Have you ever stared —

on a summer afternoon, by the park —

into the eyes of a stranger?

Chained to that moment,

under this common sky,

the only true god watching us.

What if we die together

at this very moment?

Struck by a speeding car,

lightning, a fire.

Possibilities abound.

What will remain of us?

My eyeglasses smudged,

with fingerprints.

Your half-read travelogue on Greece.

Will people dig up our lives,

Our histories from I.D. cards,

broken phones, and address books?

Faces of your old lovers,

My lonely selfies.

Evidence of inner lives

that we want to hide,

from this world,

from ourselves.

And what if our families

pay the same man

to write our obituaries?

Our eyes wander, yet meet again.

Your lips arch when,

a sudden smile rises,

then, flows into me.

A moment of indecision.

Should I smile back at you?

By then, you walk past me.

Fading away, into the city,

like shadows from the morning sun,

into streets and avenues,

whose names,

I don’t know yet.

published in Indian Literature, Sahitya Akademi, June 2019