Day #1 we wrote bits of history far from the citadel there were no emperors and armies in it no chronicles of kings, no clangor of swords against swords
it was an ungathered compendium of tales of nobodies, little stories of little people from the mud-and-stone dwellings far from the reach of the shadows of palaces
a tale of you and me
a story of farmers, of lyrics from harvest songs, of outlaws and poets, of madmen dancing in the squares of runaway nautch-girls and proud tribes the king couldn't tame it was perfumed with the sweat of artisans- their fingers melting into their craft it was a tale of weavers, musicians with their disciples, pouring their cup and passing it on, it was a story of housewives, of messiahs embracing their crosses with arms open wide it was a narrative of gravediggers, a tired biography of bonded labor that built monuments
a tale of unknown trade-routes where you and I met, we had no gold coins, but there was musk, there were forbidden spice-kisses a touch of silk, the texture of papier-mâché
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
Day #2 winter— at first, I refused its onset and took to gathering leaves and making fire
but it drew close so slowly with footsteps light as frost, held me so lovingly that I had to turn to ice, I had to put out the fires so that I could return its embrace
I had to turn to ice, hold it let its arctic whispers guide me through december
that is why, now, I carry my frostbitten heart everywhere, I carry it into spring and I carry it into summer, relentless, there's no cure for my affliction
a soul from a different season, I come and leave and wherever I arrive, I'm a stranger among strangers, there's nobody I know but winter
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
Day #3 around me: my courtroom, the cascade of a million curtains of darkness beside me: Silence - my attorney a pair of pursed lips
I, its wary client, reaching into myself to gather any leftover emotions, but all I feel are the cold iron bars of a prison cell
is this where you leave me in the hangman's arms and kiss me a death-sentence? if yes, think again, we can still drop all charges, and save what remains
bitterness though we are, there is evidence that our case has no precedent: both of us are guilty and innocent
Last edited by Arcticus on Sat Apr 02, 2016 8:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
Day #4 (whose chessboard is this?) its a clash of opposites, a game of face-off, the knights break the silence and jump over and over the pawns
THE KINGDOM MUST BE DEFENDED!
that's why the rooks must die for a slow, slow king and the ideals of royal paralysis, and meanwhile a fistfight of bishops will wake the queen, she will rush from square to square, and cut through the air with legions behind her
and then, the pawns: glorious, dispensable will march into martyrdom to protect us all
this, the romance of a black and white world, a flat grid of squares laid out, void of grey, stripped of a dimension. where in the heat of battle, no one wonders or thinks WHOSE CHESSBOARD IS THIS?
Last edited by Arcticus on Sun Apr 03, 2016 4:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
Day #5 we are worthless pieces of poetry, stanzas tangled up in stanzas, we barely make any sense and choke on our efforts, and end up with our souls hanging from clothes-lines in slum dwellings on a rainy day
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
I'm a coward at heart, I cover, I duck I run from change into shadows and go into hiding wearing a raincoat of shivers; I scrape ocean floors like a shipwreck with a sea-chest full of love letters, unopened I don't drown, but when I do, I drown deeply, perfectly and find it hard to break away from what I anchor to
ii.
I walk like a clown, half of me is face-paint and the rest is badly memorized lines I go from act to act, leaving the audience with stitches in their sides and cash myself a cheque of heartache
iii.
I'm a fool, I laugh like one, and believe in everything everyone says I give away the keys to my heart and open myself to the tearing apart. I'm useless- a rebel smile on a dying face
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
Day #9 an old victim of morning's thievery of dreams, she won't give in this time
when first light comes knocking at her eyelids, she lifts her hands and reaches for nowhere and everywhere to hush all the alarm-clocks dumb, snatches the dismal ring-rings out of their throats and throws them away as she grapples with reality, tears up the dawn and packs her bags, leaves for her subconsciousness, where she is relentless by now, laying bricks on water
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
I'm a valley, mythic lake wearing my shawl of glaciers, woven out of snowflakes Pashmina of ice crystals, my winter Himalayan, my ache landlocked
Habba's own meadow of songs Lalleshwari verses: "Shiv chuy thali thali rozaan" Shiva abides in all that is, everywhere
I'm Khusrau's Firdaus, Iran-e-Sagheer, Little Persia, Venice of the East on my skin, shy hanguls and cashmere goats, Chinar leaves
I'm overexposed postcards and medieval streets
to my west: Persepolis in ruins, the ghosts of Alexander's tired soldiers lonely Porus fighting the Greeks the thrum of hooves of the fast horses of Mongols, approaching me
to my east: Tibet - freedom's own monastery, The Silk Route my corner-street beside me, the terracotta ruins of Indus dwellings of the ancients that the ages buried
to my south, the land of sacred rivers Ganges her sparkling necklace her earth-brown sari made of Dacca muslin time frozen in her rock-cut temples
I'm the breeze from Central Asian steppes that travels all the way to Khyber, and crosses the borders while the mountains sleep
I'm the wounds left by raiders and invaders, and have no name no flag or anthem, I just watch the seasons change
I'm a valley, mythic lake of landlocked ache there's no way out to sea
You either worship something higher than yourself or end up worshiping yourself
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