Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts

Monday, 21 July 2014

Of Sisters and Sins

She's twirling her hair, not once but thrice, like in all those Hindi soap operas where they have to repeat a 'dramatic' scene thrice for effect (and exaggeration). I know she's daydreaming only because I used to do that in the 7th grade, when I had a crush on one of my classmates. The glazed eyes (because of staring into space), the hair-twirling, the readjusting her hair every second, the constant smiling when you think no one's looking.
Because no one is. Not directly anyway. I was looking from the corner of my eyes.

Yes, I was spying. But it's quite funny to see the sort of expression on her face. Of course it's embarrassing once I realise I probably made the same faces too, way back when. She, I hope, never remembers me having made those faces in the first place. She was too young to care, anyway. Even if she did notice, she would look at me weird, wondering why I was making faces at no one in particular. She specially hated the times I was staring at her, but wasn't. It was no fault of mine. My mind was just preoccupied. As is her's these days.

Unfortunately, my curiosity only increases every time I see her smiling into space.
I can't even ask her who or what (assuming it's one of those times she isn't daydreaming) she's thinking about. That would only give away the fact that I'd been staring at her, spying, in the first place. Then she'd be too conscious of the fact and never make faces again. Or trust me the little bit she does. That would be a disaster.

This piques my interest even more and I end up committing sins no sibling (younger or older) should ever commit. So horrifying they are, they cannot be named. There is also the reason that I'd be murdered in my sleep by my sister (in her dreams) if she ever found out. I know this because when I told my friend my little secret, she stared at me like a principal would stare at an 'A-student'-turned-delinquent.
With Disappointment.
(I forget to mention: My friend is the younger sibling in her family.)

Of course I feel guilty. So I just ask my sister directly instead. Which gives me no answer whatsoever. I will tell her ultimately. About the terrible sin. But maybe after she's married and lives on the other side of the world.  Besides, she's probably done the same thing while I've been away.

Thursday, 24 April 2014

Ember of Light


I walk the lonely stairs.
Right to the top.
I look around.
No one.
Not a soul.
Empty darkness...
Just like me.
I sit on the concrete ledge,
Smoothened by paint and P.O.P.
The stark white
Blinds me.
I like the dark.
It’s been home
For 3 years,
While my parents
Busy with their lives
Told me the whats and hows
Of life. My life.
I was a slave.
Their slave.
I lived not for me
But them.
Them, Oblivion’s children.
My sister,
The sheep
Amidst all the bitterness
Was my only hope.
The only ember of light
In my darkness.
I lived only to see her smile,
Her sleeping face
Every morning, angelic,
Lying amidst
Soft thick blankets
Which smelled of strawberry jam
Or chocolate cake,
Whichever she’d eaten,
With hints of hair oil.
Until two months ago
When Death’s arms embraced her.

Today I stand
Surrounded by white
Disturbed by the brown of a ladder.
And a rope,
Rough and knotted,
Thick as my arm.
Its braids within a braid
Remind me of my sister’s life
Within mine.
How we were intertwined,
Until the fatal day.

I look below.
Happy people, moving on
With their lives.
Is the jump worth it?
I step onto the flat edge
Of the low wall.
Nothing above.
Nothing below.
It feels rough on my feet
The edge,
Like my parents have been
On me.

I stare out
Waiting for Death
A friend from the dark.
A double tap on my shoulder
Turns me around.
No one, but wait...
My sister’s face in the wall.
White, pale, sad.
A hallucination
Or a sign?
I step down,
Off the ledge
Back on solid ground.
A salty tear
Escapes my eye
And into my mouth.
There’s too much to live for.
Today, …today I live.