Two Poems by Srinivas Jayanthy

1

Echoes of the Unfinished

In the racks lie half-read books,

cobwebs cling to allergic dust—

expired medicines, wasted strips,

their authors long forgotten, dead.

Whispers rise from brittle pages.

Tear drops in bottles wait to fill

the long-dried wells of eyes;

elders in forgotten halls

rust in their quiet wait.

The places once wandered

blur like aged photographs,

hanging on crumbling walls.

Once-known faces flicker in the dark;

shadows drift through fluid dreams,

falling like autumn leaves—

around the bed, dry and crumbling.

Even the bed is

2

Life Certificate

My feeble expression on this wall—

a testimony not of life lived,

but of its mere continuation.

A slip of paper affirms

what breath itself forgot to claim—

that I still am.

Strange, how existence must be proven

to the system, not to the soul.

The pension arrives like time’s small apology—

for letting me linger

between living and being alive.

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Image: Srujan Raj