i only stop when i know i’ve had enough.
i guess i haven’t had my fill just yet.
you’ve gone to france, as you always do. your second life, i call it, but i dont blame you: that’s what a lifetime of living with parents who are teachers does to you. four weeks this time; it’ll be five the next or six, or whatever. but i’ve stopped counting the days. i learnt to live without salting my wounds.
Y went camping with his blonde, though she’s not blonde now but rather a seductive red. they’ve been together months now. it’ll be a year soon. october, i think.
he was meant to come back yesterday, but his phone was off. i called him twice. twice is always my limit.
i know i’ll call him again.
X is just an ex. we speak sporadically on msn and i’ve not been on the computer for days. i just couldn’t face the lonely screen staring in my face. i wanted physical contact, the sound of someone’s, anyone’s voice reverbrating in my eardrums.
and i read books. sartre, “streetcar named desire” and anais nin with her erotica. that put me down, but then, i wanted to be put down. sometimes there comes a point in our lives when we can no longer continue to believe in what we are believing until we see what else there is to see.
then there was Z. another reunion. he called me just now. for no reason. he didn’t say so, but then he rarely says a lot. he’s coming back from wales today. he was away for a week, but what more is there to it? it was another failed lesson in love for him, but i know i’m not the one to teach him.
in the end of all ends, i love you.
and i met your ex too on the days. that was fun. hurt me like crazy but it had to be done.
somewhere in between “the spy in the house of love” and “the age of reason”, i’d lost my wits. literature has a way of doing that to you.
i needed to see her.
i needed to feel the arterial spray of your past on my face.
let her do her worst i thought and damn, she tried her best.
Posted in chapters of my life
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can you tell me, why de ja vu haunts me like a predator stalking its only surviving prey? the de ja vu, embossed with its frenchness. just like you. just like those kisses you plant on my lips, their buds opening in the middle of the darkest nights, as i wake in cold sweat, clammy hands turning on the lights to chase the demons away.
and i realise, that love is french, italian, dominican. but more than that, it’s foreign to all of us. it’s language – mysterious hum in the early-morning air, it’s lands – unbounded by borders, it’s people waking up every morning, just like the rest of us, seductive scent of coffee in their kitchens, shatter of broken cups imprinting its echo on the windows.
and when i think of love, i think of the mess that coffee would make, drops collecting, puddle spreading with every beat of the heart. my mess.
and it doesnt touch you. you’re not really here. not entirely.
and love doesn’t cut you with its broken china or stain your slippers with instant coffee, fresh those marble tiles.
does it touch you at all?
…
it’s been three months now and i’ve nothing to tell me that i’m yours, only a herbarium of those flowers you bought me the day my mother went to the zoo with my little sister in tow.
only a dead plant, in an envelope somewhere, next to Y’s unopened loveletters and the note that X kissed so that a part of him may remain with me forever, or whatever his reasoning was.
and at night, in somebody’s kitchen, in a land far away, my heartbeat keeps the coffee flowing.
Posted in chapters of my life
Tagged air, all, away, beat, border, bought, broken, bud, buds, can, chase, china, clammy, coffee, cold, collect, cups, cut, darkest, de ja vu, dead, demons, dominican, drop, drops, early, echo, embossed, entirely, envelope, every, far, flowers, flowing, foreign, forever, french, frenchness, fresh, hands, haunt, heart, heartbeat, herbarium, here, him, his, hum, imprint, instant, italian, just, keeps, kiss, kissed, kitchen, kitchens, land, lands, language, letters, light, lights, like, lips, little, love, make, marble, may, me, mess, middle, mither, months, morning, my, mysterious, next, night, note, nothing, now, of, only, open, out, part, people, plant, predator, prey, puddle, realise, really, reasoning, remain, rest, scent, seductive, shatter, sister, slippers, somebody, somewhere, spread, stain, stalk, survive, sweat, tell, that, think, three, tiles, touch, tow, turn, unbounded, unopened, us, wake, wake up, waking, was, went, whatever, window, with, x, y, you, yours, zoo
glittering soot on her eyelashes 