write and wrong

it's been three days of no rain.

no messages from the sky, just a lot of wind knocking against doors, windows, spilling flowers in vases.

where are you? i only shut my eyes for two seconds and found you gone. i looked everywhere but there were no clues to find you. i've worried and cried and wondered, and finally ended up buying more flowers, as if that were the only cure to anger.

i will make any promise that you would want me to keep, if you'll come back.

no, i've understood now. i'll write you a thousand lines of poetry. i know that will bring you back.
and i'm starting right now.  here goes the cold water...

i woke up when i felt your breath in my ear.
my eyes refused to open, fearing a broken dream.
i felt your hands roam around my body,
as if it were but the first time.
i turn around as you brush my hair
away from my neck, to welcome your lips.
i smile, and i swear it was not a plan.
the sun was peeking through the shadows,
excited to watch you kiss my hips,
my knees, my shoulders, my breasts.
he was unable to contain his joy
and rose to shine in all his glory
just as i feel you inside me.
my eyes remained closed, i promise
from the moment you breathed down on me,
till you lit the fire inside me.
and now, every time i close my eyes
i can feel you in the depths of me. 

We

loving you

is

like a blind man

feeling the words

do not touch. 

bad ideas

there is a girl who is following me around everywhere. she looks a lot like me, but she isn't me. she wasn't always there, but it's been a while since i've noticed her. she seems to be like an alternate version of me, veering either towards an evil twin or a better version of me.

i have been slowly trying to shake her off, but the more i notice her, the more invisible she becomes. she isn't me, but seems to enjoy doing things that i like to do, and saying things that i would say. i've noticed she also sometimes says things that i don't say. like, the other day, she called someone a motherfucker. that's not a very nice thing to say, is it? she also blatantly told someone that she wants to kiss him. now who says something like that?

somedays, she starts crying uncontrollably. sobbing through entire playlists and i cannot understand why. one night, i even saw her with a razor blade in her hand, just staring at it like a psychopath. the very next day, i remember observing her with a child, laughing and playing and baby-talking to the kid, as if there is just no connection between one day and the next.

she seems to like drinking and smoking and driving around late at night. she seems to think it's ok to be fat and uncaring because apparently, there isn't a single reason to be otherwise. she seems to live in a fantasy world, forging needle-thin, superficial relationships with everyone around her, that wouldn't withstand even a strong breeze, forget storms. she seems to believe it's okay to lie. and thinks it is okay to not answer messages like "where are you?", and "have you reached home". i'm beginning to think she mocks me and imitates me sometimes.

she can't seem to make a decision, and never really follows through with the ones she makes. she cannot seem to choose between now and then and later, and lives in a void of uncountable days of heartbreak. yes, i know what heartbreak looks like on a person.

somedays, she cannot even recall what she did the day before. one day, i saw her wearing my jewellery. i'm sure it was mine because i wouldn't dare wear the ring he gave me just before he broke my heart.

i cannot talk to her, so i never got a chance to ask. she seems to also have taken certain liberties with the way she works and talks and walks, as if she owns the world and anyone who thinks otherwise can basically go take a fuck.

late evenings, i've seen her vulnerable and sad. it looks like she has no one to have a cup of tea with. of course, i cannot offer to spend time with her because she scares me. she seems so much like me but everything about her is completely opposed to who i am. she looks and talks and eats and laughs like me; she even dances like me. but...she can't really be me....right?

renewal of nows

i still remember the night when i had the revelation. i was suddenly aware that it hurt to be apart from you. i had started to look forward to our meetings more than ever, i had started dressing for you, making sure i kept a marie-kondo'ed house, washed my hair more often, and had started reading all sorts of things to make sure we had something to laugh about. and, oh your laughter! i realised how it warmed me up inside to see you laugh. i had started thinking about you all the time, and was making up fantasies about our life together. i used to smile at the marks you left on my body, priding myself on the passionate moments we spent together, that had me begging for more. i remember getting your name inked into my soul, so i could always carry you around. i had learnt the recipes to your favourite dishes so that i may make them for you some day. i had created a playlist of all your favourite songs, and i even learnt the words to some of them. i had started to think fondly of rainy days and sunset and drinks on the beach. i had even started writing poems about you...

i was not in love. i was in denial. 

