Photographs

Even the paint of your father's house hasn't changed. It is still that old shade of sky-blue. Almond tree still stands in your yard like a mad lover stuck in glorious past, even after 15 years.

15 years since you left our neighbourhood!
In your photographs now, I can't find your chin dimple anymore, hidden behind your double-chin. A little bit of your eyes, a little bit of your hair are alive though- I recognise them through your tinier versions, smiling in your arms, grabbing strands of your hair in their tiny fists.

For a wild moment, I wonder if I could have made you that happy.

I shrug it off remembering how you always complained I could never keep you happy.

Then I also remember the agony in your eyes while you said it.

Like you would rather be unhappy.

The other day, I spotted a familiar painting on a wall of your bedroom in one of your recent photographs.
A little off-place from your interior decoration.
The one I had painted for you years ago.

Now I imagine a little bit of tragedy in your smile in every photograph you post.

Precious and Perishable

Her eyes never leave mine as she descends from stairs. Distant streetlight bounces back from the sheet of her hair.

Oh boy, she looks like a goddess, cursed to endure the trivialities of earthly affairs.

That helplessness in her eyes, even her kohl cannot hide. She looks resigned- so unlike her usual self. I wish she scolds me, accuses me of having messed up.
Anything, anything that could bring that lively flame back in her eyes...

She smiles, a sad smile that is made of everything that is precious and perishable.

Has the world ever made sense?

So I do something I have never done before.
I hug her and sniff her hair.

'As a punishment to you,' she says hoarsely, 'I am going to blow my nose on this favourite shirt of yours.'

We both give a teary chuckle.
The world makes sense for that little time.