पर्खीर'न्छु

I keep on waiting
for a relief; she'll come barefoot

Like the wind she'll
blow out the candles I've lit
and like the wind she'll
whisper in my ear

I'm waiting for that
whisper in my ear ...

Because I've picked up this strange habit of forgetting to exist at times. True, I wake up in flesh and blood, and I walk through the air as it parts for me. Yet between my step out of one room and into the other, I find myself dissolving into thin air: much like a whisper that never finds its ear.

I keep on waiting
for a quick kiss;
a peck on the cheek will do.
or a red slap
right on that same cheek.

Because I've picked up this strange habit of wallowing in ennui; of basking in the dull glow of the half moon and SCREAMING as a phantasm that never existed yet I'm right here and phantasmal and SCREAMING

I keep on waiting
on the terrace and barefoot

I keep on waiting
on the terrace at 11 pm

I keep on waiting
on the terrace with the power out

I keep on waiting
on the terrace where I'm the only man in the universe

It's 11 pm, served with a light drizzle and a garnish of absolute darkness here on this terrace where I stand so lonely I don't exist at all

And here the stars have descended into the gourds amongst whom I stand
And here they'll wander down to the kitchen garden twinkling as ever
And here they'll land upon the bushes: a constellation of berries
And here they'll ripen into Fireflies,
one presumes,
to flicker for a little while just
to go out like a candle

And among these Fireflies, I wait.
I wait for that barefoot wind and her subdued whisper
to put me out for a little while
so I can wake up in flesh and blood
and remain in flesh and blood for the rest of the day

Because I've picked up this strange habit of being everywhen:
in the vast array of nameless days,
in the spectrum between the Full Moon and the Crescent,
during the afternoons and the evenings,
and all moments in between.

And so my abode is smeared across days of the week and stretched across the months
And it might eventually settle itself across the years and decades
like a dead cat curled up but rotten.

In my abode the time-stream flows like endless words, relentless words,
words that never stop and words that never stay

So I wait,
for that flowery giggle
which will punctuate these words
into sentences that I can live
one at a time

So I wait
for the kisses
which will punctuate these
Sundays and Wednesdays,
and the untold number of Fridays,
into hours that I can live
one at a time