A Modern-day Meditation

Not all the devils
are cruel, depraved and treacherous
all the time.

Some of them are quite different.

Some, in fact,
rest under the watch on your wrist,
go through their ablutions in the morning,
breathe deep the fresh breeze that blows from the river
and remain silent with their eyes shut.
Sometimes, they meditate
on words of wisdom
that the saints have spouted.

It is true
that the shadows of these saints
suffer from a bout of relentless coughing

when these devils
who do not quite know their caste or past
start flapping their wings furiously
like papers fluttering on a writing table.
Wings that look like the sky trapped inside a paperweight.

But, sometimes
on an orange afternoon
even as you are turning on your side
in the siesta,
a matchstick sets your ear on fire
and a rotten, half-eaten apple
bursts out from under the wrist watch
with a gush of blood.

The sky frozen in the paperweight
is torn apart,
shadows turn into bubbles,
bangles are broken,
virginity is lost,
and sobs choke and contort the air around.
Right then,
the note paper and the table
fly out   
in search of their origins.
They curl up, burning in from all corners.
Like broken branches
they fall to the ground.

This is what happens.

Nothing more to it than that.

Only when the devil has removed his rotten molar
or
when the left side of the saint is aching
or
when the actors forget their lines
only then, something else
actually starts happening.

But,
the orange afternoon
has a different story to tell
at least

for now.

A MODERN-DAY MEDITATION