As Meager As A Mendicant Poem by Aicha Mansoor

The very thought of a bleak winter strikes,
As a frantic wind of decayed leaves blows,
Pricking hard my feeble eyes as they rush,
In a fierce sky that will shed endless tears,

I tremulously stroll down the empty streets,
With bare feet brushing against sharp stones,
Cracked lips with few drops of oozing blood,
Blue-purple blistered and frostbitten fingers,

All seems blurry through the burning eyelids,
The crick of the intense cold I try resisting,
Wondering how did I end up dispossessed,
Of all that I could achieve in a recent past,

At this very drift I stop under the awnings,
Of an old shop which gives me safe shelter,
And I slowly fall down the muddy asphalt,
Ready to confront true harshness of reality,

The name of the avenue I try to remember,
But for just a little rest the eyelashes crave,
As I close them to fall in a profound dream,
Early phases swirl and oppress the sanity,

Nothing did I ever lack in my past life,
For warm people were my surroundings,
Heartlessly rejecting them egoism made me,
Valuing people unworthy of any importance,

My entire life I had given to those people,
None but only personages they were,
Who came and performed their plays,
And deserted me on my own stage of life,

One thousand tears I did cry for them,
One thousand pains I did hide for them,
But why are they the ones to blame,
When the nocency was purely mine?

Goodbye they kissed in nebulous ways,
Forsaking me a jigsaw puzzle to fathom,
Whose fragments are complex to observe,
However missing pieces unite it unsolved,

Only lessons they left for me to learn,
That friends were there only to leave,
That promises were there only to break,
That trust was there only to betray,

And today none but a pathetic beggar I am,
Lying in a unknown street in a strange world,
Forlornly sheltering from the icy raindrops,
Voided of love, care and just a tiny home…