anyway, that was then. and this is now. 

clarity

one dark blue night, all of a sudden, he asked her, "why do you love me?"

he couldn't think of any reason why she would love someone like him. she looked up at him, baffled. she couldn't think of any way to explain why he made her heart tingle. she mulled over it, trying to match words to feeling. but every phrase caught in her throat because it seemed so petty and just-not-enough. "i don't know...i can't really explain it", she replied after a much too long pause. both of them went to sleep a little disappointed, one for wanting too much and the other for not wanting enough.

the next day, he woke up to find her gone. he looked for her everywhere, but she was determined not to be found. sad and ashamed, she had left everything behind to go look for a way to explain her infinite love for him. sad and ashamed, he believed she had left because he was not enough. but because love stories never end badly, he took it as a sign to turn his life around, and be the best person she could ever love, should she ever return.

many moons later, he came home to find her back at the desk in front of the window. as she smiled at him, he asked her again, "do you now know why you love me?" this time, she knew better and stayed silent. she stood up and kissed him deeply, as if it were the first time. there were strangers once more, with their whole lives ahead of them, waiting to be discovered.

shakespeare once wrote about love not being true love if it alters when met with change. he couldn't have been more wrong. a man who doesn't change for a woman can never know how she transforms her soul to fit into his palm. and a woman who isn't changed after meeting a man will never understand the meaning of love.

circle of life

"did i say that i need you?
did i say that i want you?
oh, if i did, then i'm a fool, you see,
no one knows this more than me."

it's been a long while since i saw you. oh no, do not worry, i'm not keeping count of the days and the hours and the minutes. i'm not psychotic.

i was merely reminded of you this morning, when i saw the second toothbrush in the cup. and when i sprayed my perfume on my neck, or when i grabbed my umbrella just before rushing out the door. of course, that song which played on the radio in the car brought me thoughts of you as well, but that's expected i guess. and when i arrived at work, it started to rain, which could've just been a coincidence. i smoked a cigarette after lunch and i unconsciously passed it to you, but there was no one there. that hardly means i'm obsessive, does it?

the day went by like the clouds, slow and beautiful. and when the darkness poured in, i was offered a drink. now, i agree i could have had any drink on the menu, but then, the waiter was looking down at me impatiently and everyone else had made up their minds, and i blurted out the name of your favourite drink, as if seeking out the most intuitive comfort in a distressing situation. but that was intuition's fault, not mine. i gathered my wits in time for the second drink. but then, you know how they say you shouldn't mix your drinks...? And so, unfortunately, i ended up being quite drunk on you.

i returned home, surprisingly, at 3am. as i washed the day's effort off my face, i couldn't help but smile when i saw the toothbrush standing there, silently laughing at me. 

my favourite song

you can be the rain
and the thunder
and the storm
and the lightning,

but i am the darkness.
are you scared now?

you may be the sun
and the stars and the moon

but i am nirvana.
are you scared now?

you may be the tears
and the despair and the anger

but i am the hope.
are you scared now?

you may be the pain
and the longing and the belonging

but i am love.
are you scared now?

who do i think i am?

"till tomorrow, 
or till the end of time"

one night, the rain and i were at battle. he bore down at me, tired of my loneliness. i cried back, blaming him for making me believe in beauty. he thundered down, louder, drowning out my irrationality, unable to believe my stupidity.

"i'm here now, aren't i?", he shouted. 

suddenly, he left. i was furious, yelled at him to return, but i was answered only with silence. i couldn't stop my tears from falling, as if compensating for his absence. 

"where is he?!", i asked the trees and the stars and the skies. they look down at me sadly, commanded to silence by the rain god himself. 

i waited. long days and longer nights.
it was a new battle now; i wait and he watched me in silence. 

one night, as dark as the night we parted, he returned. i had no words to welcome him, and he asked no questions. he is the god of rain, after all; and who did i think i was?

"why?", i asked him, merely mortal.

he said nothing, knowing me to be the weak one. 

"why did you leave me?" 

"why did you believe i was here to stay?", he replied as he left. 

