When the Oyester's womb lied
In the hollow chamber, I began to take form,
I, all but a grain of silence,
turned luminous by tides, day after day, night after night.
The walls slowly arched like a cathedral,
the veins lit faintly as stained glass.
The ocean daily whispered to me,
sometimes breaking with laughter,
sometimes trembling with grief,
its currents pressing inward,
a secret language etched,
into the marrow of silence we both shared.
Over time, she thought I was a pearl,
rare, eternal, shaped by beauty
of her, my mother-shell,
who gleamed with the brightest shine,
her pure body that guarded me whole.
But time unwound the myth.
The layers grew heavier, not nacre but flesh,
and when the hush broke,
I was no jewel for crowns.
I was an onion: earth-born, tear-bringing, rings folding in on rings.
I stared at her then, at her luminous shell,
her radiance unbroken, her silence holy,
while I remained so ordinary, so far from treasure.
The irony cut deep:
that such beauty had harboured me.
In pain, I turned inward, peeling myself open piece by piece.
With every peel, I saw her in me
her arching walls echoed in my rings,
my veins mirrored her once glassy threads,
a rhythm of tides folded deep.
I was just like her, but our cores, though different, were deep.
And even when I thought I was a pearl,
I never once loved her for her shine,
only for her shelter.
So even as an onion,
layered and mortal,
I carry her beauty woven through my flesh.
I may not be ethereal, not eternal
but I am loved no less, and I am no less hers.
Copyright ©
Pranali Vg
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