Dear D,
Last night I couldn't sleep properly. I tossed around with the blanket, not able to register how should I place it to feel comfortable. Sometimes, I was feeling cold and then within minutes, I felt like sweating. I was unable to dislodge those conversations from my mind. It kept coming back to me in hours of silence and shadows. In broad daylight, when there is so much clamor, I somehow sweep them away to that dusty corner of my memory bank. But with time they show up with cumulative interest. I had almost successfully placed them, covered within a soundproof cubicle.
But yesterday, as I was dusting my almirah, that book fell down from the top. Those pages, almost turning yellow, were fluttering in the wind. It rained yesterday. The window was left open as I was watering my plants. As I bowed down to pick up the book, a red rose, now turned brown came out of it. With time, its petals have lost their softness. Now they have crumpled up. With a mere touch, they got detached from the fragile stem. It was a poetry book by my favorite poet. I had almost forgotten its presence. With time, the poet remains no more my chosen one. I have abandoned it long back. Those poems remind me of days spent with a dear one-- reading them together, laughing, going to places I never knew existed...I didn't know it would later become only a memory-- images that would take me years to dissolve in the water. The water is now puddled. I don't drink it anymore. From there rise wisps of unfulfilled promises, still lingering around those pages...
Once I thought of throwing it into the bin. But then, I couldn't. I kept it back to its own place... Next time, while I dust that place, I would be careful enough not to touch it...Some memories and bruises are best kept untouched...
"I look back and laugh
In mirth, I shed my sorrow,
Every tear has some purpose
We learn tomorrow"
(This diary entry is a figment of my imagination.)
By Nandini Sengupta
@metaphors_of_life