Paresh Tiwari

Time in a Bottle

The road by the ocean is like a busy sentence; choked full with words but going nowhere. Cars honk, people yell and a steady drizzle rolls down the sidewalk.

Sitting by the ocean on an old wrought iron chair, we could be anyone or no one in particular. It's easy to lose yourself here. To be one with the courting couple, the old man ambling hand-in-hand with his shadow, or the urchin playing with a deflated football.

A mongrel inches close and I offer it the last of our red-velvet cake. In the faint light of the streetlamp the silver dragonfly on your ear shifts and you slide your palm into mine.

cashmere scarf –
the smell of mothballs
in our kiss