Fairground Ghosts

By Kaavin Farwaha

I drive a road that never ends,

lined with shadows I once called friends.

They wave from mirrors I don’t trust,

faces fading into the dusk.

There’s a fairground somewhere on the way...

I pass it but I never stay.

Laughter echoes like a lie,

a carousel against the sky.

But no one ever held my hand

or bought me tickets to the band.

The candy floss was out of reach,

as the system buried me far beneath.

They said, "Walk around, be free, go roam."

But freedom doesn’t feel like home

when home was cold and overgrown

with questions I asked all alone.

Curious questions filled with buoyance,

met indifferent faces that underlined annoyance.

No answers came, just careful eyes—

the kind that scan but don’t empathise.

So I became my own disguise,

smiling just to minimise

the weight of growing up too fast

on wounds too quiet to outlast.

“Soon, child, you'll be free to roam”

saying this, they took me to someone’s home.

Between fake promises and tired smiles,

I was too naive to discern a lie.

There was a boy... yes, he was me...

tucked away too carefully.

He wanted birthdays loud and bright,

not just a cake-less, silent night.

He wanted arms to hold his rage,

to tell him, “You are not your cage.”

But I made sure he disappeared,

because the world had made it clear—

to be enough was too much noise...

so I buried all his softer toys.

And still I pass that fairground gate,

where music tries to imitate

a joy I never got to taste—

just empty seats and candy waste.

But deep inside, I hear him call!

A voice I tried to make too small.

He whispers not of what was done,

but what was missed and what’s begun.

I love the thought of coming home!

Though I have never truly known

what "home" would mean to someone who

was taught to break before he grew.

But maybe I could still arrive

and keep that little ghost alive—

to sit beside him where he lay,

and tell him, “You can cry today.”

“You didn’t dream those nights in vain.

It’s real, that heavy, shapeless pain.

You didn’t fail by being scared.

You only broke because you cared.”

And if I could, I’d let him stay

just one more ride before we fade.

A little hand in mine to say -

there’s still some fairground on the way.

By Kaavin Farwaha