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16

Poetry

If this is not You, then who?

Manali Divecha

And that night, I saw a shooting star—
Unexpected, unheard, in my city that never sleeps.
My friend missed it by a second.
It was my first, so I made a wish—
The only wish I had
since the day I heard that speech of Liz,
the one I wrote on a paper at twenty-six to my therapist:
“.. to impact lives through my writings.”

It was then, another lifetime,
trapped within the miseries of my mind.
I asked for signs, and you showed me sunflowers—
not two, but ten.

Was it your dream too?
For my blood carries your metals,
from the times we were one.
The clouds read “trust”, so I took the plunge
into the world of these girls,
writing on-the-spot for people in the sun.

And how divine it was, the same day two years hence,
that I found that paper again.
The same day I wrote for a daughter,
as requested by her father, on women’s empowerment;
for those innocent college kids, expressing their crushes.
And for that girl who asked me to write on grief,
years after the loss of her father,
also leaving behind a note for me.

So tell me— if this is not you, then who?
Whom do I say this to, without being called a madwoman?

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