Drowning

Lifting lips
From a now swollen nipple
Grinning down at brown pools
Meant for drowning in
Expectantly watching
for some sign of love
on the edge of reason
weary from the games
the unpredictable turn on-turn off-turn on again
eternity stretching out
from your lips to mine
facing each other
wrapped up in tangled limbs
it’s time for the reckoning

choosing that exact moment
to respond
you say
“I don’t love you”- “that’s why”
smiling
like a man surveying his dirty deed
you ask “are you angry with me?”
short of breath
I bite the end of my bottom lip
from inside
determined not to let you see me cry
I let my gaze stand
Though I don’t see you anymore

Falling down your flight of steps
The same night
Slipping
Losing balance
Raw-cool-cement
jolts me back
Blood springing from my spine
The stinging hurt
Comforts me
Sucking away attention from the pools
On the verge of overflow

I want to run away – break free
from your
suffocating embrace
leave you to your tangled desires
uncertain caresses
your almighty confusion-dammit

I promise myself
I will- Yes- I will
tomorrow

Sashikala Premawardhane

Two men

Two men
have been here
often hammering
steady, uncompromising blows
alternatively
they have squeezed it dry
taken pieces with them
that caught their fancy
pieces that fit them for that moment
left without goodbye
or any words of comfort

looking for those missing pieces
that would fit back in
has been difficult
taken without asking
stolen –almost-ripped
leaving open wounds

Inside though
there is still a beat
that will skip
and
keep time
and leap
at the mere possibility of love
a beat that is all mine
despite the two men
and their love of ripping my heart open

I’m not done searching
for those pieces just yet

Sashikala Premawardhane

fairly simple

Today

One year ago

You told me how we could be together

You & I

 

It was fairly simple

 

Till we each

Find that perfect partner

More willing

To share our lives

Yes, till that time,

You said

When she changes her mind

And when I find that someone special

You said we could

Be together

You & I

 

My refusal

To be this

Stop-gap measure

For pleasure

Shook you up

 

I cried all night

 

You said you were sorry

The next morning

And I forgave you

Not quite understanding how I could

Sashikala Premawardhane

Because I can

Don’t look to me

I have no answers

No magic wand

To make things right

No words that can heal

All the wounds you carry around

crouching, as if, you can feel it

pushing you down

 

I can instead hold your hand

When you feel like

Things aren’t going your way

And listen

To all the pain that pours from you

As if the wounds were my own

And hold you

Till the pain has eased

And you can smile

 

And love you

Because I can

 

Sashikala Premawardhane

 

Run!

Run brother run
Leave the guns behind
the madman
his cyanide
and his gang of murderers

Run sister run
Let them fight their battle
Your children are your own
Not theirs to
Train and mould
Into killing machines

Run brother run
Make your weary way
Across the lagoon
Sri Lanka waits
Patiently for the arrival
Of her children
Taken from her by force

Run sister run
And we run with you
To safety
And you will see
For yourself what the truth really is

30 years of violence
will end today

so my friend
run!

Sashikala Premawardhane

Naiveté

Didn’t quite comprehend

The naiveté you often attributed to me

It made me angry

I realize now

It was you that made me naïve

 

I’ve wisened up

Become the adult

You always wanted me to be

Stark, naked, brutal

It makes things easy

When you make those

Strangely naïve attempts to contact me now

 

I am transformed

You have – de-mystified – these

-All- grown- up- transitory- relationships- for me

I look back at the time I spent

Listening to you

And think

“What a colossal waste of time”

 

I prefer me before I knew you

Before you killed all the naiveté I had left.

 

Sashikala Premawardhane

Alcohol & Touch

You make small talk

And I wonder

what you’re thinking

I reach out and stroke your forearm

Slowly

In the midst of you fixing me a drink

Toxicants – alcohol & touch

We exchange

I can see the surprise in your eyes

Amused at this rare initiation

Knowing it’s not

The alcohol I’m after tonight

You smile

And I am undone

 

Sashikala Premawardhane

Playing my part

Perhaps there is no river

For me to drown in

As there was for Ophelia

Rejection hurts

Be you a character of the Bard’s imagination

Or as real as I

Living as you may have done

Centuries before me

Or today, in this time….

 

I am, forever, playing the tragic lover

In an endless theatrical production

That is my life

 

Sashikala Premawardhane

Cakes n’ Tears

Over the weekend

I baked my pain

Into cakes

Chocolate

Banana

Lemon and Bluberry

They came out

Tasting delightful

Moist and warm

Like my tears

 

Sashikala Premawardhane

Contact

Our moment is gone

And now I am terrified

of running in to you

And having my heart broken

All over again

And of the wounds covered

By the thinnest layer of skin

opening at the slightest

Form of contact

With you

 

I have no words

To say all the things I want to say

Only tears

“ I want to be free

Baby, you’ve hurt me”

 

 

Sashikala Premawardhane