I once heard water moving behind the plaster.
It was not a leak; it was memory rehearsing itself.
Each crack widened its mouth for confession.

I pressed my ear to the wall—
the sound of a river pretending stillness,
the faint heartbeat of what refuses to be contained.

At night, the dream deepened.
Fish glimmered behind the paint.
Their silver scales made constellations I could not name.

When I woke, my palms were wet.
I touched the wall again, and found only dust,
but the pulse remained inside my skin.

Sometimes the body becomes a reservoir
for all it could not say aloud.
Sometimes the house listens better than we do.

Vaishnavi Pusapati is a physician and poet featured in over 100 international journals such as The Meniscus (AAWP), BODY literature (Prague), and Roanoke Review, among others. On her journey to exploring poetry, she finds freedom in the restraint of sonnets and haikus and joy in concrete poetry and even black out verse sometimes.

Next Page (Vaishnavi Pusapati)

Previous Page (