Pathi

last night i dreamt
that you came back,
from one of your journeys, away.

a long journey, you had not told me about,
but it was all so natural.and you were back,
with the usual tales of persons,
the films you saw and the places you met.and i had stories to tell, too,
tales of old friends, you left behind,
what david said, slipping from my mind, too soon

the pulse of an age, vanishing in a blip,
as we picked up threads of your life
i had dropped somewhere, along the way,
unravelling, in the middle of a mise-en-scene.
new stories of new films
i made, i had not shared
with you, nor did you know of their making.

we lie together, side by side,
we make films, born out of time living,
and talk of change, in the restful time of sleep.

we listen, hear and wait
for the softest of treads in the distance of hope.
see the light of the sky,
in the blue of the sea.
new stories of old films,
remembered, but cut
in the middle of a shot,
zoomed to no place,
none beyond.

by sumathy

On the passing away of Dharmasena Pathiraja, six years ago, on 28 January, 2018