By Vasundhara Singh
The divorce papers came in last evening
They lie on the counter top
Unsigned.
Ma makes dinner for two.
A decade or so ago
She would’ve cried and screamed
But today
She is sipping her cup of tea.
Negotiating the truth
Of a marriage
That expired long before
It’s actual demise.
Humming a tune
Of nostalgia
Rescued from the depths of her mind.
The sharp tick
Of her eyeliner
Ebbs and flows
As she blinks to the tune
Of a previous self.
The phone calls are ignored
Of voyeuristic ones
Who say they care.
She sways in purgatory
An uncaring optimism
Fuming within.
Dinner is almost ready, she says.
A damning notion of hope
Lingers underneath
These ritualistic deeds.
An image etches itself bare.
An embrace
A light giggle.
The only time I saw any love.
Autumn of 2007
A year before
The shouts would make me shiver.
A year before
I’d start latching my door.
A year before
Two officers sat in our living room.
A year before
I made peace with the onslaught of silence and terror.
An embrace
A light giggle.
The only sign of humanity
I was fortunate enough to inherit.
Autumn of 2007
Those absurd eleven seconds
Contradicting the days ahead
Tease the cynical adult
I’ve become.
I had peered through the open door-
Two familiar strangers
Taking and giving
In each other’s warmth.
I fear
I hadn’t stayed long enough.
I fear
I didn’t take my share of this temporary escape.
An embrace
A light giggle.
A cruel prologue to the beckoning future.
Autumn of 2007
Arrange the plates, she says, dinner is ready.
The divorce papers have been
Returned to the envelope.
Signed.
