Samsaara : Malakh-ul-maut

5. Malice In Blunderland

The long walk back home had me running on fumes. As usual I overestimated my abilities and ended up exhausted. A small oasis in the dessert if weariness appeared. A garden.

I walked into the garden and took a seat on the swings. Tall green trees scattered the morning sun and the soothing breeze occasionally brought a sun-beam on my face. I took my shoes off and let my feet hover above the ground. The fresh dew-crowned blades of grass brushed their tips against my heel and between my toes. As I rocked back and forth on the swing the sounds of sparrows gently lulled me to sleep.

In the Fortress of Soham a beast resides,
In the guise of a saint, the monster hides.
His hyde of scales into supple flesh turned,
His breath of hell fire, no longer burns.

The saw-tooth scales and wings of blades,
Along the beasts monstrous body cascades.
With the death of six, the truth shall emerge,
And this unholy land of lies shall be purged.

Layers of mist on the ground sprawl,
Concealing the rotting bones of ones past.
With a blade in his back the first crawled,
In the spell of despair that I have cast.

The fingers of death silently wrapped,
Her neck which like a twig snapped.
A plunge in his heart and a pool of blood,
The fourth pillar fell with a muffled thud.

The fifth corner dies, in the icy cold womb,
The tentacles of green shall be her tomb.
The final pillar, shall remain a mystery,
How the sixth corner falls, and who shall it be?

In the circle of time, six corners are burned,
Wherefore six meals of anguish, I will feast.
The flickering flames now midnight turned,
And I will expose the six horns of the beast.

I woke up as violently as I had peacefully fallen asleep. The sun was a little brighter and the breeze had stopped. I woke up soaked in sweat. Whether it was from the scary dream that I got or because of the Mumbai heat and humidity I did not know. All I knew was that there were people in the garden, some of whom were looking at me like I was a hobo. It was time for me to leave. As I tried to stand up my feet became numb and tingly, perhaps due to improper blood flow.

A few old people were enjoying their morning walk and a gardener was diligently pruning the weeds around the nasturtiums. A child in uniform, with a school bag was probably bunking and on the swing opposite to me was a girl. She was about my age, or maybe a year or two older. The wrinkled yellow t-shirt she wore was tucked into her track-pants shabbily and she wore a neck brace around her neck. She was smiling brightly while swinging hard on the swing.

As I looked at her, our eyes met and she smiled. She stopped whipping her legs fore and aft and slowed the swing until it came to a halt like mine. Her pale hands went behind her neck and pulled apart the velcro on the neck brace. Once she took it off, she tried to put it into her t-shirt's neck hole. It was too large to fit into the the t-shirts opening but it was fun to watch her try.