Have you ever woken up
To feel the high of last night’s sorrow?
Your face pressed against the cold window-pane
Hopeful, until your eyes bring to focus
The blank wall of your stranger neighbor
Drab as the portrait you’ve painted of him.
Well, the view’s not always the same.
Sometimes her curtains are drawn.
Sometimes, not.
She’s a stranger neighbor too– but you’re a hypocrite.
And you’re
Hopeful, until your breath fogs the glass.
So you turn inward and look inside you
To a view that ages beautifully
With you, yet,
never grows old.
You ride the tramcar over the cinnamon-scented hills.
Promise,
That you terribly deserve.
and you love how the morning smells like breakfast.
Honey-glazed croissants dipped in sunshine.
Rain,
in your warm black-coffee.
You are in a place so beautiful it makes you sad.
Promise,
That you feel is undeserved.
You long for a place that doesn’t exist.
But you know how to get there…
Raag Bageshree on a bamboo-flute
Teentaal on your fingertips,
It’s the farthest you’ve been from your house
Without ever leaving home.
The sun is setting now
You regret the same lunch that delighted you
Not so long ago.
You feel dirty so you stand in the hot shower
Your body bare and your thoughts naked
Fetal in its honesty
Fatal in its truth.
It’s hard to be a romantic in an opportunistic world.
And you’re romantic about most everything but people.
No, that’s a lie.
You’re terribly romantic about people.
Just not persons.
Everybody,
But nobody.
You think of making dinner… but
You’re swayed by the promise of the morning,
Hungry but settling to starve,
You alienate yourself.
You don’t know who you are
But you grow fond of who you’re not
And your mind implodes, crumbling
Into the vacuum of your thoughts
As you fall asleep.