Maze

so there was this

dream i had last night

that i was lost in a labyrinth

and was trying to find you

amid a web of walls that

disappeared

and

reappeared

and because i couldn’t find

you

i kept palm-prints on

smooth white surfaces

which recorded them in blood

so i would not search

again and again

for you behind

the same old walls

but the palm prints disappeared

seconds after

they appeared

quickly, like the ending of dreams

so there was no ending

to my search for you

and no beginning

to my finding you.

(From Stitch Your Eyelids Shut)

Caricature!!

Drawing by Sumudu Athukorala

Not my words

What you will remember

long after

I have vanished

from the margins of your

life is

not my words

fragile as flowers

under a dancer’s feet

not my thoughts

that floated bubble-like

through the air

and sometimes met yours

But what you felt for me

for one moment

in time

that  intense

hot, razor-sharp

feeling 

as true

and as fleeting

as a new-born’s cry.

From nothing prepares you 2007, 2012