Classic Poem

When you called me
To light up your life
I could never refuse.
But, there are things I ask of you.

Love, I can’t be a candle
For I know it is an ancient lie.
The candle is for the solemn,
And for those who yearn a slow
And settled tenderness. Not for us.
It is for those who can bear to leave
A mass of their waste, the dregs of their glory.
O, it is for the selfish who seek to burn through a medium.

Love, I will promise you a substitute.
I could be that piece of holy camphor
So safely locked away from prying hands.
And dearest, when I burn for you, that single time
Nothing shall remain of me, or of you, except that flash
Of memory. Our blending shall be so sublime, so intense, so total.

Come, consume me,
Devastate me love, if you ever will,
But with a force that I will forever remember.

(First published in Kavya Bharati)