Suddenly One Day

Like sudden rain, you came into my life one day. You came as a jasmine blossom, white and washed with water.

Then this pale existence became colorful like a seven-hued rainbow. What rapture it was, what intoxication of fierce love, what blissful days and nights of heavenly feeling...ah!

Throughout this life you were like kohl around my eyes, like the vermillion dot half-drawn on my forehead. In my sleep and in my waking you were there, in my laughter and in my tears you were there. Like the artistry of every stitch in a nakshi kantha's border, in every corner and crevice of my whole life, in every lane and alley, you...only you.

Suddenly one day the nor'wester struck. It shattered and swept away my little weaverbird's nest. Like torn cotton in the gusting wind, it carried off the dreams I had built bit by bit over nearly half a lifetime. In an instant, my home and hearth lay in ruins.

For whom I had given up so much in life, whose hand I never let go even when facing death itself—quite casually he took two other hands and walked away before my very eyes, leaving behind intense love, honeyed memories, and countless known and unknown moments of tenderness.

Yet we had promised to stay together all our lives. We had promised that on each of his birthdays, the first wish would always come from me. No, it didn't happen. This year could not be like last year. Today someone else has taken my place.

Someone else will decorate your room, color your world, sing you the song of the first watch. Today I have become a stranger in that very home that was once entirely mine.

Because you came into my life, I understood there is no feeling higher than love in this world; because you came into this world, I learned that perhaps not even death holds more agony than separation or parting.

Today I have lost everything. Yet I say this, beloved: be well, be very well without me. If you are not well, whom else will I love? If you are not well, I might foolishly believe again and suffer once more!