Prowling by. One paw, one paw–it hunts slowly.

[A prose poem]

       I never loved apples. They taste just okay. But I looked up "how to be anorexic" on google once, and an ana-pro idiot said we should imagine food as monsters. "Take an apple, for example. Imagine it turning into a dead pig. Imagine it rotting. Worms coming out of it."
      I still don't like apples. But I still like chocolate.

[A prose poem].

I see you've got the ropes.
        Somehow you adapted. There, your green tea; you filled your thermos last night, preemptively. Your fingers have always been awkward too. They incline to the chubby side, your fingers. And they hold the thermos with strength, like they hold everything– except for your papers and your keyboard. You don't grip those. You tap. Are you aware?
       Remember the balcony? You had too much wine, obviously. Your rolling on the floor from one end to the other turned legendary. But time rolls by, and so do tobacco leaves on papers, and you hate those two things.
       You took the balcony along. You've got the hang of your schedule, where and how to tunnel your way to class; you get up as soon as your alarm goes off. No snooze. The ropes are gripped tightly by your fingers, and I don't know why.

Child, please look up.
I know you don’t want to listen.
But you will, you will take what suits you.
I know you well.
Stop, wait,
You don’t need to blur the lines.
There is no black and white–
I know you’ve learned that the hard way,
but just wait– don’t shade just yet.

There is a certain grey.
But don’t rush– hush,
Put the paintbrush down.
You don’t need to sin to understand.
Child, I’m sorry you’re so lost.
Take it from me:
You’ll be fine.
You’ll be fine.

For there she was.*
Upright, bliss.
Blooming petal,
do its wish.

What a day,  

sounds, sounds
and people,
she says.

Dalloway, her petals,
the ones she picked,
herself.

She breathes
air like silk.
Details, dresses,
Precious petal,
does not know.

And the patient,
the open palms,
wait for prayers–
prayers, perhaps.

What a day.

*Mrs. Dalloway said,
she would pick the flowers
herself.

(First and Last lines taken from Paradise Lost).*

Through Eden took their solitary way,
the contemporary mind, page by page,
sitting idly on his soft bed and modern age,
witnessed the injustice, far away.

“Not today’s fault,” cries the observer.
“It is for the first man to pay.”
There is no reason a mind so clever,
could muster in its wavering faith.

What fault was his in such arrange?
Was he to pay for something so estranged?
Was it his own pain to ache?
Was it not years, years too late?

But away from his leathered book,
off to the pristine white of a winter’s day,
his eyes wander, and cry his inner grey.

His hand would abate this fray.
For if love can cast out hate,
In love, His grace will satiate.

What could he understand?
Isn’t feeling all he knows?
It is in the tears, the gentle hands–
In grace, His love will flow.

For if the stars are in our veins,
and hidden lives in a single verse,
if there are wonders in the mundane,
and even more in the lofty universe,

How could one aspire,–
How could someone underestimate–
to audaciously take life’s fires,
and in his mind, encapsulate?

So the man decides for sweet abandon.
And finds that in his soul it would suit,
to trust someone with infinite compassion,
as he read the story of the devil’s loot,
*of man’s first disobedience, and the fruit.

Bear with me, Smile.
Let me cling to this denial.