Melancholic Melody

By Udita Sharma

Sturdy arms, enormous, beautiful lips, and fingers carved with perfection.

My skin is painted with golden flakes from some broken-down castle.

Yet, it is merely a creature of flesh and bones that forgets to polish me.

You have lungs, while I boast bellows lined with silver.

You have hands with blue veins; I have valves crowned with black rubber tops.

You have a heart and I ... but do you?

Do you have a heart? Or is it merely a dark object that sits within your chest?

You and I; Both forged pieces of cold, hard metal,

 Yet I conjure songs; melodies sung in harmonious voices.

And you create chaos, bombs, and bullets.

What do you possess? Flesh, hair, and organs?

Then, sorry that I cannot breathe, for I don’t have lungs.

 Sorry that I cannot walk, for I don’t have legs,

And sorry, that I am merely a golden, lifeless object, cambered and covered in dust.

Yet one thing we have in common; sorry that I cannot feel, for I don’t have a heart.

I sit at the top of your dusty wooden shelf,

As if I am a piece of rotten meat, that dried up in the blazing sun

Still; Smiling, hoping for your eyes to wander upwards.

But what proof is there that I exist?

Whispers hundreds of years later, or tales that no one will believe ?

Knocks on the doors of my grandchildren, whose faces are wrinkled like crumpled paper?

I, have won the race, and you are standing at the start line.

Yet you have won the gold medal, and sorry I say, sorry that I could not even win bronze.

By Udita Sharma