The staircase was desolate.
There is a difference between things appearing deserted and being actually deserted by life itself. This cannot be realized until you happen to, in the blackest hour of your life, come across such a place. The staircase would continue to serve its purpose; many sets of feet would continue to prance happily or run urgently or drudge lazily along its length, but still it would never be whole again because on pair of feet has disappeared forever. Never again will there be the calculated rhythmic sound of those two going up after a long day. However the echo will remain always like a fractious kid who creeps up behind you as soon as you are distracted, touches you or speaks in your ear and is gone again as soon as you turn around leaving you to frantically search for something to explain the noise, and you wonder with a hopeful but despaired heart hammering in your chest whether it was the person your eyes longed to see and your ears strained to hear from.
In the day, the light appeared too white, too serene, devoid of colour and allure. It was like living in a dream in alien surroundings where you don’t understand anything, nothing is under your control and you just float around trying to piece together an answer which makes some sense. The white world was like a hospital where there is so much pain and sadness around you that it becomes essential to cut yourself away from it to continue with your existence, just existence not life.
The nights were worse – the darkness was even darker- the pain and longing kept at bay because of the fear that the daylight would reveal them and they would lie naked demeaned by the presence of unfelt empathy in strange eyes, would come crashing down in a moment. Eyes that never glistened in company could barely contain themselves. Hands which longed for the touch, the feel, the presence shivered. The emptiness inside would expand to fill all the crevices and the recesses of the entire being in all its complexity and reduce it to just infinite, unendurable and inexplicable pain. The eyes refused to close dreading the moment they did and there would be sharp jibes of pain from the dull fire that keeps burning endlessly chilling and numbing everything.
The sense of loss is one of the most imperishable of all the feelings that exist in the universe. To add to the despair it is accompanied by regrets that so much was left unsaid, so much undone and so much time was lost, precious, invaluable time. This guilt never goes away and maybe that is why the memory of death often outlives the joy of the life it purloined.
The heart and eyes always lie in wait at the bottom of the desolate staircase, even when the mind tells them to move on; turn around and never ever look there, but still the echo and memory remain, coming back to haunt you and make you stare and search fruitlessly in the past again and again.
In the day, the light appeared too white, too serene, devoid of colour and allure. It was like living in a dream in alien surroundings where you don’t understand anything, nothing is under your control and you just float around trying to piece together an answer which makes some sense. The white world was like a hospital where there is so much pain and sadness around you that it becomes essential to cut yourself away from it to continue with your existence, just existence not life.
The nights were worse – the darkness was even darker- the pain and longing kept at bay because of the fear that the daylight would reveal them and they would lie naked demeaned by the presence of unfelt empathy in strange eyes, would come crashing down in a moment. Eyes that never glistened in company could barely contain themselves. Hands which longed for the touch, the feel, the presence shivered. The emptiness inside would expand to fill all the crevices and the recesses of the entire being in all its complexity and reduce it to just infinite, unendurable and inexplicable pain. The eyes refused to close dreading the moment they did and there would be sharp jibes of pain from the dull fire that keeps burning endlessly chilling and numbing everything.
The sense of loss is one of the most imperishable of all the feelings that exist in the universe. To add to the despair it is accompanied by regrets that so much was left unsaid, so much undone and so much time was lost, precious, invaluable time. This guilt never goes away and maybe that is why the memory of death often outlives the joy of the life it purloined.
The heart and eyes always lie in wait at the bottom of the desolate staircase, even when the mind tells them to move on; turn around and never ever look there, but still the echo and memory remain, coming back to haunt you and make you stare and search fruitlessly in the past again and again.
* * *
MISSING YOU
When you were there before my eyes
There were reasons to laugh and smile,
And wishes came true without any compromise
Because you would go that extra mile.
It was easy to tell you secrets
Because I knew you would understand
And somehow erase all my regrets
As if you possesed a magic wand.
The happiness and ease came naturally,
Never forced or grudgingly forgone,
And comforts were given gift wrapped to me.
Now it is just I and I alone.
You have gone too far to come back
But still I long for the sound of your voice,
Instead I am haunted by echos that lack
There were reasons to laugh and smile,
And wishes came true without any compromise
Because you would go that extra mile.
It was easy to tell you secrets
Because I knew you would understand
And somehow erase all my regrets
As if you possesed a magic wand.
The happiness and ease came naturally,
Never forced or grudgingly forgone,
And comforts were given gift wrapped to me.
Now it is just I and I alone.
You have gone too far to come back
But still I long for the sound of your voice,
Instead I am haunted by echos that lack
Your soul, or you to be precise.
Your voice, your face, your love and your feel
Are irrevocably lost forever
But in prayer before you, not god I kneel
For I know you will leave me never.
The memory of you is safe with me,
It’ll always be fresher than dew and never fade.
The precious past is under lock and key,
But for another moment with you, centuries I’ll happily trade.
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