The pencil lead broken on the table,
the mild stutters, the slight swoon in the chest,
all this darkness when the phone rings
and throws in little flourescence his name,
with a custom tune set in days of happy togetherness.
Symptoms of guilt.

Of not having loved enough,
but having lived once like you did
and zoning out like a power cut,
Just bang. Gone.
The aftertaste of trying to sing
“I don’t know why I didn’t come.”
It matters not you truly didn’t know
why you didn’t come.
You didn’t come.

You can stand someone up.
You have been stood up.
They refuse to strike each other out
in a game of elementary this for that.
Sweet innocence cannot even be feigned.
This is how love is performed
by some of us who do not know
how it is to be done.

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(c) 2008 Aniruddhan Vasudevan, from his blog. Reproduced with permission.