Alone I stand among the dead,
Single survivor of the army I once led,
What went wrong, when it came
The end of my time, its end game .
Without her to hold me near
Years wasted for a fruitless search
Still she is out of my reach.
Fires still rage on the black peak
Fueled by the blood of both bold and meek
On top of it all she lives alone,
Inside the tower made of black stone.
I hear their cries, the clash of steel
Her minions closing in for their next meal
I feel the cold biting breeze
Causing all my senses to freeze
There she was, my lovely Ice Queen
Still like an angel, how long has it been
Her once lovely eyes are no more
Only crystals, frozen to the core.
A smile plays on her lips
Fills me with a familiar feeling of bliss
Her voice tears into my heart, sharper than a lance
Against that, I never stood a chance.
Words flowed into my near deaf ears
“Oh dear Ralph, it has been years
Have you come to carry me away?
Or is my life still in your way? “
Gathering my last breath I yell
With a voice that could be heard till hell
“It’s time for you to sleep dear,
And I will end my life here “.
Her cold voice shatters the silence
And her words confirmed that I lost my chance
“Why do you do this to me ?
Why can’t you just let me be ?
Times have changes, so did I
It’s time my dear, to say goodbye.
There was a time when I waited for a day
When you would come to take me away
Not any more love, your time is past
Here in these lands you will breathe your last. “
As I close my tired eyes,
All I see is her face wreathed in ice
Farther down into darkness I fall
Bouncing around like a lifeless doll
My heart burning with her last few words
“Oh but I still love you among all the lords”
A single teardrop falls on my scarred chest
At last I smile, perhaps it was all for the best.
It all began sometime soon after she left but then again it was always there. While she was around, it was no more than just a shadow lurking in the corner of his mind but when she finally decided to leave and let him be, the wait was over for it. Finally after all the wait and pain, it was out and that was not all. With it came something more dangerous, darker than anything I had imagined in my life.
Initially it was the emptiness that choked me. Many a time I even picked up my phone to call her. Call her and beg for her mercy. But even then I knew it was not going to happen. What I have become over the years was not something that gives into these weaker human urges and desires. So to avoid further webs of temptation, I did the only thing I could do at that time. I deleted her number from my cell…a silly move but necessary to preserve my sanity. But e-mail remained one of the biggest hurdles that needed to be crossed for me to completely get rid of her from my mind. Even a stray mail from the very few friends I got might contain her name and that was enough to drive me crazy. All this time I never thought I would miss her so much but then again like always I was wrong and she was right. One would know the hurt of missing someone only if you really miss someone you care about. I remember her telling me that I would never understand and I never did. I still cannot say I really missed her but one thing was sure. Without even talking to her, my life has become something like an empty hall. I realized who she was for me, more than just a friend or a partner. She was something more, something precious. She was that ingredient that was holding this pathetic existence of mine together. But now it was all over. Knowingly I had pushed out the one person whom I ever gave a damn about, pushed out so far that I doubt whether she would ever hear me again should I decide to go after her.
Jealousy is a very strange being. You would not be jealous at even your worse enemy but then again you would be goddamn jealous of someone real close to you. This is one question that I asked myself all the time. Is jealousy what drove her from me? Impartial though I was, I was not able to answer that. That could be a reason but then again there could be other more severe reasons. But one thing became very clear. Without her by my side, I was suffering but she seemed to enjoy every moment of it. She was colder than I thought she would be. While I was sitting in the corner thinking to myself and trying my best not to lose my sanity, she was running around shopping and watching movies and hanging out with her ‘gang’ of friends. I don’t know whether she was trying to freak me out but then again I respect her because she was doing a damn good job at that. Days went by, days turning into weeks and months and finally years. A couple of years have passed so far but still life remains the same except for the fact that we were 2 years older. But something also changed inside of me. I was no longer the smiley blimey guy around but a ghost of my former self. A rotten creature stuck up in the human shell. Then it was time for all of us to part our ways…to go out and see the wide world around. At this moment, at this last moment, I made the decision. The decision I am still debating on.
