A Letter To My Dead Daughter

My Love, The sky reminded me of you today. The sun set in lilac with a teasing tinge of pink— just the way you used to love it. On other days, the sky is yellow and murky, reeking of sulphur and carbon; I feel suffocated in grandma’s old penthouse (I sold off our homes the day after your funeral; they had too much of my mother and you in our footprints on the marble floors and coffee mugs containing our midnight musings). Twenty years ago, it used still used to smell like her— the turmeric paste she used to put on her visage every Sunday, and the pumpkin plants she used to cultivate in the backyard. That yard is desolate now: the trees are bones of wood that split the firmament into asymmetric parts— I look for you in them; sometimes I think you twinkle between the oak branch and magnolia branch— you used to love playing in their treehouses other times, I think you are amalgamated with the soils, holding onto the roots of these towering creatures. Will you hold onto them? I fear they will collapse in a year or two, taking away with them the memories of my childhood. New folks have moved into our neighbourhood, the neighbours keep changing and I am exhausted from remembering new names; I know no more than their countenances. They reek of youth— their voices, clothes, laughter and scuffles. I miss the days I used to be like them: carefree, spreading my wings across a cerulean firmament like I had no destiny only flying and flying to my heart’s delight. Even then, I knew I had no destiny but what felt liberating then feels caging now. The sky is yellow and murky every evening when I drink my tea, I look at the branches segregate it into parts of myself I’ve lost over the years. My wings are worn thin and I think I’ve forgotten how to fly (I stopped trying the day after your funeral). I know not how many years I have till the only home I can claim is my own body, frail, bony, deteriorated and discarded. Perhaps, the sky will offer me homage even under its yellows and sulphurous smokes. But today, the sky is lilac and pink bringing you home to me. Tell my mother and father that I love them and Aunt Daisy that I read her remnant letters even now. Today, the sky is lilac and pink, and I can feel a blanket of warmth dissolving my loneliness. I hope I can mend my wings again; I’ll fly home to you. Yours lovingly, Mom.