09 October 2023

Distance

We keep coming back
To each other.
To sit on park benches 
At an arm's distance.
To count all the roses
We couldn't have.

At train stops, temples,
Hills, tea stalls.
Sunsets and long walks.
To grow some more
Distance each time.

This time at different 
Ends of an aisle.
Ten empty chairs apart.
A caste, a few lakhs,
And a doused flicker of
Longing as divide.