Hujan di Tengah Kemarau

Kopi hitam di hadapanku merengek mengharap perhatianku. Sesekali kuaduk hingga isinya meruah. Tak apa, curahannya tak sampai mengotori taplak meja. Tujuanku ke sini bukan untuk menyesap minuman kesukaanku.

Hari ini ia minta bertatap pukul 5. Aku tidak menolak; tidak mau munafik bahwa aku juga merindu. Jarum menit di arlojiku memberitahuku bahwa ia terlambat 28 menit. Cuaca hari ini sedang baik. Mungkin lalu-lintas saja yang sedang tak apik. Alih-alih bersungut dan angkat kaki, aku melempar pandangan ke hal lain untuk mengulur waktu. Aku benar-benar ingin bersua.

Usia kami terpaut jauh. Namun entah apa yang membuat percakapan antara kami mengalir tanpa rintangan. Mungkin aku dapat merasuk ke labirin di dalam dirinya. Mungkin juga sebaliknya.

Tak lama ia datang dengan koper kecil dalam jinjingannya. Peluh mengalir di durjanya. Senyumnya tersugging, peliknya sirna tak kasat mata. Tentunya ia meminta maaf karena datang terlambat. Dan tentunya aku menerima maafnya karena sejujurnya aku tak peduli. Raganya sudah hadir merengkuh jiwaku.

Kami membasuh; saling mengobati rindu yang meradang di kalbu. Mataku sebak dibuatnya. Tak paham bagaimana cara dirinya mencipta teduh di tengah kalut. Tetapi semua ini terbilang semu. Kami berdua tahu, pada akhirnya hari akan terlampau malam, sigaret di atas meja kami akan menjadi nihil, dan Cafe Batavia akan menyudahi harinya.

Malam ini akan sama dengan malam-malam lainnya. Kami akan memberikan kecupan sebagai buah tangan sebelum berparak dan menutup hari. Ia akan berkata bahwa jika mampu ia menggugus bintang lebih lama lagi untuk bersemuka, jika harus mendaga jagad, maka tentu akan ia tunaikan. Namun sama seperti malam-malam lainnya, langkahnya akan bergegas melaju menguntal janggal. Kami berdua tahu, ada bani Hawa yang risau yang sedang menanti raganya kembali.

Tergamam

Puan di ujung malam mengulum prahara
Berdzikir ingin mengubah takdir
Atau hanya menggumuli kemelut hati
Remang melahap setiap potongannya
Sebelum sisa-sisanya dimuntahkan
Lalu dituntut untuk merengkuh rasa
//
Mau dibawa ke mana amarah dirinya?
Rasa bersalah dalam benaknya
Perlu tempat untuk merumah
Di manapun, apapun kecuali dirinya
Di semesta atau kembali ke Pencipta
//
Munajat yang tak kunjung mangkus
Dimaklumi sebagai kurang-Nya
Barangkali tangan-Nya tak cukup besar
Mendekap seluruh bani di muka semesta
//
Tetapi puan hanya keliru
Tuhan hanya sedang menjadi pengampu
Tentang bagaimana memeluk tanpa terkeluk

Tempest

The rain did pour today. The weather forecast turned out to be accurate. But frankly, checking it wouldn’t be necessary. I already figured the drizzle would fall upon my head and made my hair damp.

I’ve been holding it since I shifted from my long slumber. My chest feels sore, my throat ached, as if there’s some form of whimsical feeling that needed to be released. Perhaps it grew tired of hiding behind the smile and hilarity.

And it happened. The tears seeps out to my cheeks whilst the rain descends helplessly on my roof. Breathing becomes an arduous thing to do. I didn’t put it in halt. Letting it show its brittle shape.

I always believe that we human are a fragment of something so tremendous. A collection of puzzle pieces that complete each other when they perfectly arranged. It might disclosed why the weather and I move in sync.

But perhaps it was because the rain season prompted the air drops to fall.

Maybe human ceaselessly disheartened me to the point where my heart is too jaded to cradle the anguish.

Still and all, I regard, the possibility is there.

Insomniac Dreamer

Ever since I was a little girl, I have always been the person who finds falling asleep is a difficult thing to do. A night owl, they would say. Sounds very enchanting but in reality, it’s far than that. Knowing your body is weary but your head never stops doing mind-tricks to you is burdensome. Formerly I assumed it was the side effect of moving from one place to another too often, since my family grew fond of changing their environment. But it wasn’t it. I didn’t want to claim to have any form of sleeping disorder. All I know was I had to have a good night sleep for I had to go to school in the morning after. It wasn’t something that I pleased to exercise, to be quite fair. But I knew that just simply putting my uniform in the dawn would help to put a smile on my parents’ faces. So that was what I did.

I was determined to find any ways to help me with my sleeping problems. That was the time I discovered yoga and started doing it every afternoon. I got hooked in aromatherapy candles and teas. Most of the time it’s chamomile, but sometimes it’s lemon balm, or lapsang souchong. I discovered sounds that could alleviate my complication. One of it is Symphonies of the Planets by NASA; a quite long recording of the sound of each planets in the solar system. If you gave it a listen, you might say that it was eerie and bewildering. But that, along with the rest, helped me sometimes. That was before I prescribed myself with sleeping pills.

My parents despised the fact that their youngest daughter depend her sanity to sleeping pills. But one thing that my parents didn’t notice (and I assured not to tell them) was the fact that sleeping pills has rested the ceiling on my bedroom. I was pretty convinced it grew stale of seeing me tossing my body from one side to another. Another thing about it was it helped me to calm the endless tidal waves inside me. It took quite a while for it to function. But once it got inside your vessels, you’ll fall asleep faster than a speed of sound. Another marvelous thing about it was it never gave me dreams. For me, sleep has always been some form of getaway from this horrid world we live in. I wanted the episode to be as close as a dead faint.

Years gone by and I somehow got accepted in a university that wasn’t on my list. But I went nonetheless. I was a single rider; living on my own and depending myself on my own two feet. Everything got more and more difficult; sleeping and the attempt to go to sleep. I was required to finish piles of assignments and deadlines. I didn’t have time for yoga anymore. I stopped spending my money on my favorite teas and Diptyque, even sleeping pills, only able to spend it on food and packs of cigarettes as my company for the sleepless nights. It wasn’t the healthiest habit, I’m fully aware of that.

As a matter of fact, I always wanted to adopt a stray kitten or dogs as my company in my small boarding house. But that is something I couldn’t do. If I’m too desperate to act on it, I’m certain that I’ll often find my eyes and skin turned red before it got swollen. Followed with my airways become inflamed and soon I’ll find it hard to breathe. On these kinds of events, I sometimes consumed antihistamine to ease the symptoms as soon as possible. Some people didn’t know that antihistamine could make you feel drowsy and as soon as you realized, you already find yourself in a deep sleep; forgetting the fact that you just had an allergic reaction that could nearly kill you. So maybe one day you might see me embracing stray animals or voluntarily asked you to clean your dusty room. Maybe on days like that, I just want to rest in peace.