Downstream, my Prayers become the Girl of my Dreams

By Komang Ira Puspitaningsih   1   God is the words spoken by prophets   It is for that reason through prayer and mantras I explore my woman   A girl in dream’s silence a dancer in the rain at the river’s end Your fingers tremble when scaling the...

In My Poems

By Komang Ira Puspitaningsih In my poems are silent fireflies, pretty dolls, and innocent girls whose fluttering skirts display butterflies with colors of orange, blue, purple, and pink. A smile appears on the lips of the lad who waits for rain in the night. The steps...

Nameless Streets

for aditya karna By Komang Ira Puspitaningsih With all the small and nameless streets I never remember             where your house is: down that lane across the road or in front of where I now am   But I can still hear three balladeers singing             a...

She Who Kneels before the House of Ashes

By Inggit Putria Marga open your gates, open your doors, open them for I wish to inhabit you not as ashes but as the urn I wish to reside in you to crack open to freeze to prevent the ashes escaping from you and from those who come as pilgrims to you, from those...

She Who Burns Incense in the Temple

By Inggit Putria Marga thank you for allowing my body to be embraced by yours the digits of these hands are cursed to have but one ability: to burn you or things of the same nature as you   praise be to you who faithfully soften and dissolve into ash which for...

After the Call of Evening Prayer

By Inggit Putria Marga give me your poem the sun that has never before set in another sky the chirp that has never before heard in another tree the body that has never before incubated in another soul the flame that has never before melted another candle the divine...