Pyre

Your bones refused to burn
when we set fire to the flesh
- Agha Shahid Ali, 'Cremation'


...Being the burning type,
he burned properly
at the cremation
- A K Ramanujan, 'Obituary'

. . .

One refuses to burn.
The other,
burns properly, and
in between the two
the world
crackles...

Life is a flight
from cremation 
to obituary,
from obituary to cremation.

At times, you refuse
to be decimated by Words.
On other occasions,
people profusely 
singe you
on the pyre of life.

too stubborn in life
we persist.