[A dark love poem. Image source]
Love Poem
I
You steal around the earth pretending
to be alive.
I stop you and
you let me for
you see
I know better.
I know better.
But I don’t.
I hold you and there’s
nothing
to hold on to.
Still I try to hold you
to find beneath this iceblue cloth
red flesh
boiling blood.
I try
to get you to hold me.
You try.
Weak. In my arms limp. And so
I cling to your bony breast.
And so
I try
to be the
One
who holds up you and me.
‘Impossible’, says my mother
‘Unhealthy’, say my friends.
Wicked! What does she know
of love. She who resented
me.
Cowards! What do they know
of love,
who from their bluewashed cells
dare not lift their eyes
to red ecstasy
dare not sink their eyes
to black agony.
They know nothing.
I know better.
But I don’t.
II
I know only
that I have to save you
from what other people
did to you:
people I never knew.
From what other people
did to me:
people you never knew,
I fail to see
that I cannot even
save myself.
Oh, the addiction
of giving and of giving and of giving
and of getting
nothing.
Oh, the religion
of getting and of accepting and of
wanting
nothing.
Addiction I have known
and overcome.
I was weak but now I am strong.
Religion I have always
despised.
Others are weak but I never was.
And now, I feel sure,
and I, I feel sure –
I know better.
But I don’t.
III
I look into you
to see you.
Your eyes look back at me pretending
to overcome
your past
to desire
your future.
Beloved,
your eyes lie
for behind them
there is left
nothing
but a resignation to the eternal
present.
I look into you
to find you.
I venture down
into you
to mine you.
To cull from you your love
to make myself a cloak
warm red
to swaddle myself
against
the cold of the world
– the better to warm you
when we get back to life –
I venture down
into your darkness.
Alarmed
you warn me
there is
nothing.
Even you
I dismiss.
Fervent to save you
only I
see You.
I descend.
IV
I descend.
I shine my light
into you
stumbling, listening
for your heart.
Listening
for the boil of your blood, I hear
only
a simmer
torpid: as when
spent
I cling to your bony breast.
Outside.
Outside –
Can’t be.
I stumble. I retrace my steps –
I peer
into your dark
waiting for my light to show me
You.
You warned me there was
nothing.
I held you and I felt there was
nothing.
I dismissed
my senses.
Eager to find
You
I dismissed
you.
And now
peering into your dark
waiting for my light to show Me
You –
— too late I see
you have
softly
selfish
in love
snuffed out my light.
Too late I see
I have
softly
blind
in love
culled from you your
nothing.
Too late I see I have
already
made myself a cloak
iceblue
shrouded myself
against
the heat of the world
– the better to join you –
have dug myself a home
down here in your
nothing.
V
I know better.
But I don’t.
Beloved
I am ready.
***
TRUE LOVE: A Microstory
She looked into my eyes and saw me as I wanted to be.
I looked into her eyes, and I wanted to be the man she saw.
She was my inspiration.
***
HER SECRET: A Microstory
Other women thought it was her looks that made her popular.
Men thought so too.
Only her best friend knew the secret of her attractiveness.
Her kindness.
She was a mirror to everyone, showing them the best in their own souls.
END
Amita Basu 