Miss Elusive!
Remember that feeling of coziness?
When the winter winds howled out at night,
Like a specter wheezing away in the distant
horizon;
Dreadful, haunting, and sinisterly
threatening to fright.
But that didn’t matter to us, for we were tucked
alright;
Our bodies cuddled together, our breaths
providing needed warmth;
Our thick and puffy blankets, wrapped all around
us, a fortress of our own;
Under the stars formed by the decorative
lights on the walls and the ceiling,
Flickering into a dance like fairies,
sprinkling their magic dust.
Every crevice they touched, happiness and
joy they seemed to conjure.
But the touches were not of mysterious and
dreamy faerie-folk!
Yours on mine and mine on yours, that’s all
really folks!
Remember that warmth on that sunny evening
on the beach?
The cold waves touching our feet, and luring
us to follow them;
The crabs tickling our legs, as they scuttled
between muddy burrows;
The relaxing sound of the coconut tree
leaves rattling and smattering;
As the breeze threw them into a frenzy, of ecstatic
head-bobbing.
When the distant laughs of little children playing
and running,
Made us forget the adult in us, tempting us
to join their merry-making;
But our own coy forced us to stay where we
were, in each other’s arms;
As our own hands turned to crabs to run
over each other’s body,
Tickling, making us laugh, squirm, and fall
more into each other’s heart;
Our eyes peeking over each other to the
people in the distance,
As we mischievously sneaked each other a
gentle yet moist peck.
I remember those wonderful, playful moments,
and many such more;
For I had the mind to conjure up places,
events that never were;
And sometimes people, however I want them
to be, who never really existed.
Call it day dreaming or a surge of
imagination, the mind that can make up a reality,
And had an equally tremendous power to force
the present to take a back seat,
Ignore all that happen around me, so I can
give life to you and make you live beside me,
For the few moments you exist, my life seems
to have a purpose,
A purpose more important than being just an
extra, in someone else’s main story.
Not an ounce of courage nor a smidge of
patience to make my imaginations a reality;
For the high, your few moments of existence
give, quenches all thirst and passion.
But in recent times, as my memory fades,
you remain just as elusive,
As you are in my reality, so are you being
in my most recent dreams.
Old age…a weak heart…crumbling body…a fading
memory…
The island of Ogygia, that my mind once was…
That always housed you as a forever young Calypso;
Untouched by the forces of time, that made
leaves wither away and turned bones to dust;
Now turning into a dark misty cavern, where
words don’t settle and memories don’t stay.
The desire in my heart remains, to hold
your young hands in mine,
And walk with you into the sunset, as every
happy fairy tale ends.
But desire alone remains, not my power to
see you in my mind’s eye;
And feel you, the way I used to feel, and
the way I used to think about you.
Dear Miss Elusive…Your features are now
mere smudges on a canvas,
Your shape is all waves, your lips mute,
and your breath, unreachable.
The worst curse of all bestowed by my
growing old.
Is losing someone so dear to me, whom I never
really got to hold.
-
SriVishnudaasan
