Alternate title: scar tissue that I wish you saw
****
Scar tissue that I wish you saw,
There are no birds here to share the view,
No familiar faces to confide in
About the loss, this dull, numbing consistency
Of grey buildings, litter and adulthood,
No birds, only patches of grass, no birds,
Only pigeons, and I’m not sure
If they classify as birds or pests
And if that’s a controversial statement
Given humans are definitely parasites,
An empty mcdonald’s cup, half crushed
Like our teenage dreams to make this
World a better place, a charity shop
Across the street that I never seemed
To notice, on the dry grass lies broken glass,
a soiled mask, useless,
like our spiralling loops
Of anxiety in this era of great pandemics
And great, unfulfilled expectations,
I have fought my own thoughts
Till I’m temporarily empty with multiple
Thoughts still in the making,
Half healed, half trying to make peace
With my own self-inflicted conditions,
Scar tissue, last month I had a scratch that wouldn’t heal fast enough
And I heard that’s definitely a sign of growing older, though sometimes the older
I get, the younger, more lost I feel,
Scar tissue that I wish you saw now,
Younger sister.
****
For a moment, I turn up the music and suddenly, red hot chili peppers is in the charts, suddenly, we are back to the glorious 2000s
And I am not crossing this grimy park
In the heart of this daunting city,
Suddenly we are in grandma’s house
And everything’s familiar,
Everything’s homely,
The smell of frying onions
Clinging on our skin for dear life
Though we already smell of
Chlorine and sugar
After a long summer day
Spent splashing warm water
In the swimming pool and licking
Melting ice cream off our fingers.
Tell me where did our best summers go
And why do we spend
Our ever diminishing time
Crossing dirty streets in a haste,
Barely noticing the details
Until they are barely traceable memories,
Our minds distracted by empty coffee cups,
The buzz of caffeine, financial plans and smartphones,
Our minds always preoccupied
With this taxing process of
Always trying to remember
The long forgotten details of
Where we were three summers ago,
On this day two decades ago,
pre-pandemic, planning, still, planning
where we’d like to be next summer,
Who we’d like to be in another lifetime.
We’d definitely be our younger selves
In another lifetime, ourselves
Before we got lost amongst scar tissues
And crossing dirty parks,
The details of great distraction.
Rational Artist 