Echo but it's ridiculous

Clover Box

Echo but it's ridiculous

That face was thinner
It was tight
With features
uncluttered
if stupid.

That belly was a stomach
not a disobedient overhang-
those arms were sinuous-
Not sticks borrowed from Olive Oyl.

it's ridiculous how
Every one of your vices
Etched themselves on you
Scoring lines
blighting your beard white
Stooping you
When you intended no particular respect
For anyone.

Like Killjoy the vandal-
Carving I was here
I was there
I will remain
Gouging and scooping
But boo to you
You old ghost.

Old faces look manic animated
But you must expect consequences
Like a vintage car being taxed
You expect the oil to blow-
Veins to pop-
Candles to gutter

It's ridiculous
You can't be hearing ticking
Bombs, time,imagination,
Hell what's the difference-
It's Heavens every time.

Mutter mutter mutter,
Talking to yourself is good when you're old
You hear perfectly-
You like what you hear and like what you don't.

But imagine muttering at people
Complaints,longings,bewilderment
Why would it matter
About you-

That you carry these extra enthusiasms in you still?
Silly old fellow.

But tell yourself good things anyhow
Appreciate yourself because no one else will
Shake your head at how clear it all seems
Now-

When it is much too late-
And your life events are a bore
What a joke to have kept you up nights smoking.

Grace your thoughts-
Clothe it in the shreds of your old self
Ignore the frays and tatters
Because you can see them anew anyhow.

You may have turned into a cardboard box do you know?
To pack things or find meaning in-
Not quite like Kafka's giant spider
But
Either metamorphosis
Would have delighted you at ten
When everything is naturally delightful-

You cadged the big Carnation condensed milk box
Remember
From the back of the provision shop
For your den then-
And now you've turned into one yo'self!

You've worn so thin and flappy
And become boxy too-
And yet no one wants to huddle inside
For a giggle.

But its still free
And freeing-

When no concrete can hold you
And the brown paper thing metamorphosis
You've become-

Corrugated, edges soggy,
Dead as a pulped tree
Heavy with nothing
but facsimilies
Of your life


It still makes a cozy home.
And you're hopeful
Like a lover awaiting
Call mail or text
Waiting for the huff,
The puff,
To breeze into you
Puffing out your sail
Or even
Sailing your upended boxy boat
All the way to the sea.


4th November 2009
Gautam Mukherjee

Copyright Gautam Mukherjee, 2009.