I Want You Back

8/10/24

I want you back. 

It’s a simple wish

An uncomplicated craving 

Neither treasures, nor followers  

nor world dominance, nor the moon. 

Just. You. 

In the flesh; your hugs and your scent. 

I want us back

Who we used to be

when we first began.  

Not who we were at the end 

Battling, struggling, helpless. 

If you ask me…

It hardly seems unfair 

to request not for something someone else has

but a few perfect moments from my own life again!

They’re not even the big milestones

The highs and the success

I’m grateful for those,

but I remember them quite well. 

I’m begging for the simpler times

The quiet days 

The mundane ones

Our lazy ways. 

A stroll in the park

hand in hand, lost in thought;

The luxury of comfortable silence 

in front of the TV together;

Little reminders on the phone 

to bring home the medicine or the fruit, 

to buy tickets, to make the appointment,   

to remember to send the car back,

to check if the other’s reached safe.  

Grumblings of traffic and roads and politics;

Musings of trips we may never take. 

It’s not everything that I’m praying for,

It’s the little nothings that I crave. 

It doesn’t seem too unreasonable to ask

of such a merciful God 

who has created miracles everywhere,

to relax this one rather rigid rule 

of the forward marching of time.  

Why can’t it go both ways?!

So that I can replay at will 

parts of my own life 

that I want to live twice 

I promise, without any change. 

It’s just a matter of a simple rewind. 

Seems rather harsh to be denied

since they were already granted as mine. 

So I ask, and I beg, 

I pray, and I plead;

I light flames, ring bells, 

get down on my knees 

But God’s grievance desk doesn’t seem to be 

any more efficient than 

a government office out to lunch and tea. 

Fine! If it can’t be arranged for me to revisit,

at least wipe out all the memories

of that bustling house

where every room was once filled 

with those I love immensely. 

And this petition isn’t just for tragic grief. 

But also your garden variety separation, farewells & heartbreak,

your babies outgrowing your lap. 

(Nostalgia, you’re a drug induced trap!)

However, the best that they can do for me,

they say as a consolation prize

is, in my opinion,

a rather half-hearted compensation,

They’ve invented…

(drum roll please)

DREAMS!

So, I guess…

until we get permission to meet,

I’ll see you when I sleep!

#grief #griefpoetry #missing #longing #mourning #love #fathersanddaughters #rolemodel #guru #memories #love #family #forever #sarthi