On my way back home,
ignoring the palmate pink
underneath the green,
I carelessly stepped
on the most intricate leaf
I had ever seen.
For a few seconds
I held on to the belief
that all will be well..
That you will descend
carrying your silver scale,
your broom and your pail
to sweep me again
from these animal motifs,
this geometry
of the ornate rug
that once covered the whole World
or at least the one
of my sunlit room.
I was hallucinating,
sick from dysentery.
I remember well
when you tapped the sliding door.
I was hot and cold.
You were so agile!
You jumped from the high brick wall
to my balcony,
your Egyptian eyes
cast to my naked body,
white and juvenile.
I wasn’t thinking
that I didn’t die that day
or the one after
I didn’t see you.
I heard later that you slept
on our speckled tiles.
jam11
