Shaleen Rakesh

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.

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)

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.

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

The evening is dry its heating like a stone, I see a solitary person, parched bent like a crumpled leaf time flows endlessly here this night flows through him like a rustle.

I don't feel like picking a fight with this night  my body Is gross tired of carrying this day I would like to be  Alone like a thing I forgot  to pick up Alone I feel nothing but bliss Alone with small wisps of dust  and heat rising from the earth. 

A ruthless and windless, summer The summer Thirsty too, summer The summer The sun brought a friend, summer  The summer When the trees pray for rain, summer The summer Even the earth gets tired, summer The summer.

Dream from  down under and dream from the edge dream of a love no soul could allege see the light appear slowly fill up  your eyes, and  suddenly you catch, new wind on the rise  come towards me now come to see me my lover this dream for a dream for the moment  forever.