,
but a tadpole among the stars,
unafraid to plunge
deeper
if it must –

only if it must –

into transit.