Slightly Used Coffin

“I have the feeling that inside you somewhere, there's something nobody knows about.”
- From Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt

I will carry your name on my lips when I breathe my last. I will also carry a thousand stories with me, words that were aborted and flung into a stream of viscid aberrations and the load of promises that were never ours to keep. It would have been nicer if we could have met one more time, maybe to validate that it wasn’t just by fluke that we gave into each other’s soul when we last got together.

The rainbow spewed its colored venom on a perfect grey sky today and stained it. I was hoping to use it to hold the tablature of my elegy and will now have to seek another patch of heaven. I never wanted that dollop of sugar you wildly threw in my cup of coffee. It spoilt the delectable, unadulterated bitterness I was looking forward to enjoy. My veins now sit cold, my motivation is wrecked and my desires stand defeated.

A few nights ago, the roof that sheltered me, crashed on my head. A few pictures, a dozen books, my childhood toys and a couple of fridge magnets were lost in the rubble. It will take me a while to relearn my ways but I will never be whole again. There is no solace in the futility of life anymore. When they pulled me out of the debris, they assumed I was dead and laid me to rest. However, much to their horror and dismay, when the Sun came out the next day and thawed my bones, I rose and stood tall once again.

Over the years, I learnt that once you outlive your utility for people around you, there are no takers for what you stood for, all your life. I never claimed to have all the answers you wanted. It was always about a quest to find the missing pieces of the jigsaw together. I never feigned an excuse or faked an emotion and could never pawn my integrity either. You always knew what I brought to the table and that I was never afraid to eat alone.

The heart is a coffin that while you are alive, you don’t know what to do with. At times, you use it as a trunk to store all your memories. On other times, you abandon it on the roof when it rains and let it rot. The one I put out for you wasn’t brand new but it was in perfect shape and pumped just as good as new. It could have lasted you a lifetime but then I realized people don’t buy second hand coffins even if they are just slightly used.

I regret the inconvenience caused. I will pick my wares and get going. For now, I guess I will chop a slice of my casket and cover it in piece of my cerement. I will bejewel these bits in a locket cast out of my ash and will wear it on my sleeve.