by Nitin Lalit Murali

I called my father today and told him that his death

will give me closure.

“Why don’t you jump off the balcony

while I’m talking to you? You’ll do us all a favor,”

I said, seething with rage.

Echoes of abuse never become whispers;

the past lies mangled like the hind leg of a deer

in the mouth of a lion,

the future is as cut up as paper put through

the shredder,

a voice in the dark

that’s as sharp as a blade screams, “Injustice!”

But does that give me a right to become the very man

I detested growing up?

A tormented, tortured, theatrical fool,

a disgruntled, discontented, disgusting do-nothing,

an uneasy, unstable, unsettled madman.

I wish there was more to life than

looking at my shattered reflection,

I wish there was more than drowning

in a green abyss of self-loathing and hate,

I…