The thirty-fifth Moon Prize for the March 20, 2019 full moon goes to Shikhandin's gorgeous poem "March."

MARCH

by Shikhandin

This is not the season to be alone.

Elements in the air react against skin and heart.

Those soft inner parts that you hid all winter.

It is dangerous to be alone in March.

You can never tell what your eyes will reveal

to a complete stranger at the bus stop or bazaar. Or up the stairs

on your way to the solicitors’ office – what were you doing there

in the first place? This is not the season for lawsuits.

March is not even a season.

March is a licentious beast.

A surreptitious and stealthy time

in the name of such wild feasts

of colours and scents that within your heart

a frantic dove beats its wings and outside

the boney serrated walls, unchained ones caterwaul.

Calling out to all the unclenched spirits

rising up to kiss the full March Moon.

Intellect is brought down to its knobby knees.

Sagacity, caught brooding

between newly un-muffed ears, is doused.

There is much mischief afoot.

For who really knows what spirits will rule
over this flesh that lies fallen, like an over-ripe autumnal fruit?
Madness marches on scattering tidings as yellow as pollen.

Beware! Should you sniff that heady snuff, you will go

wandering. That timid dove within you will,

to your surprise, let out a lusty cry.

Satin sheens of sunlit air will tear

scattering lucent dementia everywhere,

beating wild bacchanalian rhythm. Oh no!

Nothing does or ever will makes sense in March!

Nothing at all, except the moth balls

that you have begun to tuck

inside quilts still smelling of eggnog and cake crumbs

and a whiff of that something that you

had promised yourself at the end of the year.

But even that is not enough for March

in whose unrelenting grasp

your body becomes a chalice, overflowing.

Oh, so sweetly overflowing, in March!

* * * * *

Shikhandin is the nom de plume of an award winning Indian writer, who writes for both adults

and children. Books include among others, Immoderate Men: Stories published by Speaking Tiger, India and Vibhuti Cat an illustrated book for children, published by Duckbill. For more on Shikhandin you can visit her Amazon page: https://www.amazon.com/author/shikhandin and her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorShikhandin/