Half a Life

To live Half-a-Life,
To cry at every step.
To bite tears back,
at every turn,
To yearn for joy,
when there's none.

To cry while you smile,
not knowing what's next.
Hoping that the poet's pendulum,
swings back; but never forth.
To live Half-a-Life,
To cry at every step...

To drown it in a glass,
To hide it behind a puff,
To get stoned till you get stoned.
But these are mere thoughts;
Can't even do that... mine is Half-a-Life.

To yearn for loneliness,
in spite of the terror that it is.
Cutting yourself off
from your only, only love,
always afraid of what's next.
To live Half-A-Life,
To cry at every step...

To peck at my intellectual fodder,
only to put up a facade.
To act the cool dude while,
simmering, whimpering within.
To fly off into the sole solace,
of vicarious pleasures, realities,
only to live abstractions of full lives.
To live Half-A-Life,
To cry at every step...

To feel inadequate, impotent,
confused, dazed,
only to finally give it up.
Decisions are now outta my hand,
trusting the eternal wisdom of love,
the infinity of grace.

Who knows, it might become more than Half-A-Life;
Who knows, I might even smile at every step.

PS: 1. The phrase 'poet's pendulum' refers to Sreekumaran Thampy's famous song
"സുഖമൊരു ബിന്ദു,
ദു:ഖമൊരു ബിന്ദു,
ബിന്ദുവില്‍ നിന്നും ബിന്ദുവിലേക്കൊരു
പെന്‍ഡുലമാടുന്നു“
‌‌- ശ്രീകുമാരന്‍ തമ്പി
[ Happiness is a point,
so is Sorrow,
Life is a Pendulum,
swinging from point to point.]

2. 'The Infinity of Grace' is a book by O V Vijayan( ഓ വി വിജയന്‍).