Tethered Kite Frozen In Time Poem by Rajitha K.S. Ayyappan

I breathe you like oxygen.
A kite, I'm tethered to you,
to your words—
like a clinging cherry
kissing a hummingbird.

Both will be my end:
a slow inhale will collapse my lungs,
the cherry will be swallowed.

I'll glide down in an autumn breeze,
like a fallen maple leaf,
buried beneath the soil,
waiting for the winter snowflakes.
I'll freeze your memory
like water beneath a frozen lake.

Like a gardener,
you dig through my garden.
A crush on you seeps
through my soil—
but nothing grows here.