my eyes wedged open

by shards of grey

the night gathers

at corners

yet refuses to flow out

yours

are a mere shadow

a curtainfall

of pale eyelids

over red misplaced rage

your purplegrey lips

are inert

drawn tight

over words that

once tasted blood

and mine

are parched

a landscape riddled

with ghosts

of the unsaid

:

:

above us

a naked bulb

its light falling

breaking

into shrapnels

:

:

you are a body

relieved of its mind

at peace, at last

wrapped in the throb

of its glassy shroud

I am a body

careworn, on guard

its wounds still

oozing thin blue pain

:

:

I sift through the debris

of our lifetimes

those thick yellow days

and nights

that dared not breathe

:

:

here a laugh that almost was

there a song half sung

a morning’s fleeting sunshine

at a distance, a lotus… 

:

:

my grief now

keeps shifting shape

and sometimes

it’s the colour of

the could-have-beens

…

Mini S. Menon: Writer and language teacher. Avid people-watcher. Loves words, flowers, sunsets and shadows.