Nibbled Edges of Infinity (A Rat’s Elegy for Shelved Time) #BlogchatterA2Z #poetry

Once upon a hush,
in a kitchen where the curry sang louder than memory,
we were young.
Life baked itself in aluminium foils of possibility.
Steam rose like dreams,
saffron-laced, cumin-kissed,
and we—
we spilled ourselves
into bowls of sunlit hours,
eating tomorrow with our bare hands.

We were unafraid.
Of rats.
Of ruin.
Of God.
Of shelf.

Now, now the larder groans in twilight,
and a rat comes nightly—
his tail a question mark,
his eyes two punctuation holes
in the sentence of forgetting.

He comes,
not for food,
but for history—
crumbs of who we were
when the window was still open
and the fan sang lullabies
instead of murmuring decay.

He tiptoes across the spice jars
like a poet dodging responsibility.
Turmeric smears his soul.
Chili seeds puncture his paws.
He writes graffiti with his claws
on glass jars:
"Mortality lives here."

Once upon a yesterday,
our dreams didn't smell like mothballs.

**

We made fuss,
not war.
Maneuvered challenges like trapeze artists
drunk on ambition.
The rat watched.
He was there,
behind the clock,
inside the wall,
listening to the loud symphony of our youth
like a tired god
who’s heard every version of “I will change the world.”

And we?
We danced.
Naked in potential.
Wearing tomorrow like sequins.
Eternity?
That was for the grey-haired
and the slow-speaking.
We had youth:
our unlicensed miracle.

**

But now—
now the kitchen is quieter.
We wipe surfaces with vinegar and existential dread.
We line the shelves with camphor and second thoughts.
We spray peppermint oil like it’s cologne for lost resolve.
We bait traps with nostalgia
and catch echoes of our own footsteps.

The rat still comes.
He does not heed our prayers.
He is godless.
He is god.
He is the Ancient of Days
in a fur coat.

We call him pest.
He calls us past.
His tail flicks to a rhythm
older than our songs.

**

"How will we stand
before the Ancient of Days?"
you ask,
while sweeping flour from the floor
like brushing regret
off an old love letter.

We will stand,
knees wobbling,
hands stained with turmeric and memory,
holding a spoon
and a question:
"Did you taste the stew of your soul?"

He will ask,
"Did you keep the shelf clean?"
And we will lie—
like all good humans do—
say yes, yes, we tried.
We laid traps.
We made noise.
We disinfected silence.

But the rat knows.
He’s chewed through our defenses.
Gnawed at the veneer of denial.
Made confetti of our calendars.

**

Each night,
he climbs the shelf of time,
between the pickles and the old steel tins.
He finds stories.
He eats them.
One bite for the day you forgot your mother’s birthday.
One for the friendship you ghosted.
Another for that poem you never wrote.

You see,
this isn’t a rat.
It’s consequence
with whiskers.

And the shelf?
It is not wood.
It is your life—
stacked, shelved, sealed,
half-empty jars of what could have been.

**

Once,
we were young.
Now,
we chase shadows
with disinfectant and desperation.

He scurries.
We scold.
He hides.
We post traps on Instagram.

We are foolish,
armed with ultrasonic wisdom.
Plugged into denial.
We measure the distance
between dusk and garlic
and call it progress.

The rat writes sonnets
with droppings.

You do not read them.
You sanitize them.

**

Listen—
this is not a warning.
It is an elegy.

You do not fight the rat.
You befriend him.
Offer him crumbs of awareness.
Whisper stories of who you once were
into the shelf,
where he listens.

Not to trap,
not to steal,
but to remember.

He is your keeper.
Your reminder.
The twitch in your conscience.

**

So when the Ancient of Days
opens his ledger,
he will not ask about your trophies.
He will ask:

“Did you let the rat teach you?”

Did you learn from his silent sermons?
Did you stop sealing every crack in your soul
and listen?

Did you understand
that even in decay,
there is devotion?

**

Life was simple, free, and good.

Now,
life is nibbled.
Life is rat-bitten.
Life is fragile tins of meaning
stacked in alphabetical hope.

You can trap him.
Sure.
You can drown him in garlic water.
Fill holes with steel and scripture.
But he will return.

Because he is not a rat.

He is your memory.
He is your sin.
He is your yesterday.
And he wants you to stop pretending
you can sanitize the past.

**

So when you mop the shelf tomorrow,
leave a crumb.
Not for him.
For you.

A reminder
that once upon a time
you were young,
and life was laid out before you
like a feast you didn't finish.

And now,
most of your time is behind you—
but not all.

Even rats know
how to return
for what matters.

#Poetry #SymbolicRat #MemoryAndMortality #LifeAndDecay #ThresholdOfTime

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