There she was walking like a princess among her ‘friends’ if I could call them that. I never really understood why she was hanging out with those bunch of freaks but then again she always liked to be with the freaks so that she could be noticed. No wonder she was with me even for a short period of time. I knew what I had to do. This was the answer to all my problems. The time has come for me to go back to my peaceful existence, to the pre-meet her period, when I was normal, when I was human. I picked the time carefully so that she would be alone then. Also I knew she wouldn’t pass an opportunity to hear me apologizing to her. I knew she would be there and was early to come as usual. But I was prepared for this emergency. I had woken up very early that day, freshened up and was all set and ready by the time I met her at the football field. Apologies were exchanged at first but then the plan started acting out. I asked her one simple question: “What do you think of me now?” Before she replied I read the answer in her eyes, her face. To her, I was nothing more than just another of the crowd of her friends. This time I was ready. She had damaged my soul once and she was not going to do it all over again. I never gave her a chance to speak. I thrust the knives right into her eyes, those gray beautiful eyes that caught me in it in their first glance. The spell was broken the moment I felt her eyes exploding and showering blood all over my hands. But this was too easy a fate for her. There were more to come. I cut out her nose and ears and thrust her into her mouth to stop her shouting. It was just so awesome. Eyeless, nose less and earless there she stood gagging on her own organs spilling blood all over her light sky blue skirt. Once I got her on her knees it was easy. I cut her open like a fat pig. I cut out all that I could from that carcass and fed it to the dogs around who were watching all this like some blockbuster movie. I felt her shivering with each cut I was making but I was not going to stop. The fun, it was too much for me to think about her. I was having too much of fun cutting her up, so much that I literally chopped her into small slices, slices that reminded me of bacon. I had her heart in my hand. It was the moment I was waiting for all my life. Her heart with me…it was still warm and trying to beat all the while squirting blood on my already bloodied arms. To get her totally out of my head, there was only one way. To get her into my stomach and let my body reject her, throw her out of my system for the one last time. The sun had risen and with it my appetite rose. I took a bite out of her heart. It was soft, mushy, sweet and tasty. The first bite was the hardest. Once I tasted what it was like, there was no stopping. With hungry gulps I ate it completely and once the meal was over, I felt peace…peace like heaven for the first time in my life for a long time.
The days that followed were nothing but figments of memory. After the meal I ran off leaving all and everything behind. I traveled lands I have never seen or heard before. I met people who liked me and hated me. All the time I was on the lookout for someone to come and take me back to the ground and finish me off as I did to her but no one came. I made discreet enquiries about her fate but no one seemed to know what happened to her. It was like a person like that never existed but I knew she did. I could still feel the taste of her heart in my mouth; it was always there like some sweet dream that one wants to see all night long every night. Maybe the dogs might have finished her off or maybe someone must have found her and is keeping this quiet so that they can find out about my whereabouts. For whatever reason that was, I was never going to go back. I got all that what I wanted. I got her out of my head but at the same time I can always have her with me, in me for all eternity. I am a normal satisfied man right now. The world is a beautiful place again and the beauty beckons me from the distance. Ah life is so beautiful!!!!
Birds have started their singing now,
That might be the morning I think
Time to wake up and start the day
One more day added to my waning years.
Greeted by a breeze on my face
Laden with the sweet odor of flowers
Jasmine, rose and many others more.
And now winds starts to play around
Dancing around my unkempt hair
Teasing me with their fragrant gusts.
Soothing the world with its gay colors
Finally the cruel winter had left
But leaving it’s lasting mark around.
Getting along with their daily things
I feel their gaze upon my face
I smile in return, yes I do smile.
Its all so peaceful now, Only
Joy and the sweetness all around.
Not a trace of the winter snow
To numb the senses with its embrace.
I wish the birds to go on singing
I hope the world will remain the same
To be in the spring till the end of time.
Lucky ones, some black sheep too
Like me they stray through the paths
Unconnected with everything around.
I smile without joy, cry without pain
All the flowers,birds and people around
Fails to free me from my icy throne.
Smelling flowers, hearing the songs
I see them all in my mind’s eye
For I am blind, ah cruel fate
I cannot enjoy the light anymore.
Darkness and ice encasing my mind
Always has its icy clutches on me
Oh cruel fate, the cold wind blows.
Like a ship that ran aground
Broken up and shattered by howling winds
Destruction is beyond human minds.
They saw that love is blind, deaf, dumb
I say its nothing more but a garbage dump
Rotting and stinking to its very core
Scheming to draw people all the more
Cute little Cupid with his lovely arrows
Is nothing but a vile thing, evil till his marrows
Disrupting lives is a hobby he carries on
Lives that end with no future to look upon.
Victim I am to his cruelty
A normal being, driven to insanity
Plucked out of the life that was mine
Forced to live a live amongst the swine
To Her I was only an instrument
One to be discarded after merriment
To be cast aside, thrown into the junkyard
Joining countless lives existing within each yard.
Broken hearts anything but new
Feels like a fire inside, burning to your sinews
Fuelled forward by an unnamed hatred
Keeping out the madness, not that it mattered.
Frozen inside, a block of hard old ice
With nothing but hatred in my eyes
Times have changed, but I have moved on
Dead and rotten but cold, to get my hands upon
My Love, to burn it up like dry timber
We were sitting cross-legged in front of a big man. He was big in all sorts of ways, huge face covered by a bushy salt n pepper beard with no or little hair on his shiny head. His whole limbs were long and large but were hanging loosely from an enormous frame slumped in defeat. Strangely for a man this large, his voice was soft n pleasant. In the beginning his voice was very low but as he got into the main part of his story his voice became louder, his hands moving in expressions and overall there in front of us he was transformed from a nervous wreck of a man to a passionate speaker. He looked at each of us in the eye and with small smile he started his amazing life story.
"In the beginning it was unbearable. Even just to breathe was so difficult that I literally had to push the air down into my lungs to stay alive. Yes , after all this, I didn't want to die, but I wanted to live for I know that even in death, what I desire is what I will never get.
Now it doesn't give anyone any inkling of an understanding if I were to say this story all backwards. So now in an ordered manner, this is what happened. But a word of caution, people who are non-romantics please don’t read it because this is something which i know you will not understand.
