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Akshat Kumar

Akshat Kumar

A Raw Almond

2 min readJun 24, 2025
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I have gotten to see

These snow cones flavoured with rose syrup

These petals in such adorable bunches

Smiling at me with all their might, though

What you seem to me

Is something like a raw almond,

Barely unfolded even as a flower,

A bud that never reached fruition.

And perhaps so

You have spent your life

Stuck to the stem,

Emanating though

This unusual fragrance(?) of your own;

I was astonished to know that

One could even be blinded by a scent.

You seem to surround yourself with flowers,

And these flowers too

Allow you of their company, for

In their eyes perhaps

You have already bloomed.

Or you do when you are with them,

So it is there that you stay

And perhaps attempt to forget your

Seemingly decaying state of unfurling

(or can I even call it that)

In the sight of their grinning blossom,

Their flawless stature,

Making their flourishing your own.

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It is better I think

That you stay with them than me;

A flower can never harm another,

For petal knows petal,

Thorn knows thorn, and

Root nourishes root

Willingly.

What place in all this doth have

My hands and my eyes?

They are already

Poisoned and bloodstained,

Paralysed and too wounded

To hold that rose again.

Or is it that the flowers surround you?

If indeed there is something

Surrounded by bouquets,

Is it then not more precious

Than the bunch themselves?

A stream is,

however still,

Flowing nevertheless.

And not every one of them is

Meant to converge into a river.

Although most of them

Trickle into the ground

Never to be seen again,

Never to reflect back a strand of sun,

Some might stay,

And save man from drought

When summer arrives.

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