Bodies and Memories

by:  Debarun Sarkar

I

My body was awake that night
She clinged to me, with her desire
But the separation(s) after the announcement Of separation
Were (like) rituals

Bodies didn't make any contact any more
Money did
A mere Rs.1000 at 3am at an empty ATM cubicle Which was duly returned through cycles of debts

We walked back
To a vehicle
Where she stood at a distance We both cried silently
In the presence of other people

While walking I remember telling her
Liking a wise man how separation shall not be painful She chipped in her similar wisdom too

There I was,
Looking for the moon Looking for God/s
In everything and everyone

Wo/men move around me I don't desire

HM says that
Anais says, "Sex is sainthood"

I knew of a Christian Mirabai Her body intertwined
With bodies

II
The travelling memories of me without an anchor exists, lives, still

Memories of her exist too

A travelling memory
Of madness, sainthood, (and feigning virginity)
Of communism, anarchism and imagined revolutions With imagined communities
With a gaze from a fortress ala The Coming Insurrection Overshadowing swathes of tiny buildings on the landscape

With Nizam's royal architecture in vision
Forever sullied by democracy