Deconstructing

you recited Shakespeare, head popping
out from the window, entirely inappropriate
i thought, lines from Romeo and Juliet
reckless lovers, distant on Bangalore streets

later we feasted on death by chocolate
the corner cafe, but that was before
you turned sullen because there was no
space in our house for the stray dog you loved

you must have thought us mean, content
in our lives, of domestic helps to pitch in
with the cooking and cleaning and returning
from bookshops with overflowing bags

today i am ready to tell you the lie of
that story, i never liked you, never, but
you came to the greenroom to feed my ego
and we drifted into something temporary

something that made you flinch
when we watched Dead Poet’s Society
you were always a Pritchett fan you said
i found that detail unnecessary and boring

we moved to other things after that, things
we disagreed on, like your vegetarianism
and my disregard for commas and semi colons
only to stop talking altogether for years

not that it matters, but do you know
i walked out from a reading when i discovered
you in the audience, it would have been awkward
for both of us with mutual friends looking

but today there is something in the air,
something only you could have understood,
like lines from a poem, this blank gaping hole
for a very long time, almost eternity.

Vijay Nair