Temples in Our Hearts – A Poem by Rachana

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While others make smoldering burial grounds in memory,
those who have never made promises to make us laugh
build their own temples in our hearts.

Stories that don’t need our mother’s tongue at all,
are these secret wishes that transcend cultures and generations.
“Be happy. May you be treated like how you treat strangers.”

The hum follows them out the front door or the hung up phone,
leaving a scent of their memories and the smell of their touch.

When we get back to the time and place that claims our presence,
thoughts of our uprooting or some old days pronounce themselves.

We separate our meetings with the foolishness of distractions,
judging and admonishing ourselves for not knowing the difference – THIS is just loneliness.

If this was the cold, the chill would search us to the marrow.
Yet, we derive the warmth in the surge of the love and kindness that has passed by,
wishing they would choose our idleness, just for the sake of company.

Grasping and replaying
their works of endearment on us
gives us their strange ability —
to hear the cracks in others’ voices,
to surprise everyone around us into happiness.

A knock on the door gets us ready to claim our right to life again,
and we make sure to quell the uproar of the drumbeat in our hearts around them.

To wonder if such longing is ours alone,
human and irreplaceable,
makes us too proud to touch, too afraid to ask:
“Friend — when I die, will you cry?”

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Rachana’s summary of the poem:

This poem is to celebrate quiet, unspoken love and friendship as a gentle form of immortality. Kindness without promises builds lasting warmth in our hearts, lingers like a scent after someone leaves, and comforts us in loneliness. We replay small acts of care, gaining the gift to notice others’ hidden pain and spark unexpected joy. Beneath it all lies a tender, unspoken fear that’s haunts us all. When I die, will anyone cry?

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Poetry