Odds and Ends

 

My fingers tangle and fumble with the frayed edge of my jeans

I want to talk about the cold beer I had on a Sunday afternoon, as the news yelled at me
About the girl who cried for help and the men around her who held their phones up to capture that moment
But I finish the bottle and commented politely how lovely the meal was
Because that's what one does and so it's what I do
Even tonight as the words swim behind my eyes because I'm afraid if I start speaking I won't be able to stop them from escaping me like an overflowing sink

I want to tell you how the sky turns pinkish orange, a delicate petal soft above me when I go home everyday and how
I think about the accordion player, the one I'm sure I've told you about
The one who I can't stop thinking about, a little like you
A little
Glaring detraction from the routine of my life, so manicured and organised into tiny calendar boxes of purple, yellow and blue

I want to mention how when I drive down to the middle of nowhere, the electric wires criss cross and coalesce in those large metal towers,
That always looked like the origami guidelines in my yellow notebook, knotted and flimsy lines across the sky, a mess against the dry brazen countryside

But I think about how many little nothings I have whispered into the dark, met with silence and indifference
That I gather these words and moments and silences, trap them in my chest
I can sometimes hear them rattle in my ribcage, like loose change in a pocket, the stuff you don't know where to put but can't get rid of
And I know I'm made of that stuff, those in-between things and moments and silences and I wish I were whole

Except who am I when I'm not scared? when you brush my hair from my face do you see the headlights reflected in my eyes
I'd rather look away, pull at these stray threads, that don't belong, ripping them out, say something half witty and sit as still as I can
Because if I can't talk about it, wouldn't want a rattle to give me away

I've spun a yarn around myself as

a system of being

the threads along my veins

knotting in my hair

wrapped around my limbs.

No, don't pull that thread
you might unravel me
I'm held together by flimsy knots and stitches.

Over time,

I've learned to look at the yarn from afar:
darned the patches that have worn out
embellished the parts I found beautiful

tightened the strings where I'm falling apart.

I'm weaving with all my strength to become.

But every new stitch feels like a noose,

choking me as I come to life -- 

as though the only way to create this cloth is with
my fingers bleeding as I weave myself together.

24

 

Twenty-four

I'm beginning to recognise who I am in the mirror

No longer faded 

No longer jaded

Not perfect

Not unforgettable

An evolving moving image 

Flickering as I 

Balance 

what I want 

with what I can have

Twenty four

Nearing the mid mid-twenties

Alone, single, smart, successful --

Or so I'm told.

I'm happy.

The words taste strange on my tongue.

Is this happiness?

The ability to find loneliness

In the middle of a pushing crowd of emotion

To taste it's bittersweetness

Feel its goosebump inducing chill

And embrace it in the dark night

The night:

When everything looms larger 

As though under a towering magnifying glass;

Wraps me in a cold blanket hug

It still scares me

It still isolates me

It still scatters my thoughts in a million directions

Grains of rice spooling through my fingers

Seemingly multiplying in the dark

The day:

A harsh bright light

Laughing at the insecurities the night cultivates

A splash of cold water for the sleepy

A cup of coffee for the hungover

Twenty four

I balance the night and the day

Precariously

Finding my footing

Clumsy landings and muddled form

A half-formed person

Flickering image.

Open Letter To The One Who Broke My Heart

I like the colour purple.
I remember when I was younger and
my parents had all these plastic glasses for me to drink from
because I couldn't drink from glass
and the steel ones were too big
but anyway there was a purple one
and I thought it was lucky
so purple became my colour.
I bet you didn't know that.
You know how on your palm
every person has three defined lines?
I only have two on my right,
but I know you never noticed
even when we'd hold hands every day
our thumbs tracing patterns on our skin
but you weren't looking.
I'm sure you also don't know
that I've never watched Titanic
or drunk a drop of milk
that when I climb steps it's always
my right foot on uneven numbers
my left on even numbers
that I have trypophobia
and hate wet grass.

