Shaleen Rakesh

Deep blue underwater filming the final cut  the final act on videotape I barely hold on, and break into tears  it's the pressure, pain. sand  on the ocean floor  that gets me the shifting 
bodies editing the final scream then it cuts to black
 you shout pack up and I wake up on a different shore.

A haze of steam allows me  to be discreet and so like bluish vapour and pungent sap I'm everywhere  not even woodsy  or rain-kissed or exotic I am working sweat  dripping  in dampness to return to you  the drops in your sweet soft eyes 

Voices from the surreal
 bringing echoes of your internal war
s and news  that we are losing  day after day start taking possession within me, of me.  maybe
 if your earnest words can dissolve these nerves I will grant you the wings
 to answer the prayer I read in your eyes the first time we met smoke rose  between your fingers
 casual prayers  you didn’t utter.

Sparks between you  and a pretty boy 
in the dark I stepped out and stared at my feet in the park your crush lighting up the night  and me lighting up  like I can’t cope 
 with the puppy dog hope  in your eyes I fled that cage  that I was starting to weld for myself.

When I wake  I'll feel for you under the pillow arms across the sheets and miss you close my eyes again around a dream press my lips to swallow your name and let sugar cravings  kickstart my day. 

When the ink has dried up  and all fluid  from your motion is visible  as residue  left behind on trace paper bleak or weak with intention  it's time to remember that all which is left is still  the purest essence of you 

At night at night you're not here at night at night you're not here  any more than day at night you're not here no more do I dream no more do I wake  any more at night 

I am a wolf watch me at night before I leave your bed trading your warmth  to wander the streets and leave my scent on fences
 watching over strangers in darkness catching some sleep in open air and stealth It will be days before  I scratch at your door
 again spit-cleaned  white fur and shiny eyes ready for the new moon.

You were a storyteller  lurking on my pages you told me your immigrant story running through your veins  in my language and into my blood until I knew it by heart in my inner verses and it became mine you became and i was (yours)

Dried on my lips last nights kiss on a pillow at rest tracing the hollow of his chest the morning air now empty of him but drifting freely with his scent the fragrance that showers me awake as the day begins.

You want to be like glue stuck and warm, creasing my body removable, but not easily If I tear at you, it will hurt It turns out I am plaster even closer to you I am imprinted you can't peel me away  we are not (thank heavens) like sticky tape  clingy for a little while but easily brushed off I know we don't want to be metaphors but the truth is we like to feel stuck like adverbs and more than close.

There are two things  I forgot to tell you the first had to do  with the biting chill of winter and the second with the way the colours run in spring I forgot to tell you because I only knew you in the summer and the fall the time of long days and pretty sunsets.

The fruit is ripe dust collects on the leaves like sweat  upon the squalid summer stream where the tree  stands, shade has fallen on the road the light is clear  and distant the last anguish comes when the birds flee.

The night of parting, now rests on your silent lips the tedious love we indulged under a treacherous moon when a dark and heavy, thunder scattered brush on the road.

Medium : Paper on Ultrabook

Under hurried footfalls a limpid road  runs metallic blue, and comes upon a large temple the sound of bells and chanting  fill the summer evening, where  softly rest  blades of grass.

I stand exposed in your dying waves, you smile  endearingly  I can only hold my breath and taste your sweetness Evening you consume me with the vanishing sun in a last burst of shade.

Hiding beneath the earth morning reclaims itself  in a golden blaze the orange of summer inflames the branches start crackling across the neighbourhood the dogs start to bark, day has broken  between sleep and vigil dream was like a cloud