The audience has fallen silent,

In the Colosseum after cheering.

At the centre of the arena lies our past – our story,

which for hours had kept all of them consuming.

Retreated now we are to our own dugouts,

With our wounds, hickeys, and garbs bloodied,

Lonely we are, with you clinging on to your version of our story,

And I with mine.

We are left alone with our own stories now,

And with our old wounds to nurse.

We don't know if our stories are alike,

Or different, or one of them is false.

Because you never wanted to know mine,

And you thought your silence will make me know yours.

We don’t even see an interlocutor in the audience filing,

Out, writing their own stories of our verse.

*

Jay Jagdev | 30^th March 2024