Has the world killed you
through your own hands too?
I asked him, painfully. Sobbing
like a dim cloud which breaks into
torrents of emotions, looking
for a soil to dry his tears
& a sun to console him with light.
But his voice had died along
with his laid body
before he could answer,
& tell me how one could
become a ghost at every wake,
every walk to find freedom for
his frail flower in a thorny garden.
He lost his fragrance to his own flaws.
I cried, & cursed the day
he brought me pain
through his own selfish skin.
He didn’t know that heaven rejects
such inconsideration, so he jumped
the line, looking for his ideal grass
on the other side. I am here, a tree…
becoming more with my own branches
to fill this lonely forest with my long limbs.
I takes this tenderness to thicken, to find strength.
Author: Tukur Loba Ridwan