Rented Love
written by: Rituparna Mukherjee
How does it feel,
Each time you love someone new.
For me, it feels like renting new apartments,
You try out the rooms,
Look for old mildew,
Try out the colour of the walls,
Against your skin,
Sniff them for dampness,
And residual fervour,
Tour the balconies for the love and light,
Touch the surfaces, rid them of cobwebs,
Thinking each time,
You would make a home here,
Somewhere that’s not your own.
You tell me you’ll rent me your love,
One rainy day, when you stretch
Your hand across that table.
Your warmth singes me,
Scorches me with base desire,
I pack hurriedly and reach your door,
Only to find, you rent out rooms one by one,
Unravelling themselves to others like onion skins,
Each layer piling on another,
Your heart cleverly hidden somewhere,
Your mind recklessly close, curiously distant.
There is no rent agreement,
I don’t know what this love
Will cost me, or how deeply
Will it bleed my savings.
You tell me I can live comfortably in one,
For a few days,
While you empty the rooms downstairs,
For they are cramped with angry furniture,
Baleful of careful angst,
Stowed with doubt,
Where desire peeks like a rat,
Nibbling on my toes,
And leaves them bleeding.
Your love is like a maze,
Frayed, worn carpets everywhere,
Libraries of dust gathering thoughts,
Mulling like old, old wine.
Each day, a new passage opens for me,
But shuts me out so soon,
That I don’t know how long I have,
Or where to keep my thoughts,
My pots, my sketches, my books.
They’re all over, and nowhere close.
My things are much in disarray
As I am, in your curated rooms,
That look staid outside,
And calm inside,
But cautiously dissipate each day.
- Rented Love - April 7, 2025
