Pungent Knives

By Sahana Prabu

Posted on July 1, 2025

Cover Image Title: Household Stuff

Cover Image by: Chris L.

Size: 4032 pixels x 3024 pixels

Classification: Photograph

Year: 2025

Location: ON, Canada

My mother smiled while she told me I had curly hair when I was young,

That I loved holding her hand, and was left handed

That I would scream when pineapples touched my tongue

Because they felt like pungent knives in my mouth and made me feel hopelessly stranded.

My mother’s smile failed to adorn,

When she told me that my grandmother used to show her sparrows in the garden,

That my grandmother told her not to touch the roses, for they had thorns

That my grandmother sprouted her papaya addiction and showed her how they calmly unharden.

But I think of their relationship now,

And I see a desert road unrolling for miles and miles.

This is how years passed by, somehow,

All spiraled, churned, and compiled.

Humans’ emotions are too fluid 

They congeal and constrict like a tightening thread

How a smiley gaze can subtly fracture and turn rigid,

How quickly bonds come to tingle with pins and needles 

where they once outpoured instead.

I have wavy hair, and I’m not as young,

I forage comfort in holding my mother’s hand, but now, I am right handed.

I still scream when pineapples touch my tongue

Because they feel like pungent knives in my mouth and have me feeling stranded

I would scream louder if it would make my mother laugh

I would spoon feed my mother papayas if it’d mean she’d close her eyes and smile

Because I want her to remember; papayas don’t have to taste like regret 

Description:

This poem is about memories, family, and how feelings change over time. As time passes, relationships shift, and emotions become more complicated which can sometimes become strained or distant.

[ Writing Editor: Paul A. Shannon. ]