CLOUDY THOUGHTS
The clock on the wall ticked, piercing the gloom and momentarily disrupting my wayward thoughts. Each object in the room held a phantom echo of your presence: the worn armchair where you’d read aloud, the chipped teacup, the late-night talks, the dusty photographs on the wall where our smiles were unburdened. They were relics now, fragments of a life we no longer shared, or perhaps, that I no longer shared with you. The silence was a heavy blanket, suffocating and punctuated only by the frantic rhythm of my own heart. It screamed your absence louder than any argument we might have had, any harsh word spoken. And in that silence, the poems continued to bloom, dark and thorny roses watered by my tears. Each stanza was a whispered incantation, a desperate attempt to unravel the threads of the dream that held you captive. Were you even aware of my pleas? Could you feel the vibration of my grief resonating across the distance, a silent SOS carried on the wings of ink and paper? Or were you lost completely, adrift in a sea of illusion, oblivious to the anchor of my love that still held fast in the hope of your return?
I picked up my pen again, the nib scratching against the page a fragile sound in the oppressive quiet. More words, more pleas, more desperate attempts to build a bridge across the chasm that separated us. Perhaps, if I wrote enough, if I poured enough of my soul onto the page, the sheer force of my longing would be enough to wake you up.
©Habib Dabajeh