The importance of penning down love

I wonder if lovers still hand-write letters to each other. If they still sit a little lost, drumming their fingers on their heads, a pen dangling from their lips, thousand thoughts in their heads clamoring for attention. If they imagine a sweet sigh for every word they write, if the torn sheets full of rejected ink lie strewn on floor, rolled into balls. If they read and re-read what they have written, if their words ever match up to their yearnings, if they lick their postage stamps, if they post with a little prayer of intact delivery, if they jump at every door bell ring anticipating a reply...

I wonder if there was ever a love letter written whose author felt he could do justice to his feelings.

But then, you can always text message, instant message, write an e-mail or maybe call and you are left with no tangible proof of your labors of love which you can pull out of an ageing book when you are thirty-four.

Think about it.

Meanwhile, I will let Nizar Qabbani* convince you.

Light is more important than the lantern,
The poem more important than the notebook,
And the kiss more important than the lips.
My letters to you
Are greater and more important than both of us.
The are the only documents
Where people will discover
Your beauty
And my madness.

--

Every time I kiss you
After a long separation
I feel
I am putting a hurried love letter
In a red mailbox.

(Translated by B. Frangieh And C. Brown)
--

*Another poet whose work transcends language barriers. What Neruda is to Spain, Qabbani is to Syria except that a very few translations of his poetry are available online. You can read more of him here

Her bit to save the world

The worst feeling is hearing a baby cry, constantly, for hours and hours, everyday.
A sitcom is interrupted.
A headache is realized.
A song is drowned.
A thought is intruded upon.

Not to mention that general feeling of helplessness one feels while watching bad stuff happen from a distance.
She has had enough.
She gets up.
Opens the door.
Crosses that two feet corridor.
Rings the bell.

"Is everything ok? P has been crying a lot..."

Mother sighs, says, "Yea, she is all right..."

A smiling P makes her debut, holding a battery operated doll who is crying in a rather weird natural way.
A first birthday present from her father, mother explains.
She wants to ask the mother whether her husband is homicidal or suicidal or just plain stupid but she refrains.

She lies, "Never mind."
She turns back.
Crosses that two feet corridor.
Shuts the door.
She feels very, very cheated.

An expletive

Head aches
Throb throb
And I
Who just fought with her
Over everything
In between earth and sky
Flatter her
Come now,
You have analgesic hands
She retorts
And what you have,
A dick head?
And on this expletive
This conversation ends
Till our next tiff