Caves, Cockroaches, and Che by Abhishek Kumar Singh

Death is a profound thought process.
You’re not breathing anymore — veins bursting like landmines.
People cry for you, the ones who never cared.
Yet there you lie, peace in your heart,
a smile on your face,
freed from the burden of this mortal, material world
that worships gain but forgets to feel.

We sell each other in the marriage system,
a barter deal straight from an economics textbook.
Life? Just a long-lasting inflation.

You feel like an indentured laborer,
carrying bricks on your back and your heart —
yet smear on a fake laugh like makeup.
Telling the world, “I’m alright,”
while you’re chapped and hollow inside.

A haunted mansion of flesh and bone,
your tears echo in silence.
You deliver monologues to indifferent walls,
getting pierced by invisible bullets —
but no blood, no death, just
the quiet burial inside your chest.

You live like a suicide bomber on pause,
counting down to detonation —
alienated, unloved, unseen.

You drink molotov cocktails like Che Guevara,
survive nuclear fallout like cockroaches.
You ask yourself:
"Am I finally free from Plato’s cave?
Or still admiring shadows, like Narcissus,
destined to die gazing at myself?"

Am I the master of my cage?
Or a prisoner of free will’s mirage?

Abhishek Kumar Singh hails from the beautiful state of Bihar a land where the sacred Ganga paints the rhythmic beauty of Madhubani paintings, and the Kosi flows with a sorrowful grace. It is a place where the stirring tales and poems of Veer Kunwar Singh and Ramdhari Singh Dinkar were born.

As a student, Abhishek often found himself dozing off in math and science classes. Instead, he was drawn to the world of literature, which, to him, made more sense than the laws of physics, and to history, which felt far more colorful than chemistry.

A passionate traveler, Abhishek finds inspiration in nature and weaves those experiences into poetic expressions laying them gently on the pages of his soul.