‘Why Not Home?’ by Pallabi Roy

In the cozy nest that you build often,

lying beneath you, my cerebral cortex wanders,

waits for the game to be over.

That one question plays hide–and–seek

through my giving in.

Am I of so little worth?

Amid the glory of your victory

I celebrate my distress and don a veiled smile.

Then I set out a buffet of those old “?s” again,

with dread,

and you do not fail to echo what I already know.

You make me count my minuses,

and I show my mathematical genius.

Moments later I muster your words

and ask myself,

Am I really a no–good?

Long days of silence plod along

when you nourish your ego, and I do mine.

My eyes and ears caught in action though,

but the void refuses to fill.

Few more days,

and I bury my already buried soul

to continue from where we left.

And the game starts again.

But that q-over-o still lingers in my mind.

Am I not worth taking home?

 

Poet’s Bio: Based in New Delhi, Pallabi Roy is a technical communicator by profession and a creative writer by passion. She has penned numerous flash fictions and poems in English and Assamese, and got published in The Assam Tribune, Prantik, The Sentinel, and so on. When she is off from her writing schedule, she is either travelling through water (a former competitive swimmer!) or trekking through some hills in North India.