5 more minutes please

"the present tense is all we have" 

the most liberating thing in this world is to be able to not tell someone to stay. 

the rain beckons us outdoors, and then chases us inside. it cannot make up its mind. all the love songs are equally undecided. they beg us to sing along to the chorus, over and over again. then you realise you're sick of the song before the last verse. the skies put on a splendid show every evening until you don't even look up anymore. it took me all these years to understand this constant fight between wanting and not wanting. i should've listened when Emerson said, "adopt the way of nature. her secret is patience."

i am, tonight, more at peace than ever before. cryptic poetry has given way to prose, like uncomprehending pain has given way to happiness. a happiness born out of the ashes. a happiness that does not know the bounds of the real world. a happiness that needs no other. a happiness that propels me through the universe from the simple power of being able to let you go. 

i have learned to adopt the way of nature. her secret is now mine as well. 

i am in no hurry for you to come. or go. 

broken is beautiful

the japanese have a tradition they call kintsugi, where they use gold, silver or platinum powder mixed with lacquer to repair something that is broken. so the repaired piece becomes more beautiful than the original, and becomes a part of the object's beauty rather than render it useless or old. the "wounds" of the object thus become an integral part of its being, rather than something to be hidden.

our lives are constantly broken. by time, by thought, by mystery, by people and by grief. and nothing breaks you more than the unknown. every person i meet seems to be mortally afraid of being alone. better sad days than lonely days. better a bad movie than a quiet weekend. better a bad relationship than dinners alone with the wind. when did we all become so afraid of ourselves? do we not trust? is there no meaning anymore in the self? is the soul determined to wander confused and aimless because it was not taught how to love the self above all else?

in the 15th century, when kintsugi originated, it was rumoured that people became so enamoured with the art that they deliberately broke precious lacquerware so it may be repaired with strands of gold. wabi-sabi, a related Japanese concept talks about how you embrace the flawed and the imperfect, and how an object's brokenness simply becomes an event in its life, rather than the end of its journey.

you are the gold lacquer that has now filled the cracks in my soul. i am broken, but you have made me beautiful. i am alone, but you have taught me how to be happy. i am lonely, but i now know how to cherish it. you are the love that has repaired the thin fissures of my soul, and made me more beautiful than before.

later

"i can't live,
with or without you..."

i had a strange dream sometime ago. strange because i remember it even after all this time, and because the more i think about it, the less it seems like a dream.

i saw you. many many moments after we had parted, i saw you suddenly in the middle of a crowded place, late one weekend afternoon. i saw you, and you didn't see me. i watched you. you were smiling; the same smile that lights up the world around you. you were holding her hand, and she wouldn't let go. the tears rolled down her face, her hands scrunched around your finger, trembling and scared, wanting nothing more than to be in your arms and rest her head on your comforting shoulder. you hold her, her tears slowly fading. you lead her to a chair, sit down, put your arms around her and hug her as she slowly closes her eyes. she melts into you.

you look up and see me. time stops in its tracks, and the world stops turning. she isn't crying any more, but i can't seem to stop myself. tears break through my resolve, tears that defy the iron-clad rules of love, despite the smile on my face. you wave at me and smile. i smiled back, i promise i did. you beckon me to you, invite me to walk those thirty steps to you. i stand where i am, i wave and shake my head. no. we looked at each other, smiles on our faces, tears in our eyes and our souls on fire, burning down the entire universe. i stood where i was.

after what seemed like eternity, when the little one looked up at you, you tear your eyes away from me to pat her back to sleep. the spell was broken. you looked up again, and i was gone.

in my dreams, i swear, i did the right thing.

allow me

it's quiet. at last. nothing but the swish of the tree outside my window. and the crickets wishing each other good night a thousand times. because saying it once may not make it good enough.

i'm alone for the first time in seven days, after going over every deadly sin. thursday for sloth, friday for envy, saturday for pride, sunday for greed, monday for gluttony, tuesday for wrath and wednesday for lust. seven days of going from wanting to kill the self to feeding the soul. the trees and the water and the rocks and the sun tried to feed the hunger in my soul, while the smiles and the hugs and the laughter were slowly poisoning my blood.

strange observation that love is not one of the seven sins. suffice to say i would've been held guilty many times over, if it was. unrequited, unfulfilled, unnecessary love. i would need more than seven days of seven years to fall out of love. but it took me less than seven minutes to fall in love with you.

