Tasenda

If only Life was resolved In small moments of Celluloid Clarity, Where breakfasts and brunches and sad little lunches Had small interludes, where we lived our lives Where we were caricatures or men and women of certain types All our flaws, all our smiles, all our little hopeless dreams Would be resolved in time for dinner, with space left for small snacks If only Life was resolved In tiny trespasses along Alliterating allusions, Where time and pain and all those little hurts Would pass in a montage, set to silent soundtracks Where ghost-quiet nights were woven together into magical quilts Held together by the threads that were unknotted from latticed shrines When the invisible returned from shadows of memories, to be whole again If only Life was resolved In small moments of Empathic epiphanies, Where prayers and amulets and objects of unverified provenances Had the power, to turn fireflies into starry nights Where our messy little truths, no longer colli...

Mou’ji , sing me a lullaby tonight Too many faces made of white smoke Smother me when I close my eyes My dreams are on a leash, and Olive green monsters stalk my breaths Mou’ji , sing me a lullaby Mou’ji , burn my clothes while I sleep Too many friends have bled on the Shirt, You brought for me when Eid last came For when the demons come for me, Let them never handle threads sanctified by blood Mou’ji , burn my clothes while I sleep Mou’ji , take away and bury my school books My classroom is now a sandbag bunker My fingers will trace words in the dark now Every page full of the names of the dead One by one, till I am one of them Mou’ji , take away and bury my school books Mou’ji , don’t cry when they bring me home For even if there is no heaven, I refuse to be choked My hands are scarred from the edges of stones But iron chains are heavier still Even when gilded with fool’s gold Mou’ji , don’t cry when they bring me home ...