Fleeting

Fleeting

I am slow to get it

Now for the moment

You have stopped me

By a hello, prolonged into

Let us know each other,

A bit more. Flitting around the

Modest wall flower, like a 

Curious feisty bumblebee.

As slowly it grew slightly beyond that.

Well beyond for the introverted bud,

Whose petals quivered, could not open.

It’s alright to have a thick skin, turtles

Carrying shell houses on shoulders,

But I live within a quivering carapace

Velveteen silk and paper-thin pain

Your attentions little needles teasing

Fresh tattoo piercings, when withdrawn 

Even for an hour, or nightmarish day

Unbearable to withstand its negation.

Now take pictures of me, in this state

I am drawn in invisible ink, only 

The acid test of your curious persistence

Reveals me true. Take your pick

Of my papyrus soul, ancient as a new-born

Baby, fresh from horrific travails of labour 

And a hundred lifetimes, writ in rueful pain

Creasing parchment face. I wonder if a 

Pincushion could feel, would it be mine?

Doppelgänger, or soulmate?

The tears are old, years sodden in my pillow,

From loneliness, and bereavement.

I cried hard when my great aunt died,

Burying my head on daddy's desk

Yet it was not the first death 

That etched my adult heart...

My beloved soul guide, an aunt, who passed

When I was nineteen, brought no tears. Yet

Passage of a great uncle, touchy and stiff

Sank me to the floor in despair

...I wonder why? Survivor guilt?

Remorse for not loving enough?

And why do you leave me so alive

So quivering with life?

So choked up with grieving questions?

Burning flame upon my eyes? Why?

Is the reason......too much love to bear?

Will I, if you cease to care, never again hold dear?

The price paid at the gate, of the carnival.

Choosing to enter, to ride the carousel,

Maybe I am the funniest clown onstage. ...

Because I don't know that I am, the joker.

The wild card entrance, that you didn’t reckon

Would enter your world.

Maybe none of us can ever be, 

Our own objective audience,

Till second childhood descends 

To observe in impartial neutrality

Subjective reins handed to descendants

Regard despair with detached amity.

My god! Too many balloons, 

Too many curve balls up in the air

I can't juggle them all, one by one 

They like pebbles fall.

Timekeeper....Observe, on watch tower,

Watch out for these grains of sand, 

These minute spheres

They each hold an ocean of tears.

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© Amrita Valan 2014