Friday, January 28, 2011

COWARDICE

I’m doing it again.
I don’t have you,
So I’m seeking others
And they will never be you.

Last time it was easier
I was young and so were they.
But now it seems too late
To admit mistakes and move on.

Now I am sure I have wronged you –
We will never ever be one again.
I should have been stronger for longer -
I should have stuck to our crooked path.

Your dismal destiny is down to me –
Careless as I was and ever wasteful –
You were left to cope with the leftovers
That drove you to scornful rebellion and more.

If I had known they were destroying you,
Would I have rescued you?
With nothing left to lose now
I carry my cowardice like a scar.

How can I expect you to forgive me from the grave?
I feel like Heathcliff - determined to join you.
But what if you rose and rejected me as I dug:
Would we spend eternity as enemies?

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

PERSIAN PRINCESS III

Tonight I finally had the heart
To cry for you like I did
On the night you were first taken from me.

Tonight I knew you were really gone
And I would never see your eyes again –
Except in a flash of an old memory.

Tonight I lost my hope of love
Because it was locked in you –
Pent up over decades and never spent.

Tonight I saw you in visions
That rose from flickering candles –
Beauty that I never valued enough to save.

Tonight I could hear you in lyrics
And new wave rhythms that jangled –
Making me swoon with longing.

Tonight I drank you in draughts –
Sweet malted swigs of caramel –
Like the exquisite taste of your mouth.

Tonight I could smell the musk
Of your soft body and my hard lust –
And I remembered our love language.

Tonight I could feel the silkiness
Of your downy skin with its beads of sweat –
And I delighted in our desire.

Tonight I could do nothing
Except regress into regret
At a loss beyond losing.

Tonight I had no other urge
But to kneel by your grave
And weep enough tears to stir the ground.

Tonight I resolved to journey
Halfway across the world that killed you
So I could be by your side again.

Tonight I decided that you
Had been everything I ever really wanted -
But I failed to realise how much.

Tonight I understood at last
That all my other failures were nothing –
Much, much less than nothing.

Tonight I deleted the rest of it
As so much meaningless dross
So I might visit you untrammelled.

Tonight I wanted to drive you home –
Along Kourosh-e-Kabir and left at Khiaban-e-Pars –
To a place we two still inhabit as one.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

PERSIAN PRINCESS II

The news
Of your death
Shredded me
Like random shrapnel
From a roadside bomb.
Jagged thorns
Tore ragged holes
In my old heart
And left it ridden
With shabby scars.
But I am so lucky
Because I knew you.
I saw you –
Watched you from a distance
At first,
And then
Looked into your eyes.
I touched you –
Sensed your warmth,
And knew I was
So close to heaven.
I talked with you –
Heard the symphonies
That sprang from your voice –
The songs in your Persian phrasing.
I walked with you –
Kept you by my side
So others knew
We were together
And you
Had chosen me.
I laughed with you –
And you were so funny
As you teased me
And told me things
I never would have known.
I worked with you –
Solved problems –
And found solutions,
As we discovered
Each other.
I loved you –
Brief moments –
Stolen and stored away,
Before we wept,
Separated and bereft.
I wondered about you –
Long years of other
As we grew old
And walked our paths.
I sought you –
Too late it seems –
And long after
Your pain was gone.
I am left
With holes
In my heart
And scars
Set forever.
Sometimes I dream of you
And some of the smallest
Holes in my heart
Are filled for a moment.
Sometimes I talk to you
And I hear you answer
In your sing-song voice
That pleases my ears.
Sometimes I pray for you
And God tells me
Not to worry –
For He has rescued you.
Sometimes I lust for you –
The hardest cut of all.
Your beauty rises up
And falls against me, softly.
Sometimes I simply love you
And my heart’s scars
Are salved so sweetly
With the joy of privilege.
You were special.
You were unique.
You were too much
For a man like me.
And yet,
After decades,
I still see your face
As it was then –
Nothing compares
And nothing ever will.