By: Imrana Muhammad Nata’alah.

DEBT OF DEATH, DEBT OF LIFE

At midnight, I felt a warm hand with thousand fingers jacking me by the neck, like my bowtie.
These were practically hands of death
taking my life; as the bucket of my lifetime on earth is full—and about to flood the house of death with my sins tho! My good deeds were more; they formed a silver-like foam on top of the bucket—dancing to the waves of my charity, patience, and compassion.

I couldn’t help but ask ‘Is my time up?’
‘Yes,’ he said, with a melancholic background that echoes. I looked death in the eye; and whispered ‘I’m not scared of you like deers do tigers.

Deep down my heart beats faster and my legs were shaking like the legs of a woman —that had just attained orgasm, from the soft work of a vibrator—I needed a debt of money not repayment of the debt of death. I’m not a murderer I haven’t killed an ant in years—why am I owing you a life? I asked.

Death said “Kullu nafsin zaikatul maut“ I replied, I have no tongue to taste you, I’m not hungry for you; I owe you no life—you don’t owe me yourself (whether peaceful or painful death) I’m just a human who believes you’re my friend, though we just met a few minutes ago—otherwise you’re a fiend.
Don’t ruin your first impression in this lovely heart of mine, I said and murmured in a pathetic tone of voice; into the ears of the death ‘A debt of life’ must not be ‘a debt of death’

BLEEDING HEART

If you were given the chance again
Would you still pierce my heart?
Would you have rendered the Butterflies
In my tummy homeless?
Would you have shattered the dream
Of us becoming Romeo and Juliet
Dancing with the moon
While the stars chant our names
In sweet melodies that please the soul
Would you have broken my heart?
Would you have made woes heap
On every single piece?
Making it heavier with burdens
Of “Had I known and I should’ve known”
Would you have made my heart shatter?
Leaving it perforated with holes
Tears flow in every hole and corner
My heart is a sea of worries
A dwelling place for sorrows
A seashore of regrets and anguish

I know the heart deals with blood but
Why must a poor heart be bleeding?

DEAD POET

Found myself amid buried cadavers
Yet I can still hear the tunes of molten flows of oxymorons and euphemisms
Addressing me as a dead poet.
Am I a dead poet?

I asked myself; with a deeper voice
thinking it could be my obsession
with metaphors and clingy act on similes
That made me believe I’m still living.
Am I a dead poet?

I seek answers from weeds and heap
Of sands that surround me
Despite enjoying the luxury of silence
And reminiscing about good poetry
I still hope life would give me a chance
To be reborn but I ask myself; Am I a dead poet?

BLOODED ROSE

Planted the seeds of your love,
in the dungeon of my heart,
where nothing grows but pain,
and blooded rose of regrets;
singing a melody of dismay
with the fragrance of anguish.

It bloom, i bleed mentally and physically.
My nose could cry a river in blood,
and catarrh running down to my lips.
My face is now a battle field,
covered with blood of a trembled heart;
yearning for unadulterated affection.

Rejection wreck havoc in my ship,
dragging me to the darkest cove,
where i cries and drowned in distress.
With no active compass to find my new rose,
I’m stuck between trying or crying;
Yes, flowers don’t bloom in the concrete.

LIFE IS A CUP OF TEA

Life is soft, dry, wet, fun and difficult
Like spraying mayonnaise In between
Two soft-hot baked loaves of bread
Without any utensils
This life is a pool of hot water mixed with Dissolved sugar at the bottom of the cup
While the milk at the top dances with the Bubbles of caffeine singing the song of Dainty in steam with a chorus of sweetness
Ready to satisfy or burn the taste buds
Of the man holding the cup.