Verboten desires, buried feelings marinate
in the minds wok to erupt with unexpected
vigor at the opportune moment.
The body creaks for company.
Its ululations force me to your fence.
I find you fixed with the pagination of another print run.
Secrets are like words; some we will never know.
But I disremember your dualities. That is my need.
To be compos mentis, I require credendum.
It is gauche to quarrel with one’s quintessence.
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Sanjeev Sethi
Picture Nick Victor
Sanjeev Sethi is an award-winning poet who has authored eight poetry collections. His poems have been published in forty countries and appear in over 600 journals and anthologies. Some credits: London Magazine, The Fortnightly Review, Stand Magazine, North Dakota Quarterly, Hamilton Stone Review, and Indian Literature.
Sethi edited Dreich Planet # India, an anthology for Hybriddreich, Scotland, in 2022, and in 2025, Fictile Feelings, a poetry special for The Hooghly Review. In April 2026, he was the guest curator of the India Edition of The Candyman’s Trumpet in Scotland. He is the joint winner of the Full Fat Collection Competition-Deux, organized by the Hedgehog Poetry Press, UK. In 2023, he won First Prize in a poetry competition at the National Defence Academy, Pune. He served as a judge of the Wood Rose Spiritual Poetry Prize 2026. He lives in Mumbai, India.
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