Jyothy Sreedhar

All in me is love...

For this was on seynt Volantynys day

Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese his make.

[For this was Saint Valentine’s Day,

when every bird cometh there to choose his mate.]

 

The first words inked for the Valentine’s day

that was emotionally Chaucerish.

The later poets tied their red flowers to the garland of roses.

The Valentines bloomed in the centuries of history,

in the legendary manuscripts of versatile poetry.

I didn’t exist then.

I was asleep yearning for love in my unconscious snores.

I missed love in the golden ages of literature.

When I was born, it was my tear that I saw first

like a tender film that covered my eyes.

Through it, the blurred face of my mother,

a bit blocked by the transparency of those tears in my eyes.

The first flash of my history was for that vague sepia capture.

The first love that I had felt was with her kiss that was red.

The childhood and the teens passed as regular cycles of seasons.

Love ramp walked in my eyes costumed with the trends of ‘loving’.

What I loved about Love once were the greeting cards made

with some soothing colour tones of overpowered emotions.

The blurred image of lovers in black and white

and the bouquet of roses in colour.

I remember to have seen such a card long ago

when I had fascination for paintings and pictures.

I loved Valentine’s day for the variety of those cards,

creative visuals, deep emotive scribblings, even the font used,

the special write-ups in newspapers

and everything special that used to come that day.

Years later, now, I get my version of ‘love’.

The Valentine’s day comes tomorrow,

six hundred and twenty years after Chaucer’s thought,

when love has got its shape with the legendary verses

like how a nomad stone is shaped with the waves in a sea.

Now my stone too is polished and is engraved with a name.

Perfect it is, with the color tone of sunrise.

My blindness is gone, the reddish garden is seen.

The world drew in the sky a happy face smiley

that very much reflects my inner heart.

It tells me that I am the happiest in the world

when all in me is love…

I agree to it while I feel the freshness around.

I call my winter, and it comes in summer even!

I call my spring and it blooms in an autumn!

All is fresh, all is red and all is love,

that which hold me in the center

and makes things revolve around me happily.

I don’t fear about the destiny when I decide it

and I scare not even for a storm

that has high chances for someone to hold me.

Let the rains end, the breezes vanish, the springs decay

But I have them full in my heart beats.

And I dance with every beat…of my heart that loves.

Love is like that, in this season, the age which I live in.

A century may make differences with happier faces.

The new buds are welcome for the transitions.

I sign this with my heart, turn to the next page and leave it,

for someone to pick it up tomorrow hopefully.

And I fall asleep with a favourite Shakespearean line

in a soothing soft tune…

waking up my dearest face in my dreams…

while the gentle music plays on…

 

To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,

All in the morning betime,

And I a maid at your window,

To be your Valentine.