Debasish Mishra is a Senior Research Fellow at NISER, India, who has earlier worked with United Bank of India and Central University of Odisha. He is the recipient of the Bharat Award for Literature in 2019 and the Reuel International Upcoming Poet Prize in 2017. His recent work has appeared in 𝑁𝑜𝑟𝑡h 𝐷𝑎𝑘𝑜𝑡𝑎 𝑄𝑢𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑙𝑦, 𝑃𝑒𝑛𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑟𝑎, 𝑇h𝑒 𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑙𝑖𝑔h𝑡 𝑅𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑒𝑤, 𝐴𝑚𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑑𝑎𝑚 𝑄𝑢𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑙𝑦, 𝐶𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑛𝑖𝑎 𝑄𝑢𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑙𝑦, and elsewhere.
Chapbooks
Lost in Obscurity and Other Stories available on Amazon and Flipkart
An Abecedarian on the Fate of the Thought-Fox
After the fox is printed, the struggle
begins. The printing is just the foreplay—
catching stars with a pair of binoculars—
desperation awaits the send button,
expectations dangle on the thin, ashen
foil of the sky like ribbons of smokes
Great expectations indeed
Hunger of recognition, thirst of
intellectual curiosity
Job is done The waiting starts
Kites reel above the fox
Longings for flesh Food-chain pyramid
Months and years crawl
Nights harbour more foxes,
on the lookout for the one
pushed for a ceremonious expedition
Quixotic hunter may well be hunted,
rejected, aborted before pregnancy,
served to the kites for a dinner,
terrible yet true prophecy, or be
under consideration for eternity by
vets who fail to diagnose it
When the fox returns with a crown though,
x-factor gets validated,
you attain a temporary orgasm but can’t
zonk out, there’s a long journey ahead
The Field Guide Poetry Magazine 