Funeral Lights

A tree is falling,

Slowly, roots tearing away at life.

The aged bark grunts as if in submission,

Nearly a century spent under shower and sun.

Dismantled, bloodied, she lies in wait,

Her lofty shadow attempting a fading escapade.

The wind sweeps away her last echoes of rustling as if in farewell,

And a long forgotten name falls from her lips.

Her lovers lean in to touch her ebbing light,

Her leaves weep for you the tears you cannot shed. 

Even the sun dips his face behind the horizon.

You remember the funeral, you know you are drowning too.

Alone she makes her journey forth, towards darkness,

Clinging, against confusion, to pictures of youth and life.

Stars, and wind, and the music of rain,

And you are caught in the corridor of sorrows left behind.

Ashamed to go home now,

You fall at her feet just like the rest of her sighing lovers. 

Here lies a grave of dreams imploring the world to remember,

And you, an unworthy witness to this story.

The city lights come on as if to blind one, 

Dotted windows of mocking cheer, 

Piercing honks and passing cars, rattling your insides.

The world is incapable of mourning. 

At the brimming tides of Nagaon

The unbounded joy of the surging waves,
As if they couldn't wait to reach the shore.
They remind me of my own eager footfalls,
Each time I set forth to see you.

When at last they merge,
When water and land consume each other,
Like lips meeting lips, or like book meeting reader,
Thirst and satiation become one.

As the waters sweep over me,
I try and clasp their memory in my fist.
But as a dear old poet once wrote,
Time shall have its fancy, tomorrow or today.

And so inexplicably I find myself deceived.
They are gone all too soon, and I am left
With the residue of their love story in my palm -
A murky map of abandoned dreams.

So too are the homeless debris of my mind,
Like ghosts fading into the ocean.
But before I am allowed to mourn, they return,
New waves promising new dreams.

And so we play our respective roles,
Mortal souls in an immortal story.
The sun, the moon, and the waves indulge us,
And for a moment, we like to think our footprints won't wash away.