To those of you wondering, it is neither a new whim of mine nor a fancy; but just a mere recollection of the past. Well, I was going through one of my old books and I came across the following verse. I wrote this when I was waiting for a flight at the Suvarnabhumi airport, Bangkok. I re-read it and it still felt just as raw and surprisingly fresh, so I thought I’ll document it before it gets lost in oblivion. And before you read it you should know that Suvarnabhumi is a sanskrit word and means Golden Land.
Faces faces and faces, like a refugee home
With a book, mobile phone and cheap coffee — I seek my own
Young girls swaying around in stilettos like they are tap dancing
Old bespectacled men with news papers half peeping out
Crying children, concerned parents and bossy adults
Earphones and earplugs, cigarettes and chewing gums
Tablets and gadgets, goodbyes and welcomes.
Clutter! A lot of clutter!
Sitting in a corner — amidst all the fuss, sweatshirt half zipped
Crimson Irish curls clinging to her curves, drowning all other sound
Half sliding, eyebrows curling — from an artist’s brush
Now looks around like she knows what she was looking for
Finds me; adjusts and tightens — walks at me
Like morning breeze I let myself get sucked in
Picks up the parchment I was scribbling into
Nonchalance around me, anxiety that I was found out
She seems consumed in my scribble
First a smirk and then a half moon smile and a peck
so fast those ten seconds like the speed of light
Suvarnabhumi, indeed!
