Wipe with cotton balls of clouds
the gaping wounds of the ozone layer
and suture them with the rainbow’s
multicoloured thread. Ask the rain
to play some jazz music
on colocasia leaves to deaden the pain.
Dislodge dynasties of plastic
from the river’s black throat.
Rouse sirens from the fossils
of mythology and have them lure
litterers with hit songs.
Dismantle mansions of pollutants.
Find a wizard who can transmute
chainsaws in the hands of lumberjacks
into ticklish feathers, guns into gentleness,
and bombs into bombast. Ask the bees
buzzing about with yellow tablets
of pollen to administer medication.
Prop the heads of flowers against the dawn
and insert the cannula of light
into dark green stems.
Be gentle.
Let IV fluids of dewdrops
bead their slow progress into Spring.
Sambhu Ramachandran
Sambhu Ramachandran is a bilingual poet, translator, short story writer, and academic from Kerala, India. He is currently working as Assistant Professor of English at N.S.S. College, Pandalam. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Bombay Literary Magazine (TBLM), Wild Court, Madras Courier, The Alipore Post, Muse India, Setu, The Chakkar, Ethos Literary Journal, Sextet, and Neon & Smoke, among others.