Oedipus-Like Poem by Raj Arumugam

(i)

Yes, I left but I am no further
away from you and formations and life
than I was before
The physical journey and remove make things and events seem real
but I traveled a great distance really a long time ago.
I wish you well and, except for the occasional
(fair comment, as journalists might say) bitter word
that even you will allow one who lived in your midst
and is so removed, I speak no ill and
every time I hear of you or am made reluctantly to speak of you
I feel my distance. I feel again strongly
how far I have always been
to all things close to me.


(ii)

I cannot say how it happened but
a long time ago, so far away I cannot
salvage when precisely from the ocean of memory of you,
I traveled far within; I became isolated and alone and
could not say a word any more to you.
You might say, in rejecting home he rejected everything;
for a man who can't fit at home
will not - (I know you will not use the word probably) -
find anywhere a home.




(iii)

You might say
again
The man who rejects his home
rejects all places; the man who felt alone
in his own home will feel so everywhere.
And so I carry this with me; no, it is not this
place's fault, nor your fault that I first felt that way
but it is a curse that perhaps I drew upon myself Oedipus-like
that I should wander the terrain of the earth
isolated, alienated, unconnected and feeling alone.






(from The Migrant - notes of a newcomer (February 1997- July 1998))