Airport
No.
I don’t want you to find any more
about me.
Don’t look me up
anywhere
Don’t think
about me.
Take your satchel
and walk right out
with the punishing
disinterest that is
a characteristic
with the likes of
you.
Just fucking
fly out of this barren
land and let this fertile
(for fertility breeds foulness)
memory fly out of you—
this memory of me
being completely
opposite to what
I really am like (not
completely but a fair
bit I’d say),
Muse about me
if you must, on
the way to your
goddamned plane,
as whatever version of
myself I’ve conveyed—
whatever portrayal
you received. Use that.
It looked effective at
the time.
But if you don’t do
as I say, because you
wouldn’t think I’d want
to tell you anything—
would you
do me a favour?
Don’t find any more
about me. Don’t look
me up anywhere.
Don’t send me
anything.
Certainly not
friend requests.
Final Words
I have no parting phrase
except what the twilight
to the dusk says. I have a
smoke-filled morning at
the disreputable bus stand
and the half-chewed pen
cap in your drawer that
bears the assault of my one
chipped tooth. I have flakes
of dandruff decomposing
in your hard, linen sheet
where you on many an
occasion lay doubting the
truth about whether I had
spent all my last money.
Just look for me in the
creases I made on your
scalp when I ran my stubby
fingers through your smelly
hair. I loved their strong
scent that straddled the
little hairlets in my nose—
the kind of scent you
manufactured by not
stepping into the shower for
three days. Look for me in
the quick-dissolving corners
of your ever self-serving
memory. Look for me in those
perishing, periodontitis-stricken
gums of yours. I have hidden
my parting words there.
Love's Farce
Of course I don’t take love
seriously. I like to remain
aloof and poof away
hapless admissions
conveyed by my would-be lover.
I scoff at their voluntary
absentmindedness—such as
when they drop their shoes
fidgeting with their feet.
When they slyly slip in a
compliment but can only bleat.
I notice when they try to noisily
sip ice when the lemonade
has finished but I never show.
I keep looking away, half-expecting
another invisible visitor just
to break the snarky nodding’s flow.
I return like an easily irritated
tradesman from their jejune passions
and refuse to comment
on conciliatory persuasions.
Love might be said to taste
best for those that submit
but truth be told: those that
rear their front legs in love’s
so-named reverie, are actually
horses pulling fated carts and
subject to frequent administering
of spurs and sacrifices.
That’s what’s love.
Never lose control. Never lose
control. I never do.
I don’t take love seriously.
The flames scald my innards but I
Warm myself only vicariously.
I remember to forget dates
But not to shave
And do my best to keep Yeats
where he belongs—in the grave.
Passion is permanent blindness.
This bastard lets a stream free
and dams it up bad both at once.
It hands one disloyal oaths to
dance to like a modern-day dunce
who staggers in the sunshine
and traipses in the mist
holding his leaky faucet-like fancies
in his half-clenched fist.
I heard somebody say the Irish
are impervious to psychoanalysis.
That is the standard I pursue,
concerning the cheese in my plate
and the cheese in my mouth,
the possible events my mind dictates
and the ones that hap of their
accord up north and down south.
I’m not serious about love.
But I know gardenias win over roses
and affection is to be lavished in
measly doses. Solos to Shanghai
and Bruges
to be ensured no matter who died
and likewise for the bedside.
Declarations have to be
infrequent and admissions sparse
and the whole drama to be played
out should play out like a farce.
They will tell you the biggest of
all lies: when in love, let go but
in truth he who sends fewer ships
in this skirmish, survives.
Love’s only a proxy war
even the reins of which I do not
hold. Love’s a revenge unto
the feckless soul, best served cold.
Prannay Pathak is a Delhi-based writer and editor.