Home

 

I cannot go back; no, I can’t

To the house of my childhood.

Cracked walls and plaster peeling off

The brick and mortar crumbling

In allegiance

To the two failing bodies inside.

Silent horror wrings my entrails;

I cannot breathe

As I come in and see

The moment of blankness in clouded eyes

Before memory seeps in

And floods them.

 

I sense hands;

Hands which had

Once

Enveloped my entire self in protection

They now trace feeble lines

 

Down my spine.

I dwell in comfortable dementia

But occassionally

 

A little girl surfaces;

She holds wild flowers

Picked on sunlit afternoons

She sings lullabies

 

I have long shut my ears to

Her eyes are accusing

I am afraid of her

I am afraid

She would ask

 

Of the world I forsake

The day I grew up.

 

 

Illustration by Namrata Nirmal

Poem by Swathi C.S.