Vignettes

By Zahid Makhdoom

 Flowers

Remember that spring when the flowers’ dreams of blossoming got nipped in their own buds. And that water refused to trickle down. You were sobbing, the sky was electrified, our reflections ossified. Like always, the rhythm from the djembes disturbed the apple cart. Wasn’t that what those goddamned kids wanted in the first place?

Mouse

Remember the mouse that had not stirred many Christmas nights past and that the crazed werewolf had not stalked his unsuspecting admirers on those lush nights denuded by a trickster-like full moon. What happened then? That the creatures alive, dead or undead rose to walk all those miles on some faded Christmases and nondescript nights. It all got messed up, I couldn’t although I had intended and desired, to walk and to strum the notes enshrined in the score I had written to mark the end. Do you know what happened? Do you even remember those Christmases, those full-moon nights, and that score or even the end?

In the Beginning

Remember that last time we were perched high above the highest branch of that giant tree that everyone around us thought was forbidden, a no go area? I only remember something happened and then those mesmerizing contours of your countenance began to drift away, slowly brightening the Milky Way. I could still discern you and the highest branch of that tallest tree perched above the brightest star of that dazzling galaxy that still seemed so foreboding.

It’s been a long time, I couldn’t continue counting, the numbers have transcended my faculties. Memories are hapless cripples without any crutches. The ones I broke are yet to be replaced. And I know of no measure to discern the space between the time I last delved deep inside the depths of every pore of your body to now when even the Milky Way looks so distant, so faded. The times I still remember you rolling your naked body on the mountains of fallen flower petals until I could see a constellation of rainbows etched on your skin. We always gave in to those rainbows. Then those epochs would descend when we could no longer use silence as a canvas to paint those melodies that filled everything around us, made those rainbows dance, and the only refuge from surfeit was to be deeply ensconced within the layers of your scent. Are memories free yet? Has the time for venial liberties arrived? Your scent still wrapped around every part of my being. And silence has successfully subverted music. Let’s paint again. The pristine brightness has forever scared and scarred me.