Please! Do not offer
No word of comfort
No solace-
Nothing.
Regret is a silent, deep pool
Still waters, dead calm
Dark and desolate
Black, cold marble where I lie prostrate.
Bubbles break, slowly
Between sighs
Between every heave of the lungs
Slowing down.
Discarded, I lie
Like a frog squashed on a highway.
Dissected, the heart
Still throbs, beating for a life already left.
I am playing ball, you see.
Throw it down, it bounces up
Throw it up, it comes down
Throw it on to the wall
Hey! it comes right back to me.
Tired or bored playing ball
I fling it on the floor
Despondent, it rolls to a corner.
I slump down on a chair
Sit watching the ball.
It looks back at me, sullen.
Glowing red, it takes the shape
Of my heart
Shouts why I wouldn't play ball
With life.
He asked me politely, ‘ Do not write
All these sob-stuff, write about happiness’.
I turned further morose when he said kindly
‘Regret I cannot take anything away
From what you write’.
Rummaging through my trunk
I retrieved my faded, forgotten mask
Of good cheer.
Clasping it over my face
I felt good, looking in the mirror
Because I was grinning
From ear to ear.
But then, queerly, the reflection
Had empty sockets
Where my eyes should've been.
I will ne’er blame thee-
You’ve every right
To love or thwart –
But I wish –
When you left-
You could’ve left-
A little of me!
“In the last thirty years,
Three hundred and sixty kills-
Mind you, kills, and I don’t keep track
Of the mutilated, the disabled, the living dead
Who fell before me on the tracks.”
He takes a sip of the whiskey,
A deep drag of the cigarette
Looks out through the window -
I see the glimmer of tears in his eyes.
Outside, the river roared as it gushed
The birds sang as they flew
Wind ran helter-skelter among the trees
The setting sun scattered golden light as it sank.
We were old friends, meeting after forty or more years,
This boyhood friend of mine
Who tagged behind me all the time
It is nearly a year since he died;
I have forgotten the date though.
Nearly twenty years senior to me
Though time isn't really a measure for anything.
Time hardly tells you the strength of the bond -
Why, one's siblings are very often the most distant.
Friendship takes seed - hardly does it need a moment
And it grows like Jack's beans, entwining the hearts into one.
He was a quiet person - a painter, photographer
He drew funny cartoons too, though
Looking at his tall, tired frame and wispy beard
You would take him for a philosopher.
In the early evenings, I would call on him-
Sitting on the verandah we would talk -
About murals and the passing of ways of life.
He would tell me about the old town
Standing, as often I do, beneath my old mango tree,
I wonder how it would look without the leaves.
Without the mangoes, without the branches
Without the birds that sit preening on them.
The thick trunk sawed off, roots pulled out
Tiles or cement choking the earth.
For one, sunlight would be brighter; and glare
Upon the tiled roof of my house.
No more yellowed leaves to sweep away in the morning.
No more bird droppings to wash off
No more bat-eaten, splattered mangoes.
No more flies swarming around
No more air, thick
With the smell of the ripe, golden fruits.
No more, the tapping of the woodpecker
No more, the screeching kites.
In these fumes of whisky and tobacco
I disappear, slow-
This soft music
And this solitude-
Mind dulls
Limbs droop,
My death, come!
The last visitor has left.
So, what if I'm not over you?
It's Midnight and I'm thinking of you.
I wish I could sleep
Stop pounding my head with our memories.
Just shut up,
And let me sleep.
I am so tired of missing you.
Today was a good day.
I didn't flinch when they brought your name up.
I didn't show any sign that I even remotely missed you,
I didn't give them any ounce that I still care about you, that you still keep me up at night, that I can still feel your lips on mine own, that even though I'm alone in the darkness I'm not,
Because you are there with me.
I didn't tell them that even though it's been months since we went our separate ways that I still love you.
I didn't say a word.
Because today was one of my good days without you.