endless encounters

“Hi, how are you?”

“What’s your name?”

So I introduce my name 

In hopes that he’ll remember it until he forgets what forgetting means

but I know that my name has passed that stage a long time ago,

that I am a stranger now, 

a figment and creation of stories that you create when you first meet people for the first time.

I always wanted to be amorphous, never definite, nothing ever factual, nothing ever something that can be defined and pin-pointed as one thing.

But I dread the day when my name becomes a question.

When I become unknown

When you return back to the day when we first met,

but I’m left here, all naked in the past.

I dread the day,

when we both can’t remember the first day we met; when I become older than you.

I dread the day when all the words you’ll speak are lullabies that call for the past, but I’m still here,

somehow the only thing that calls for the future.

I can’t handle the thought of living in two different dimensions,

I can’t handle the sight of your tongue trying to recall syllables prone to its nature and still cannot utter a single word.

M

 a 

         l 

             a

So I say my name again.

I come forth in the present, 

because that’s the only place I exist

and just wait, until it all occurs,

“Hi, how are you?”

“What’s your name?”

My name is Malak, your granddaughter.