P O E T R Y
Anindya Arif
We have over-romanticised the idea of intimacy
So much that I cannot tell you any more
How I am going to apply for a plea of release
from all your held up resentments,
your frequent disorientation,
and the constant exhaustion
caused by
pandering to your fantasies
of how you will
someday read Immanuel Kant
and save humanity.
Instead, tomorrow on the long-ended sofas
of group therapy,
We both will complain
How we have tied each other
Too tightly to an escapist fantasy,
and are too fixated on it
to let each other go.
How we are two recovering ego addicts
Who have overstayed their duration
in their permanence continuum,
Committing petty injustices and chasing
Afternoon happiness.
In this neo-noir technical age,
we keep asking each other
What happens on Monday
when our cardinal sins
of getting easily attached to other people
will be put forth in front of the jury.
And in a town made up of jests, whims,
and coincidences,
We were blindsided by Letraset.
And
To leave you now
would mean waking up
in an empty apartment
to a new ruinous regime;
The regime hates technology:
The occasional emails, car radios
but encourages
Tiny acts of self-destruction.
There are talks of
a statewide
Government emergency
Due to rising concerns
over the current
Prime Minister’s
Growing fears of
How much space there
is around his cuticles.
To escape the foreboding doom,
I hide in a make-believe funeral home.
And I will keep hoping
That both of us will keep
Committing petty, insecure crimes
And keep wanting to be
Reborn as lesser creatures,
So we can have a second chance
at something lasting.
Anindya eats music, fiction, and reality — all for breakfast. Send him fresh recipes at [email protected]