You bought me shawls and potpourri.....

Each time you came back home

You bought me shawls and potpourri 

Each time you came back home

I would buy orchids and lilies

I would put them in vases and speak to the walls to behave

And I would ask the neighbour's son for that fallen frangipani 

And to get me some fresh marmalade his mum made

I would tuck behind my hair, 

flowers and years

I would light up the hall,

The wall, the eyes and 

The candles 

And let the imaginary bees buzz

They would rotate and follow over ponderous and unmade

Where I would prepare your favourite dishes

Where I would change the cover and quilts

Where I would circle in confusion of packing and undressing

Where I would patch the little undoings of spilled and scattered

And through the open window I would see the crow shit on fancy cars

Each time I would construct this thought 

To remind you to park yours on the other lane

The bees would play verbal games 

Ascending the language of my stuttering thoughts

And forgetfulness would arrive when you came

The pearl necklaces and crispy silk would stain in connivance and pits

And would seer my weight of memories and wisdom 

I would portion your eyes, scan your body,take in all that was commercial and magnetic

And then breathe in all that was bee wax, cinnamon and home

I would tell myself we are again standing over buried and past

You had arrived so many evenings till evenings got strained 

Since then I have tucked you in 

the fragrance of separate memories and shawls

And when each winter I wrap them around

You come swirling in the shawl and its confusion 

I have arrived to the convenience of sweaters and moth-balls  these days

But I still keep the potpourri in the confusion of a dark trunk, 

which encases your sacrilegious stains and shawls

And I still see the birds shitting on the fancy cars 

Each time wafts in a thought  

I forgot to tell you to park yours on the other lane

Edited by Dr Ampat Koshy 

A vintage painting by Herbert James Draper