ON ANY ORDINARY DAY
On an unmarked street In a small ,corner cafe You’re sitting in silence Waiting for what? Tea,coffee ,chocolate?
A cold wind is rising
From the wet pavement.
You’re early for a rendezvous With a kind of bereavement In the aloneness of your mind.
Suddenly someone enters A face you greet with a smile When strangers you meet.
The grey-haired woman
Looks like an old friend?
You see beauty in her wrinkles Her left hand slightly trembles Age has wrought its miracles.
You sit and talk
To share some news
Even give your views
On this and that
Life and death:
Is the earth round
Or is it still flat?
Of friends and foes
Scattered like petals Of hibiscus,marigolds,
In your shared gardens
Caught in the cobwebs of memories Glinting across so many seas.
On the cobbled street
From the corner of your eye
You see a world pass by
Where once all was blank
There were no footprints
Or words written on white boards.
Years, centuries ago
Someone may have walked On the very spot you sit
To sip and gossip
With your half-forgotten friend You build a warm hearth
On a coldest morning of the year With love and without fear,
Some memories flash
Like fishes sparkling
In marbled waves
Of your young days— Somethings never end.
You think of your lost worlds In faraway places
Nothing life replaces
It believes,as the heart grieves, That there are voices
Whispering in other rooms Thinking of days gone by
When the rain fell
And you played on flooded streets With your twins ,broken tins, And unbroken dreams
How the mudsplashed clothes , Were warm in the rain
You never felt each other’s pain.
Now all that is gone
You see people passing
Young and old,lost and lonely, Holding their hands
In many colours
Many dresses ,accents,
Like scattered seashells Littered on sands
While waves keep churning: So many such sights
Now leave me mourning.
An ordinary day
Brings such life
Back into your bones
And once again
You walk in memory’s lanes Of loss and remembrances
On hot stones.
The coffee has grown cold.
Your friend’s shadow leans
Like moonlight over dark waters.
Your mind stirs with embers
Life remembers
But cannot find
Those lost days and nights
Full of distant lights
Like stars afar,another galaxy, When all was so close to your eyes But you never saw
How beauty came into your life: A young girl gave you her heart To live with love.
You left her in some other place Now only memory gives you That special grace
So you may live and remember The passion,the love
That came to you from above And on this street
Where you may find
A face to greet
Sitting in a cafe
Waiting for a cup of coffee Floating steam of compassion.
The street walks away from you Over rolling hills
And blue mountains
Green trees with golden light Of a setting sun,
The sky coloured by a rainbow Like that mark on the forehead Of the girl you loved
And left in another country.
Old memories do not fade away
They deepen the landscapes
Of your life
As you walk through strange streets Meeting strangers from strange lands
Still holding hope in their hands.
Slowly darkness dissolves And you feel a kindness That blesses you
And you ,too ,can bless More or less.
Birds in bliss ,fly across the sky Each ferrying their cross, As time runs into the sands Leaving footprints
On the loved land,
And love in the sunshine Of wanton waves, so sublime.
The solitude of the seas
Below the waves
Is the same as the silence
Of the crowded streets:
Only you can behold
An orange light luminous Glowing in the transplanted trees.
Your heart is content:
‘The light is the same
The lamps may be different.’