Milk Symphony, by Tanmoy Das Lala

Baby Nursing, Mexico City, by Tina Modotti (b. USA), 1926.

Milk Symphony
 
I. Allegro
 
The city of milk, behind
puckered teat,
floods and drips
through walls of skin, then leaks
onto a baby’s soft tray of teeth.


II. Andante
 
Allowed only to watch her grow –
She, whose bones, bloom
from my garden of genes –
no funnel with which to nourish,
no clot of milk behind my nipples
to quench the baby’s thirst.


III. Scherzo
 
Through an alternate lens,
the baby blows
liters of air
into the stiffened lip
of a toy balloon
while Sleep gently kneels on her left eyelid.


IV. Presto
 
I remind you, in the dead of night,
the hunger never ends, babe,
the hunger never ends.

​Tanmoy Das Lala

This poem was written as part of the 20 Poem Challenge.

Tanmoy Das Lala lives in New York City. His works have appeared in Thought Catalog, The New Verse News and Chelsea Station Magazine. His blog is tanmoydaslala.blogspot.com