Saturday, May 9, 2009

Fire


There was fire all around us, fire in between us. 
I felt helpless. I didn't want him to go, i didn't want this to be the end. The flames had started to rise, the heat enough to melt us. The fire was taking him away from me. My scream was stuck in my throat. My thoughts frozen in my head, not even the fire could melt them. I didn't want him to go. I didn't want this to be the end.

 There was nothing i could do. I stood still. Our eyes met. The memories flooded my mind. My eyes closed as the images flashed by. The songs. The dances. The whispers. The secrets. The lies. The darkness. The fear. The safety. The love. The fights. The lust. The words. The endings. The beginnings. The laughter. The tears. The rain. The sun. The dreams. The pain. 

It seemed surreal. My surroundings began to fade, the fire was growing. I needed him to touch me. To hold me one last time. To breathe with me. I needed the smell of his skin, the smell that my mind associated with safety. I needed to look at the sky one last time with him holding me close. I couldn't let go. Why should i have to? Why this fire? Why this sudden storm?

I searched his eyes, i searched his expression. I wanted to see if he was hurting. Was he waiting for me to take it all away? I stood still, staring at his angelic face. His delicate features.
He smiled. It was a smile that i had questioned many times before, a smile i had never understood.
It was the smile of victorious defeat. 
Almost suddenly, i drowned in pain. Pain much greater than what i had ever felt. I could hear the fire roar in my ears. The tables had turned, it seemed. 
I finally realized. 
It was not him who was burning.
 It was me.

Silence.


This distance is killing me.
 The pain that i feel numbs me.
 Slow, quiet death. No one will ever know.
 I wish i could talk it out. Tell him how i feel, what i think, but I'm scared that if i do, I'll push him away. Him and everyone. Wait a minute. Isn't that what I've always wanted? I don't want everyone around. I don't want my thoughts to be heard and my words to be listened to. I want to be left alone in the rain. I want the water to soak me, cleanse me of all my impurities, my sins. The water will never be clean again. I have stained it.
 And for that, I am sorry. 
I have pushed myself into silence. Martin Luther King Jr said that Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. But what if your silent to protect someone? To protect yourself? What if you HAVE to be silent. What if silence just cant be helped? 

Thursday, May 7, 2009

A Random Friend


In four hours, four long drawn hours that seemed like forever, i found him. I watched him surface through the pain and the betrayal. He had no scars, none on the outside at least. He emerged and held my hand. He had taken me away, taken me to that place i had always wanted to go. A place i had only heard of. He was my guide, my saviour. We sat in isolation from the world, the unbranded untouchables. A pink candle was my only source of light that Monday afternoon. He was the darkness, a darkness that didnt blind me. I felt an uneasy comfort. Was this wrong? Why do i feel safe? Insecurity had almost become a habit and yet with him there was no trace of it. 
I watched him, without realising. Observing, not staring. I would look at him and laugh. And cry. Feel wrong. And right. All the lines i had drawn were being erased. All the fences i had put up were being pulled down. Gently. I had let him into my life. I imagined myself in the 1950's, driving a Ford Edsel, the wind in my hair, inhaling clarity. I asked him if he would have wanted to know me in the 50's. He smiled. All of it felt like a dream, a nice dream, but one i couldn't control. I was flying, soaring, and i wasn't alone. He gave me something that Monday afternoon, something no one could ever give me, something no one could take away. Ask me now what exactly it was and i wont be able to tell you. Simply because i dont know. 
He was a stranger. One who, not easily might i add, but nevertheless, one who was beggining to take his mask off. He intimidates me. He scares me. Yet, in his black shadow, all i find is safety. Answers. Hope. A random smile. He is, and will forever be, my Random Friend.