I will wait till you swim across a frozen ocean for me, for us. I will wait.
- Amaan [Yeh Dil Mera]
•••
Winter.
The season between autumn and spring consists of the coldest months of the years - comprising of December, January and February. A period of boundless inactivity and decay. A period where you need a fuel to keep yourself warm, not even bothering if you're burnt alive in it.
I snuggle into my warm jacket, tapping my feet impatiently against the wooden floor. It's hard - as hard as the varnished wooden beneath my feet - to feel left alone every single moment, I think as I gaze at the stars through the window.
And yet, what I simply do is wait.
You know what is the worst part about waiting?
The worst part about waiting is that you're the one left behind. You're the one who has to stay and wait.
It is said that long ago - men would go to the sea, and women used to wait for them, standing at the edge of the water, scanning in the horizon for the tiny ship in the spectrum of their labyrinth.
Now I wait for Aina, Aina Amaan Ullah, my wife. She has gone far, vanished into silent depths of the mountain. And I wait for her. Each second I wait feels like a year, an eternity. Each moment passing away is like glass - slow and transparent. And during this wait, I can hear myself shattering into pieces just like that glass. Never to be fixed again...
My life has become a monotonous trail of monotonous events now. I sleep alone, wake up alone, survive alone. And all I do is play the piano - until I'm tired, until every bone in my body cracks in despair, until every cell in my body exhales out exhaustion, and inhales nothing but hollowness. It feels as if a fire is set loose in my gut that is beginning to spread, and my heart has embraced the lofty weight of a hundred yard wall which has dropped right over my chest.
This wait is killing me.
❝Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.❞ - Rumi.
I chant this quote like a mantra in my head as her memories burn every cell and fibre of my body. As the ghost of the memory of our nearness plays hide and seek with me. As the taste of her lips against mine, haunts me...
Aina used to love stargazing, and I to gaze at her moon like face. She was like a child, innocent, pure and beautiful. Her eyes always shone like the hundred thousand sparkling stars, but how would I know that my beloved "Sitara" was a supernova in guise?
Her shy, blushing gaze haunts me as I place my laptop against my folded thighs. I open its lid. Typing her name on the blank void of Facebook does not fill the blank void of my heart though, but my parched eyes soak in the beauty of my wife, her enigma and her glory. And I wait wanting nothing more than her to return back to me, and fill that blank void....
Tum Se Tum Tak
Advocate Anjali Awasthi
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