And you know what
I don't actually mind
see, I didn't expect you to notice
I needed to feel needed and that was enough
I needed someone to hold and that was enough
and you did that for me, you were enough.
so what I'm saying is
I broke my heart on my own
when I realized it would never be enough.

Identity Rambles

Welcome ladies and gentlemen and everyone on the spectrum, to what I would like to call my literacy of un-identity. You see, through trying to understand myself, I've lost my way further. “This is the entire essence of life: "Who are you? What are you?” Tolstoy said. It's a very simple question I begin with then- who am I? And really, if you could help, please let me know who this godforsaken “Tvara” is.

Is it the “me” who learnt every word of the French national anthem before the Indian? Or maybe the one who would choose a good "tair saadam" (curd rice) or “rasam” and rice as my comfort food?

Confused as yet? So am I. But I’ll try to explain.

Sometimes I feel like I'm just there: an annoying pebble in the boot kind of there. It's a feeling that's hard to shake off, like bruises on my skin. Not a wound that cuts through skin and bleeds and makes itself felt, but the tiny throbbing bruise that is only felt when pressed. The purplish ochre stains take weeks to fade, and so does this feeling. It's like you're on the edge, your toes caressing the line that you can't make yourself cross. And so you stand there, outside looking in at life. Like you came too late and couldn't buy a ticket and so you're an observer from all the way at the gates.

Except how do you miss a ticket to life when you're a:
living (ha),
breathing (smog),
human (we like to think so don't we?)
being.

That’s what I feel like. I’ve missed some crucial information about life, on how to figure out who I am. It’s like a game of catch up all the time. My country today is a place where only being of a certain religion and caste is properly accepted. Diversity has taken a backseat. It’s a strange space for someone like me. But what’s funny is that it was never a comfortable space to begin with.
I guess it all starts with my family, and while Freud smiles on, no one can deny that that is where it all begins always.

The history of my family is like a blanket,
made of a
thin,
fine
material.
Completely see through.
The blanket covers me,
creates a lens through which
the world sees me
and I see the world.
But what it is exactly, I think I’ll never know.

All my life I have had this feeling of in-betweenness, the sense of not belonging in any one space. It’s like being invited to every group but never really being a part of or accepted in any. I think the only thing I’ve known are grey areas, or these places I don’t feel like I quite belong.

Piecing these parts together my whole life was impossible. How do you mix oil and water? Catch a wave upon the sand? I don’t feel as dramatic as the Sound of Music song, but as a seven year old I could actually relate to the trouble the nuns had understanding who Maria was supposed to be. Can I be a moonbeam that can be caught in the hand? Because “it takes a lot to wrest identity out of nothing” and I don’t have much to go off on, or perhaps it’s such a confused space it doesn’t feel clear.

Krishnamurti said, “You might think you're thinking you're own thoughts. You're not. You're thinking your cultures thoughts.” But if my own culture’s thoughts aren’t clear or in any way binary, what are they? And are they enough for me to be creating my own identity?

Yesterday

yesterday was good
yesterday we held hands
and walked down the street,
and had cheap beer
with cheaper pizza
yesterday we watched a movie
i don't remember which one
i think the boy ends up with the girl
and the best friend was smart
but that could be any movie
anyway yesterday we saw the sunset
the smoke of our cigarettes
mixing with the marmalade clouds
and as it got dark
drove down the empty roads
while i sang at the top of my lungs
as i always do

but of course
that was yesterday
and as all clichés go
it left, walked out the door
leaving a metallic taste in my mouth
as today walked in
dressed in greys
and a sad smile on its lips

