A Circus Of Songs by Shome Dasgupta
- 7 days ago
- 3 min read
Updated: 2 days ago
I seek castles and walk in mumbles—so let the refractions set forth from such stained glass
windows fiddle their way into me. Pry.
I’m my father’s son and a mama’s boy, a moat within a moat, and it’s a star light star bright
night, a sky acrylic or maybe watercolor, perhaps watercolor, and my tears make the night look like windows framed with pain and sorrow.
The magic of the wind, a wand and how we all can disappear, poof. A hand to reach out, a hand to hold amid a frail skin so gentle that upon a simple touch, a light so strong in its beam enters through such pores, leading me to burst into bits of colorful spheres, chiming and melodic and harmonious. Sometimes, I’m not a figment of my own imagination.
I hide under turtle shells and speak into plastic cups tied to a string of echoes where there is no one on the other side—maybe I’m there, bobbing in the ocean, letting the drift of the tides take me to a moon where the breath of the stars provides a nourished universe inside my body.
A dance—in my palm placed a bee with no buzz, and in its death, it still stung, a stinging which still rings roughly a million years later as I fill the earth with my face. Reverberations, and each life, an echo, and in each echo, a ripple in a pond I visited to talk to ducks and shiver in a winter cold. Pumice skin and abrasion: let the erosion wipe away the canals of the mind.
Waltzing Matilda, I whisper, when my body is cut in half by the sun.
I breathe and inhale and exhale and breathe so I don’t understand what is going on, and if I don’t understand, then maybe I’m lost, and maybe if I’m lost, I can find a castle with a drawbridge, welcoming me with a bed, and maybe I can sleep and trail away into the air just like the bubbles my brother and I would blow and in the front yard.
Musical chairs and spherical stairs—up up up I go into lullabies and stories of cattails and bells, bedside lamps and picture books where legendary lions and mythical beasts play on seesaws and merry-go-rounds, humming in my head childhood daze of blankets and spoons. Paragons of hexagons and forms and forms, such allegorical drifts—drifting and floating upon a wren’s wing. I lift my fingers to hang on and fly away.
I fumble and toss myself into the air to recognize a ceiling fan and round and round and round I go until I am a mouse on a boat sailing to a land tucked away in my mind where no one can venture. Not even me, and I leave myself there in case I find myself, and when I find myself, a circus of songs I will sing.
Author's Note:
Since my journey into sobriety, after some of the darkest periods of my life, I’ve found that practicing self-care is extremely important. I still have a ways to go; however, I’ve made some progress when it comes to acknowledging the self and giving it attention. This includes movement, sharing time outside at the park, and taking delight in the smaller aspects of life. Routine is important to me—really important, and while it plays a significant role in finding harmony, I’m also trying to fuel my soul by venturing outside my daily habits—this includes being more communicative and open.
Shome Dasgupta is the author of The Seagull And The Urn (HarperCollins India), and most recently, Atchafalaya Darling (Belle Point Press), The Muu-Antiques (Malarkey Books), Tentacles Numbing (Thirty West), and Iron Oxide (Assure Press). He lives in Lafayette, LA and can be found at www.shomedome.com and @shome_dasgupta.
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