Time the best healer, goes the saying
And yet, does time really heal?
Making your pain gradually disappear
Putting you on an even keel

The grief within you only migrates
Merely changing its form factor
From a tearing anguish weighing on your heart
To minute droplets with dispersed character

Which nestle in a scattered fashion
On your lips, your eyelids, your skin
Across every organ of your body
Across all strands of your being

Waiting for that precise cue to reignite
When the tiny rivulets of misery
Can swim back to your heart once again
Unleashing tears of agony and slavery

Only to seemingly disappear again with time
Seemingly forgotten, seemingly forgiven
But only seemingly so, while playing hide and seek
To appear, disappear and appear again

If only we could let bygones be bygones
And accept the past without denial or pretence
While welcoming the future wholeheartedly
In absolute peace and with patience

If only we could treat the past
As events outside our present ambit
If only we could enjoy the present
On its own undiluted merit

Subir Chakraborty / 10th August 2019