Shveta Thakrar

Shveta Thakrar is a writer of South Asian–flavored fantasy, social justice activist, and part-time nagini. She draws on her heritage, her experience growing up with two cultures, and her love of myth to spin stories about spider silk and shadows, magic and marauders, and courageous girls illuminated by dancing rainbow flames. When not hard at work on her second novel, a young adult fantasy about stars, Shveta makes things out of glitter and paper and felt, devours books, daydreams, bakes sweet treats, travels, and occasionally even practices her harp.

The Nagini’s Night Song

Silver-stained surf my robe
Liquid silk, my tears
Trimmed in foam, so delicate
A maharani’s discarded pearls.
I wear them well

How bright, how alien
This sea breathes
My skin, salt and seaweed
Aphrodisiacs from other days
I inhale

Read the rest at Mythic Delirium.

I love this poem so much. It’s about a nagini, but it also reads like a re-telling of Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid” (that story always creeped me out). The nagini of the title is sorrowful and angry and the way she expresses these emotions is pitch-perfect. Thakrar writes at the intersection of cultures and one of my favorite things about her writing is her imagery and the way the reader is slowly drawn into a world that is both like and unlike the one we live in. I’m always happy to see new work from Thakrar.