midnight maze

you're the kind of guy who'd take me to see the world,
but we can't go before i show you home,

streets alight with swinging lights,
winding lines and coloured umbrellas,
shadowed faces, side by side, and where
no one matters but us.

we'd stop by a vendor, and take a drink,
cold and condensing carelessly,
mine a soursop ice blend and you get lychee,
because you're predictable, like that.

there's dust, flying up from the uneven road,
sweet meat's smoke, swirling and scented with spices,
fleshy fruit, cut open and raw, mouthwatering,
the smell of the night, musky and heated and subtle.

we'd buy satay and eat while we walk;
the night won't wait for our lunch break,
succulent meat and cool as a cucumber,
snowy rice cubes and greasy fingers entwining anyway.

flip-flops fill with grating gravel,
mosquitos bite braille up our legs,
and the stars are a map in morse,
blinking us a way out of this midnight maze,

back to a carpark, hondas all in a row,
and we have a nissan, now, so
turn the air-con up high,
as this gets pulled back from the surface of our skin.

you can show me the world,
but i can show you home.


note: 
pasar malam : malaysia night markets.