Death by Language, by Nikita Parik

The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife, by Katsushika Hokusai (Japan) 1814

Death by Language

(for Katsushika Hokusai and Pablo Picasso)

The midday sun turns 
muted ochre, bee-buzz
softens to a lull, I am 
falling into my phone's
lockscreen. Pale blue
turns azure, now sapphire,
now yale, now midnight
blue as I dive deeper; 
the texture of water 
is ice on gooseflesh.

Now here is the promise 
of a thousand nirvanas!
Delicate pink tentacles
on skin, mouth wide-open 
onto my sex, mouths that 
contain thunderstorms, 
mouths devoid of language,
any language, all l.a.n.g.u.a.g.e...

The sea evaporates into 
sunlight- my friend laughs
and says how an orgasm 
is a 'little death' in French- 
"We call it la petite-mort".
Maybe all pleasure is death, 
some deaths, pleasure?
His laughter echoes, then 
transmorphs into Picasso
on the wall: here the woman
becomes the octopus. 

I stare at it until sunlight 
evaporates again, and I,
I am her, but also myself,
the octopus, & the painting
staring right back 
into my own eyes. 

Nikita Parik

The recipient of Nissim International Poetry Prize II 2020, Nikita Parik holds a Master's in Linguistics, a three year diploma in French, and another Master’s in English. Diacritics of Desire (2019) is her debut book of poems, followed by Amour and Apocalypse (2020), a novel in translation. She was the former Assistant Editor of Ethos Literary Journal, and currently edits EKL Review. Her works have appeared in Rattle, U City Review, The Alipore Post, Vayavya, The Bombay Literary Magazine, Bengaluru Review, and others.

Reclining Nude, by Pablo Picasso (Spain) 1932