Sakhi - I

Sakhi, didn’t you know?
Those mirrors you sit by and cry
Are nothing but silver silhouettes!

The reflection you see in them
Are tired mirages
From the wet tips of Dali’s brush.

Sakhi, did you forget
How beautiful you were –
When you looked at the midnight moon
Swimming in a languorous pool
And chanced upon your reflection
In its silver glow.

Did you forget about the time
You took a swab of kohl
From the night sky
And painted a gondola
Under your eyes.

Every time, I read you a poem
From my crumbled pages
Shiny white lilies would blossom in that black boat.

Sakhi, don’t you remember –
Your anguish began
When you stopped looking at the moon
And started to chase those silver ghosts
That taunt from behind smudged mirrors.

Those tears aren’t even tears
But perspiration of the skin –
Somehow in the language of mirrors,
Heart and skin must be synonyms!

Sakhi, didn’t you know?
Those mirrors you sit by and cry
Are nothing but silver silhouettes!

False memories of a thousand painted corpses
That parade in daylight
Screaming at Botticelli and Rubens;
Undulating their razor sharp hips, syncopating
With fiddles in the danse macabre.

Sakhi, did you forget
How beautiful your crow’s feet are?