Twins

There’s always someone whose existence seems richer than my own. Someone else I’m dying to write about, whose every thought I ache to exploit, whose every tear will quench my relentless thirst, whose simple joys I drown my words in, forcing them under.

Their stories flash across my eyes, each one wrapped in a single photograph, like a slide show, every second, there’s no time to look, quickly, click, quickly, click, quickly, an old man, bandaged feet, a pedestrian crossing, click, quickly, a teenage girl, a school uniform, a foggy classroom window, click, a windy day, a lady, a white sari, the edge of a roof, quickly, quickly, a starved boy, jaded eyes, a cameraman, click, click, this is the pace my heart beats at, each click a person’s life, each beat betrays their tales.

I don’t wish to know their real stories for I fear my pen can’t be true to them, I worry I will run away with their lives and it would pain me to mould them into a cliché for the fault of my own lack of understanding.

I’ve always known that if I wrote something significant it would be how others look from the bleeding eyes of compassion. In my sleep I ask for Empathy’s coarse fair hand, I dream the ringlets of her red hair falling over those dark eyes brimming with devastation. I long for her pale chapped lips to brush against mine but all they do is smile at me as she slowly turns, walking away. I try to stop her, I reach for her waist, then I awake and then I remember; how can I ask the hand of another?

I am betrothed to he who is Apathy; my one lasting attachment, my hateful love, my comatose, my empty page, my inkless pen.