Marathon

By Sayali Pawar

What about the inherent sad souls? The children who were never cooed over because they were born with an old man’s eyes and century-long festered pain that found this easy-to-maneuver vessel? We are taught to not be them; warned not to look their way- because their eyes, the old man’s eyes, turn you into stone- because their eyes, the eyes of an old man stoned to death, inflict the same pain upon gazing. And so, we learn- to read their shadows and turn around the corner, to study their shoes and patterns they leave behind on soil and concrete marked by the changing weight on their shoulders- we learn their every feature with shades on so we can steer clear from the whirlpool we are taught to be sucking smiles from precious babies and selling it to the invisible beings roaming through the air.

I’ve been trained to dash at the slightest sight of this familiar faceless silhouette; to keep vision tied to footprints and hearing to the sucking silence. You cannot risk freezing in a smileless moment. I’ve been trained to read bodies and hide until they don’t cross the block completely; to build safehouses with no intervention. You cannot risk being around a comrade who turns on you. These shelters camouflaged into overgrown playgrounds, moldy tree houses, and ice cream carts without a bell- all with entrances no one would bother to look for. We live with this tugging hunt like it’s the normal way we were always supposed to survive in. Exhausted and bent, I’m still to return home every day, pretending the war doesn’t exist. But even my neck hurts now, heart aching for the unlooked ones. The poor murderous souls, it’s not like they can help it, can they? What must they look like though? Do they have horns and claws or do they look just like you and me? Does their nose swell and ache like mine is right now? I ought to check if it’s red, I ought to see…

Oh…

So that’s what a rushed sculpture looks like…

By Sayali Pawar