this little flame

of hope for today

is out.

the gardener

i am this gardener. i have this small, insignificant patch. but it is all i have. i wish so dearly for it to flourish. carefully, i sow seeds. i watch as some grass shows, curiously peeping towards the sky. i try to encourage coriander and basil to spur a herb garden. one day i hope for a vegetable garden, and also for splashes of colour from flowers whose great beauty would leave the world speechless.

i want to share this garden. to show it. to sit with someone on the bench and admire and daydream in silence. to even have someone tend it with me.

but it is so fragile. the slightest gust of wind, the slightest breath of sand from the desert outside, and it shrinks, shrivels, dies.

and so i build this glass bubble around it. that is the only way i know to keep it safe. that is the only way i know to avoid the pain. i keep trying to cultivate these dreams within this protective shield. retreated, a failure, alone in denial. hiding this garden from the world all the while wishing for another gardener alongside me.

at the moment, under this lamp, as night surrounds me, i swirl with confusion. who am i. what am i doing. who am i listening to. who am i following. who is following me. thousands of bats shriek and stir waves within my skull, and i am left with this hollowness. i was once a whole but now, eaten and discarded, i am but a hollow core. my life trudges on. i smile fakely for eight hours during the day. it scares me how easily that seems to come, in between the yawns of fatigue that finally envelop me once i am back home. after sleep, the guilt of inactivity washes over me, and by the time she arrives home i cannot fake anything any more. i cannot feel any happiness when she returns. and i do not know what that means. or should mean. or whether i should know. or whether i know but i don't want to know. but i should know. we sleep at different times. i don't want to kiss her deeply. i just want to give up. how can this be, when i should be happy? how can i be like this when there is not that much actually going on? what is wrong? i wish i had some answers. that proverbial hand on my shoulder. but surely some guidance must come from within. this seems to be such a lonely journey. who do i want to be?

sad eyes

as the door
closes over
you holding
our beloved
child (cat)
this moment of frailty
the chink that lets
through this pang

i look away i
have
to
how can i let you
see through
to what hides inside
that

quietly,
desperately,
i am slipping
away



and so
to hide in
another day

i slip
away