A different yesterday

That was yesterday. We are different everyday, I am told. So different that the souls we have touched are now numb or echo with the shallow salvo of a “Yeah, sort of…but you know we are different people.”

Yes?

Different people do not reach the core. Different people do not sing the same songs. Different people do not melt like wax beneath your flame. Different people do not touch raw nerves and ripen under each other’s gaze.

Why am I rewarded with a different people scenario? What do you, you and you fear? Me or yourself? Why do you ask, “What do you want?” when it is you who want and give? Do your bare hands ache for that touch and then when you find the lines of destiny criss-crossed with carelessly-spread cadavers you run towards reality? Reality can never be denied but having opened it for scrutiny, you are reminded of its pervasiveness even more, you have bared it and are afraid that someone will look in and see and want to do that reality check…

I have faced many such situations and people deny me most when they have exposed themselves. Reminds me of that meeting of long ago…and what I had written:

She already hated me. Pooja Devi’s eyes were like those of an animal that has been shot dead. Their blankness resonated with a just-killed ferocity. Her kurta hung on her like a sheath; there was a string of large beads around her neck that fell limply over what once must have been breasts. There was a challenge in her voice, and I could imagine her covering the distance of the table that separated us to slap me. She had a reason. I was making her regurgitate forgotten memories.