4

We used to have

A common well,

From which we used to draw

Several fertile liters every day, and the

Nights would be spent in sleepy

Shovelling, and even the extra inches

Would be wet the next day.

And so our well grew deeper.

Soon though

The summers started piling up, and

We started scraping the bottom.

No more midnight digging -

When the darkness played peekaboo and the night kissed the window panes and everything was doused with a sense of romantic magic for me, it was the caffeinated morning for you.

Soon,

We were reduced to

Trying ravenously

To scrape out a few drops, wring

Out the last vestiges of moisture, and

Then

In desperate thirst, we started supplanting fingertip whispers

For words and directionless passion for

Discourse, and soon every explosion

Started seeming increasingly

More flash than effect.

But

The well is so deep

That to dig another one

Would take another Four Years.

So we hang onto our well

And quench our thirsts at nomadic,

Beautiful, tactile oases.

I have my tiny kittens, for whom

I harden my shield and put on masks,

And say half-felt words, so as to tunnel to

Half-felt sighs, and you

Have your pretty, pretty boys

Whom you call friends.

And we grope in the darkness, through unchartered corridors and tumble through passageways and sleep in musty beds that squeak too much, and maybe we shall fall, finally, into our own parched Well, and smile sadly as they pour sand down onto our backs,

And because we're not donkeys,

Because we are after all honourable

Men and women, with

Pride and ego,

We shall accept our fate.