It all happened long back in time, around 21 years ago. I was just another guy in the street. I had a great job, had good friends and had a lot of time and money in my hand and it was and still is the best times that i ever had. Okay so if go on in this manner, I can assure you that you are going to get bored very soon because such long were the adventures we did in those long unforgettable days. Coming back, it was a period of fun, joy, friendship and lot of adventures. We were young and had all the time in the world with us and with not even a single care in the world. And then she came.
I didn't know where she was from, one day she just showed up in a burger joint we frequented. She was lonely so after a couple of hours, being chivalrous gentlemen that we were, we went and befriended her and that is how it all began. First of all, there was nothing special about her and you can always lose sight of her in a crowd. She was neither tall or short, nor fat or slim but a plain normal looking girl. But when you stand close to her and just look into her eyes, then you can see something very different. Unlike the usual listless or overly made up eyes in other gals, there was something more there. Her eyes had an unnatural shine and she had a way of closing her eyes half way through while talking and this really took my breath away. In her eyes I don’t know what I saw but it filled me with a new sense of happiness and joy which I have not yet experienced. I felt myself being drawn more and more into those deep dark eyes, the effect which I can compare now to that of a Black hole. To make the long story short, I fell for her and fallen hard. I don’t know how she felt about me, still I don’t know. But when I look back now, I think she enjoyed my company. What began as a friendly conversation and a casual acquaintance grew into something more. Gradually I began yearning for her company more and more. We spent countless hours talking and talking about anything and everything under the sun over countless beers and fries. But every time there was something between us, an invisible wall that I was afraid to breach and she didn’t try to bring down. Each and every day I was sort of lost in a world of my own until I saw her. Outwardly I was my old normal self but inside I was a wreck till I caught sight of her, sitting waiting for me at our own special seat in the joint where I first met her. All the time I was thinking, was I in love with her? But each time I stress that I am not, I knew that I was betraying myself but there was nothing I could do-nothing I could say that could define how I felt about her. She was special to me, precious to me in my own way; God knows what way it was. So this went on for a pretty long time, but then something began worrying me. That wall between us seemed to grow more and more solid. In all our time together, whatever I asked her, she didn’t tell me anything about herself. Repeatedly I asked, first casually, then forcefully but there were still no replies. The only thing she used to tell me is just one thing-will tell you later when its time. So now this perfectly innocent piece of conversation had me worried sick. A thousand questions sprang up to my mind. Was she married? Already got a boyfriend? Was she an orphan? All these thoughts combined together and drove me mad. One fine day or rather one fine evening, it erupted. I was having so much of these emotions welled up inside that I was so adamant that I asked her all these questions and much more to her face, eye to eye. But this time, she answered me with a smile, a smile that still haunts me, a slow sad smile that can set your pulse racing. Without a word she got out and started walking, I followed her. She kept on glancing behind to see whether I was there I acknowledged her looks with a nod of my head and then she would be walking again and I followed. This went on for quite sometime and finally she reached in front of my house and sat on a bench on the lawn outside. I went and sat beside her. We sat like that for around an hour, two people just sitting together. I could bear no more of this, so I turned, took her hands and pleaded with her, please tell me something. Gently she removed her hands from my grasp and stood up, her face glowing with that sad smile again. Then she took my hand and placed it on her heart. I was shocked.....my hand went right through her. It was as if she was not there. I tried grabbing her hands again but there she was just standing smiling like that and my hands going right through her. She mouthed a goodbye then and with that enigmatic smile still on her lips, she blew me a kiss and then she was no more there. I was stunned, shocked. I just didn't know what to do or what to say. I was destroyed; I do not know what had happened. I suddenly felt like laughing and crying all together and to shout and jump and climb to the moon. The days after that were just a blur. I was in and out of dreams so often that the line between reality and the fiction became blurred.
Two months passed before I could come back to my world. To all around it was the old me again, laughing and having the time of my life but inside i was bleeding every moment I live. The pain of loss was sapping all my strength and will. I lived like this for all this time and i haven't told anyone about it for all this time. Finally, I can feel the ache reducing in intensity, sharing one's sorrows with someone else is always a good way to reduce ones own sadness. I do not say you must believe it, but now as you all can see the person that I have become in all this time, I think you know in your heart that what I say is true. I think I can see the orderly waiting to see whether I have finished and to see you out. So come back again anytime so that I can tell you more about my past experiences. "
He finished and was escorted out by two burly men in blue overalls; standard nurse uniform. Before we left, we went to see the doctor as to ask him about the patient we visited that day.
When we asked him about what was wrong with him and mentioned his experiences, the doc gave a quiet laugh and told us,” He told it to you also rite? Actually he is in this institution for the past 20 years. He is convicted for killing his wife and her parents in a fit of rage and is been in denial ever since. As due to his unstable mental condition, he was placed here and is been here till then. All the stories that he tell is nothing more than a fragment of his fantasies...a form of self denial to bury the guilt he has within himself."
Who to believe, who not to believe? With this question weighing heavily on our minds, we got out of the hospital once more...not going back but to come back again later to complete this journal about the wandering minds trapped inside those 4 concrete walls.
