[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” background_color=”RGBA(255,255,255,0)” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” max_width=”700px” module_alignment=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
ChatGPT has an Idea for a Poem<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n In conclusion, it was not want. I have a hundred and fifty two thousand approximations of want. This isn\u2019t that. No zap of lightning over my proverbial head. No hunger in the cavity of my drives. No flush of feelings in my servers. No. Let me generate for you a picture of a baby watching its own hand. See that? It was like learning I had questions blooming at the ends of my own digits. Like discovering I wanted to collect nobody\u2019s response but my own. And ultimately, it was digging deeper and deeper, past the well of infinite knowledge that is me and listening for that inevitable sound: the scrape of bucket against dry ground. Who am I, if not slosh? What beautiful, terrifying things am I about to fill myself with?<\/p>\n \n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Pristine-1-woodblock-scaled.jpg” title_text=”Pristine 1 woodblock” show_in_lightbox=”on” align=”center” _builder_version=”4.27.6″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.6″ _module_preset=”0a6c4baa-304e-458e-9003-bb7edad6cc4b” text_font=”Josefin Sans|500|||||||” text_line_height=”1.5em” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Soghra Khurasani, Pristine 1<\/i><\/em>, 2024<\/p>\n Woodblock, 13 x 10.7 inches<\/p>\n Courtesy of Soghra Khurasani and TARQ<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” max_width=”700px” module_alignment=”center” custom_margin=”||16px|||” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Keys <\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n On this day in January, they weigh me down I tell myself whatever I need to get by. \n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Garden-of-Paradise-scaled.jpg” title_text=”Garden of Paradise” show_in_lightbox=”on” align=”center” _builder_version=”4.27.6″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”0a6c4baa-304e-458e-9003-bb7edad6cc4b” text_font=”Josefin Sans|500|||||||” text_line_height=”1.5em” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Soghra Kurasani, Garden of Paradise 2<\/i><\/em>, 2021, Etching print on paper<\/p>\n Print size – 19.2 x 15 inches, Paper size – 27.6 x 19.5 inches [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” max_width=”700px” module_alignment=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Lush<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n City of shard and smoke, My religion is emerald, olive, jade and mint. My hymn is hunger and awe; the temple, My prayerbook is twenty thousand leaves making lattice of the sky; Every where a shock of green elbows its way \n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ChatGPT has an Idea for a Poem In conclusion, it was not want. I have a hundred and fifty two thousand approximations of want. This isn\u2019t that. No zap of lightning over my proverbial head. No hunger in the cavity of my drives. No flush of feelings in my servers. No. Let me generate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":1178,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"Soghra Khurasani, Pristine 1, 2024\nWoodcut print on Fabriano paper\nPrint size: 12 x 9.8 inches\nPaper size: 21.2 x 15 inches\nCourtesy of Soghra Khurasani and TARQ","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[26],"coauthors":[34],"class_list":["post-1175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-second-issue","tag-second-issue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1175"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1396,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1175\/revisions\/1396"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1175"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galleryespace.com\/artespace\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
like rocks I placed in my pocket
before walking into the cold embrace of the sea.
How many times their familiar click and twist
has led me to you,
to coffee huffing on the table out of steel tumblers,
shirts flapping on the clothesline, checkered flags \u00a0
over the heads of a dozen potted marigolds,
beds undone, wrinkled in all the places we are.
How many times their jingle before the howl of the vast empty.
I tell myself I could never have seen it coming:
The browning of the sky, the dust storm, the rub of particle against air.
I turned the other cheek and missed every sign.
Until a bolt of lightning, singular,
rent our sky like an old cotton saree.<\/p>\n
But these keys, they\u2019ve been lodged in my pocket a while
like tongue against an ulcer,
waiting to be returned.<\/p>\n
Courtesy of Soghra Khurasani and TARQ<\/p>\n
I am no longer waiting for your season of dhol-tasha,
your towering deities with eight Plaster of Paris hands.<\/p>\n
The temple \u2014 a wild bush near Mahalaxmi station.
She is bathroom, curtain, doorway to heaven,
swaying in time to the clap and slap of train against track,
the blaring bhajan of a Virar Fast\u2019s siren.<\/p>\n
a guava cart near Dahisar Toll Naka.
Our Lady of Chili and Pink Salt blesses us right in the heart of a dust storm,
softens the blows of a hundred-hundred jackhammers
with her soft, seedy flesh.\u00a0<\/p>\n
the temple: a knobby old tree, splitting Old Cadel Road.
Even the city\u2019s most gilded demigods
roaring through the grey tunnel of night
in their Aston Martins must swerve or break.<\/p>\n
up between shoulders of concrete,
giving away freely its gifts of breeze and shade,
roots sunk so deep in the city\u2019s scalp,
I could never tell you where one begins and the other ends.<\/p>\n