SWWIM sustains and celebrates women poets by connecting creatives across generations and by curating a living archive of contemporary poetry, while solidifying Miami as a nexus for the literary arts.
In the 1990s, diclofenac was used to treat cattle diseases. Many vultures started dropping dead after feeding on the medicated carcasses: Gyps bengalensis, G. Indicus & G. Tenuirostris: they took a hit so badly, that later, the Parsis planned to build vulture-aviaries for the traditional departure of their dead. I was born in that decade–somewhere around the confirmed end of Javan tigers. Since my birth, there are others who have gone extinct–birds, civets, rhinos. And yet, countless anurans hide in the Western ghats. Turn this shola, peatland, lateritic plateau–and you will find a species still willing to live, shy only of the blessed grace of taxonomy. When my mother asks how I want to celebrate my birthday this year, I say quietly.
Kunjana Parashar is a poet living in Mumbai. Her poems appear or are forthcoming in Heavy Feather Review, The Indianapolis Review, Parentheses Journal, UCity Review, What Are Birds, and elsewhere. You can find her on Twitter @wolfwasp.
