Au Contraire.

Our elaborate shadows are but shifting silhouettes,
And you lean forward,uncusping body,mind and soul into mine-
The pace of  air shifts into a timeless trance,
The breathlessness of our violin voices out of tune.
Undiscovered feeling develops into negative film reels,
Flimsy just as our vulnerability-veiled yet,unmasked.

Swing,swing.

 

It had been terribly long since I'd sat on a wing,let alone swung full force.

Awhile since I let go of my worries,drove them away into the wind.

And that's when I came upon..Upon a creaky old wooden swingset.

At the back of an apartment building,the seldom used set sat turningyellow.

One of them with an ageing slit down its centre.

And it had one screaming message carved all over it's being.

"People leave,they always do."

But then in a wise,old voice it said "People change.Memories don't."

A postive connotation or the wisdom for life in encrytption?

And today,this ol' swing set had found occupants,yet again.

A vial of joy for its withering soul.

They talked about fickle things-of how every singe year of a human life is drastically different,demarcating it significance in years.

And how psychologists in the country really needed to get to know some young people a little better.

And about friendlessness and birthdays and lack of creative space.

A sheltered domain of secrecy-conversations that will fray and rust like the reins that hold it up.

And yet of prime importance for the noursihment of two.

Going Steady.

Last night,I heard my heart beat in time with another pounding heart.

Like a trapped bird against a steely cage.Waiting to fly away.

Breathing in the milk baby smell,so close to my sandpaper lips.

My thoughts couldn’t contain the words unspoken,

And  mind couldn’t hold back the gush of overbearing emotion.

I sat up,blanket draped over my shoulders.

I’d been dreaming,again.

Dreaming of the promise of a future.

Wishful thinking or blissful ignorance.

Last night,I met love and happiness on their shores again.

 

Playdough ambitions.

Blinding colour,psychedelic pain.

Running again in scruffy shorts,reaching out our grubby hands.

The crocheted delicacy of childishness.

Sprawled all over the sunbaked terraces,

washed up in our own ignorace

,or was it mere innocence.

The playground politics,or the very lack of it,thereof.

Curled up in the  cracks of our craniums,

just fading freckles.
Grew up playing house together,

now grow worthy building houses of our own.

 

Over that old,crumbling bridge.

"Feel the Earth beneath your feet" she says,"The radiating heat of her presence,against our bare feet."
"And lined with dirt and pigeon shit." I add,matter-of-factly.
On a particularly hot day in October,we stood,isignificant beings under the the magnificent stone structure towering over us,in ways only four hundred year old monuments can.Skyscrapers could never compare.
 There's something about religious places,we all agree.A sense of serenity,the tranquil vastness of it all-the silence that dwells in the bustle of the pilgrims,maybe.
It's the oldest part of the city,and once glamorous structures cluster us,yellowing like much loved old books.To this day,we identify them as eptiomes of beauty and immortal grace,the same way one would with Marylin Monroe or Audrey Hepburn.
Just the idea of them,so ravishing,too overwhelming to be real.Unreal,unfolding before our eyes,even.
There are other things,that have we awe-inspired and spellbound,like a 100 year old cuckoo clock that still functions perfectly.The flawless marble sculpture of a woman,under a veil made of stone.A veil,almost fluid and silky and melodious as her poise.
And the statue that embodies two bodies dwelling in one soul,poignant.To discover all these treasures forgotten in corners,far-off,is to rediscover ourselves,children with reconnected roots,new identities.
And what's scorched feet and blistered soles,for a day lent from History.

Furthermore.

You know you have known someone long enough,when the sight of their apartment watchman's children giggling feels like a growing up of a kind.
When the paan stains on the elevator door and vandalized walls grow on you like your old nightshirt.
And the family maid,a constant smiles at you,remarking at your state of health by the smile on your face.
You know you've known someone long enough,when you seek solace their presence just as the smell of  yellowing pages of a novel.
Grows on you like a placid kind of reassurance,relief..contentment?
The worn down street like a map in your mind.
Where you linger afterdusk,out to fill it with your echoing laughter.
You know you have a keeper.
 

Lovelorn

 

My words never justify my thoughts.They always fall too short,or too meek to be understood the way the gravity of my thoughts can.

A a string-like ribbon holds pink cut-outs of paper hearts,blown by the nightbreeze at my windowscreen.

I can only imagine a phantom presence when I can't breathe.But it's real.

Curling up against the warmth of humanness,I fight back sleep..because it all seems too unreal.

Too unreal to dream.

My painted toenails,lie against unpainted ones,like lines perfectly aligned of poetry complimenting one another.

Is this true and good and whole?

My head finally finds the spot it has been looking to hide it's hot tears in,finally a chest to spill and wet with the warmth of the emotions.

 Can this be substantial?   

I clasp on to dear life,and for once,it;s clasping back onto me.

"I told you,you see." it's saying.

True are the colours of devotion and persistence.They can find you love,they said.

I never believed a words and walked away from the wishful thinking,instead.

But I'm starting to see,beginning to believe that the nuances are but true..

Come at you like a meteor shower,and blind your eyes the way only sunshine can.

Sunshine in the middle of the night,blinding your eyes and bubbling foamclouds of denial in your heart.

 Can this last forever and a day?