by Rituparna Mukherjee
Image by Asha Jain via Unsplash
I was back at the stairs again.
This time it was dark
A familiar odour filled the place
The window let the greenery in.
A stagnant pond
Made lush with unkempt reeds,
A few houses
Belittled in the distance.
I caressed the gravelly stairs,
I felt at home there.
They were rough,
Half made,
Uncouth,
Uneven,
Led to nowhere in particular.
Sitting at the bottom
I imagined it would one day
Bring in other people
Some more wishes
A few more sighs.
Smell of freshly washed hair,
You had come.
Your eyes picked mine
Your heart comprehended mine.
But did you ever know my mind?
Together we sat
Basked in the greenery
Thinking aloud,
Awashed in silence.
I would steal furtive glances,
Had too much to prove.
Your slender frame would resemble
The greens outside.
Such yearning you had
To touch the greens
I would want to rip them out
Form a rope
And tie you to mine.
My feet would touch a stone chip
Oozing warmth,
And I would luxuriate
In the proximity
Undone.
But that was yesterday.
I sit at the top
Looking below.
The marble stairs
Confuse me.
Cold,
White,
Translucent,
Throwing iridescent shadows
Across the wall.
It’s still dark
I long for the window
But it is nowhere to seen.
I scrape my feet
Across the polished floor
But I am left
Unhampered,
Unprepared still.
I trace the walls with my fingers
They give me company,
They smell sterile.
I look to where
The stairs open,
Large bright rooms
Lead to one another
Their windows absurdly
Imitate the others,
Each in restfulness.
I only want the green.
The green,
And your reed-like frame.
I know
The stairs will never be the same again.
Rituparna Mukherjee is a faculty of English and Communication Studies at Jogamaya Devi College, under the University of Calcutta. Her masters in English Literature is from University of Calcutta and her MPhil on Second Language Acquisition and Strategic Competence in ESL Learners is from Jadavpur University. She is currently pursuing Doctoral degree in Gendered Mobilities in west African and Afro-Diasporic Literature at IIIT Bhubaneswar. Her areas of interest include African and Indian literature and Post-colonial and Feminist theories as well as English Language Teaching, Second Language Acquisition and Communication studies. She works as an ELT consultant, translator and ESL author outside of her work and research schedule.
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