For Araku

(A valley that falls on the Eastern Ghats of India, located in the Vishakhapatnam district of Andhra Pradesh)

I haven't seen your crests or felt your air hitting my face
neither have I walked past the greenness reproduced in my head

I have circled around you
in breaks, but like a good falcon,
gone back to my abode when needs reckon

Yet I have inhaled the scent of your earth

in dusty whiffs of a good spliff, I have tasted 
your soil that is thought to be only as good 
as the tons of bauxite 
it produces for industries and governments

I have redistributed the control of your fertility
in my small drags of resistance.

I haven't been sheltered by your deep enticing caves
or met the eleven species of owls that you house in your thick forests,

But in palm-length buds and slender stems,
I have consumed the sweet scent of your creation
like a plant-worshipping pagan, I too have teleported to places
other than the Deccan.

And when the time comes, I will have met your people
who can launch a thousand spears against any Naidu or Adani,
and refuse to mine aluminium in place of the most aromatic coffee

Araku, I will pull myself asunder to see you
for one stimulant doesn't seem enough to be.