i am alone, at last. i have the night stretched out in front of me, in all its glorious, sexy self. waiting for me to stroke it and kiss it and thrust it to satisfaction. and whisper sweet nothings in its ear, so softly that even the stars will not overhear. because the bastard stars hear everything i say and remember everything i do.

and as i melt into the darkness, there is only thing i want, and only one thing i am grateful for:
i am alone, at least.

the unbreakable, innermost russian doll

second born. a name that starts with the second letter of the alphabet. woman. second thoughts. second choice. it seems my life is a strange phenomenon of two. always the second, not the first. average. not great, just good enough.

i sit in an almost empty house (thank goodness for my cat), on a quiet saturday afternoon, with the fan whirring at full speed the only noise i hear. the whirring is familiar, sounds like the thoughts in my head. i am sadly reminded that this year, i will be thirty years old. thirty years of a life led in the second person. a second person that lives in my head and constantly reminds me of the depressing truth. thirty years of a life, with nothing to show for it except money owed to banks and friends and family, work that seems insignificant the next day, friends that no longer remember me, broken relationships that were broken, strangely, because i could not fathom that the second is more important than the first. 

jokes about me taking my pills on time, and being bipolar and depressive seem all too real with every passing day. i stare at a wall, asking myself, or rather asking it if i am depressed after all. i sit on an imaginary abyss, hoping and praying someone or something would pull me back. either ways, i remain true to the hopelessly, disillusioned second person i am. 

someone once asked me, what makes me happy. i could not think of a single thing. either i am happy in a way that needs no reassurance, or i am unhappy enough to not want happiness at all. no matter how many quotes i pin on my board, how many paintings i make with reds and yellows, no matter how many poems i write, i cannot seem to fill this space that slowly becomes darker than the darkness i know and cherish. 

when people would ask me what i wanted in life, my answer was - i want only two things: to be thin and to be rich. years and years of wanting something has now become something that can either drown me once and for all, or be my only saving grace. every day is a struggle between making those two dreams come true, and wanting to give up dreaming altogether. i have either reached a stage of complete nirvana, where i want for nothing and no one wants me; or i am at the cusp of achieving greatness. i do not know. i used to revel in my solitude, protecting it and watching over it as if it were an only child. now, i am begging for a crutch. something, someone, some kind of solace that will make me want again. 

the second person in my head is shouting today. screaming and crying and pleading to be released. but she is hidden inside the smallest of the russian dolls. and all the walls i have built around me has trapped me in a maze that i cannot find a way out of. stone-cold-hearted, lying to myself every single day, smiling when i want to scream, crying in secret, resigning myself to second-best. no glory, no love, no kingdoms to torch for the sake of another, no more poems to write. even this note to the unknown is a second draft... 

and as the quiet gets quieter, i recognise the hidden truth, slowly emerging from the darkness. i must leave. again. a second time. leave this place that dulls my senses, blacks out my sky and injects despair into my bones. i must leave now. i must step away from the abyss, and trod against the darkness, no matter how comforting it is. but how? thirty years of a life spent trying to be happy, with nothing to show for it except uncountable poems about the darkness, and a growing fear of looking at myself in the mirror. either i continue living a lie, or i leave now. i think i'll choose option two. 

happy hour story

once upon a time,
it rained upon the world
for thirty three years
without respite.

and when the son came out again,
he knew his world had changed
forever.

time seemed to stand still,
and yet moved faster than before.
trembling hands now felt like warm heaven,
his lips seem to smile, with rhyme, without reason.
laughter burnt his throat more than liquor,
every day was more orange than the last,
and mere words seemed like song.

he tried to put things back in order, as before.
but the magic had seeped into the earth,
bursting in every tear drop,
rising up from the ashes in the ground,
twisting in the wind like broken conversations.

he couldn't dispel the wonder of the rain,
it was always all around him.
no matter how bright he burned,
it had turned his world into a looking glass.
his own splendor reflected in every inch of the universe,
finally showing him how to love himself.  

it took thirty three years of rain
to make the sun smile.

and everyday after that fateful day, he wondered
if he should thank the rain,
for knowing when to cry
and knowing when to stop.

new and delicious

I always send out a message 

to someone, before I take a flight. 

because, call me crazy, 

but everytime I or someone I know takes a flight, 

I imagine 

that's the last time I'm going to see them. 

so I'm always sending love to you

in case I never see you again