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The Spoilt Cornflake

The world looks bleak through curtailed holes. I used to wait for grey clouds, not because they brought in rain, but because I could hear and smell them within my confinement. I always thought the droplets from the sky healed you, poured in between the gaps and stretched out to fill them.

There were numerous times when I crawled down that stairwell to taste the north wind, until that high window in the dark corridor pulled me back into that simultaneous state of equilibrium and entropy.

In moments of lucidity, I would often carry myself to the shoreline. The wee hours of dusk and dawn look like a colorful spill in a bar on a Friday night. I never felt special or gifted in any sense, but in moments like this, I could just listen to my blood, at least in those parts that were alive.

The sea is pretty sympathetic to a visitor. I remember the time when the breeze carried away my crutches. I felt defeated, but the water would rush in and try to pretend as if my voids weren’t real, that the air between my fingers had not lost its price.

I don’t bother with stray glances. I feel people reprimand themselves for possessing what others do not. I have accepted this continuity of incompleteness, its time you do too. Then hopefully someday when we cross each other on the sidewalk, you could answer me with a smile.

The only thing worse than pain is the lack of it. In moments of solitude, I would let my dead parts bask in the moonlight. My mother would call it the life of the night. I was a troubling child but her lullabies never lost their vigor.

I don’t own an umbrella because I am not afraid of the rain. I would sit on a soaked park bench and watch mice scuttle around for shelter. I guess these complete beings do have some lacking.

But dry as they stay, they do return to a soothing brush on their bruises. I come back to a kettle on the dusty stove and an amputated table in a silent room. Maybe I will fix that leg someday.

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