The Agelessness of Ageing

She who dwells in timelessness is a master storyteller. I watch the shifting weight of light cloud her face as she speaks . My mind doodles with words absent-mindedly, but the being soaks up the quintessence of such couch-potato moments; of my sister and I. Midway, a sentence is splintered by the sound of a passing train...and then another. Cars swishing past on the highway add haphazard punctuations and ellipsis to her stories. I listen...at some point, we  both drift off into our own inner domains. Floating between here and there, we learn to negotiate the narrow lanes of reality.



1.

she rides 
on the elusive 
wings of her stories  
words radiant
steeped in love.
songs surge
eyes droop
to hide the
passions 
long-dead and
yet breathing...
an army band
playing the 
national anthem
passes by unheeded
but the memories 
from once-upon-a-time
march on...

the blue kite 
entwined within
the flaming palash
blossoms catches
the wind: free at
last



2.

the heart still waits
even as body turns
to wood, breasts sag
furrows on forehead 
grow deep and smile 
loses its curve. the sigh 
of a falling leaf faltering 
over a wayward branch 
burns a hole through 
the wrinkled skin. the end 
becomes the
beginning...minutes slip
and fall over each other 
burying those bony hands 
of Time

the blurred
flight of a crow outside the
window carries the sun 









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