These days I feel a kinship with the four white walls,
Which guard my every move, every breath, every thought.
Observe how they close in on me, irked, distraught-
They make the world look small.
I speak to them in unfinished puzzles,
And superficial metaphors,
And subdued gurgles,
And defeated murmurs.
My words are nothing but a brook,
Whose melancholic babbles fill the chilly air.
They tint the midnight blues,
Reciting a panoply of incoherent hymns and prayers.
Within these walls my love, newfound,
For solitude blazes.
I don’t know if I ever want to go out.
A captive I wish to stay.
The fluttering wings of a thousand butterflies;
The melody of sprightly wind chimes;
The buzzing bumblebees meandering along the skyline-
I see them all,
I hear them all,
I feel them all,
Right here where I reside.

Shifa