snippet (1)

(c) Harendra Alwis

... One of the early symptoms of my infatuation was an irrational jealousy. 

As I watched her from the distance of my dreams and perhaps frustrated by how little of her attention I was able to win, I felt jealous of her dog which had the pleasure of indulging lavishly in her company, which I was wholly deprived of. I felt it a grave injustice that a dog was not only allowed to brush carelessly against her, but she would also gently caress it, whereas I needed an elaborate excuse even to shake her hand. 

I would be jealous of a dress that hugged her delicate body, bangles that teasingly dangled at her wrist or a necklace that occasionally had the pleasure of playfully wrapping itself around her delicate fingers as if in a maypole-dance. In my secret thoughts, I gained reprisal over the beautiful pendant she wore, which despite seeming like it was forged from starlight and morning dew, seemed to fade into obscurity whenever she lifted those eyes that held the entire universe within them. 

But I found myself harboring a burning jealousy toward her hairpin - this loveless, careless sliver of metal that spent its days entwined in her lustrous midnight hair, sitting idly on her secret thoughts, sometimes descending to her neck, only to be wrapped in her fingers with an intimacy I could only imagine, while I stood, composing silent poems to her beauty, nursing an epic love that, in my infinite wisdom, I had somehow decided was better left unconfessed...