Blind

i wish i could tell you i was okay
and that the words slide off my back
that this feeling doesn't
blind me
choke me
cutting air and light from my life
i wish i was somehow
as strong as i pretend to be
as though if I closed
my eyes and fists tight enough
i'd be indestructible
i wish i could make conversation
and be that
funny girl
smart girl
artsy girl
honestly any girl
but also not stand out
and feel the gazes and looks
that rake my skin
in my head it sounds like
a nail scratching glass
it's a confused space
to feel people talking around you
and convincing yourself they think
you aren't smart, or funny, or interesting
they probably don't even like you
and in the next second
convince yourself that your insignificance
is now so monumental
it casts shadows across the floor
and the darkness covers you
but only you of course

Fire and Ashes

Your presence is like drinking honey-fire. It tastes sweet and strong. It burns, scorching my mouth and throat, coating my lips. It's liquid fire and fills my veins fast. My body tingles with the warmth, and I'm sure I glow. 

And when you leave, all that's left are ashes and the smell of smoke. The only reminder that I was here, that I lived, that I breathed. The remainders of me and the ruins of my body. 

But if I could, I'd do it over: drink you in like the parched soil drinks in the first monsoon. Because my strength and my weakness are one and the same. I love to burn.

Gentle

The silence envelopes me
like a comfortable blanket.

You know the one
the one your mother puts away
in the cupboard for the winters.
It smells
like mothballs
like the memories of a year ago.
The cloth is gentle on your skin,
a soft carress
a lingering kiss
of everything that's been.

There's a fullness to soundlessness.
All the unsaid words
unshed tears
come out to play
as soon as the hectic sounds of the city
turn the street corner and vanish
with the dying rays of the run.

Away from
the crowds
the noise
the hands
the eyes
the "why don't you talk more"s.
This is my favourite time.

Beauty

On days when the weather is beautiful like this: cloudy and comfortably cold, she wishes she didn't have to be here. She wants to run barefoot , grip the beach with her toes so she doesn't fly away, leave footprints that will only last a second. Wind in her hair, salt on her lips, sand on her skin- she feels one with the sea, with all her crashing waves and heady foam. She is the sea.

Unphased by her unruly appearance, she is uninhibited and open. The acne scars fade away and the undimpled cheeks glow- the smile that isn't worth a million dollars makes the waves break.

It is beautiful in the way naked joy is. Unfiltered. Unchecked. A beauty that is so rare it slips through your fingers like sand. That if you held too tight in your fists would leave imprints on your skin- red, naked and raw.

Patterns

Your words bruise me
And stain my skin
A dirty purple, with a tinge of ochre
Patterns, which that artist,
The one we studied in art
Who dropped paint on a blank canvas
Bringing stories to life,
Exactly like those.

Your words litter the air around us
Each one a sound wave
Sticking to the surfaces
And then to my skin
Like I said before:

The purple and ochre patterns.

The ones I can't scrub off.

Poetry

Sit here. Hear me out. No, I'm fine, thanks.

Don't you feel like poetry some days? When the moonlight paints over everything? Your every breath is art.

It's weird, I feel happy yet sad. I feel pain and am happy about it. I feel joy and am sad about it. Like any moment I could burst into laughter or tears.

Hold my hand, I'll walk you through it. Just us two.

No, I'm not drunk.

Somehow the world is in different colours, but everything is still so familiar. Familiar like your collarbones or the smell of cookies, but incompatible too.

No, don't interrupt, I don't need help.

It's only a surrealist's paradise. Everything ebbing away, yet getting clearer, less vague. I feel in love. Not with anyone. Just that happy feeling. Like everything is right in the world. That careless happiness tinged with sadness like an afterthought.

I know, I know, you say this feeling won't last. But look. I understand "fundamentally unhappy human being" all too well. You've pointed out yourself how I can be.

So on those rare occasions when I feel like poetry, like art, like music: please don't burst that bubble. My happiness comes in slivers like the crescent moon. And when I share that with you, I trust that when you hold my thin, fragile happiness in your hand, you won't snap it as you so easily could. I trust you to treat me gently. For poetry is fragile like that.

Home

We pace the familiar hallways, smiling absentmindedly. There's nowhere to go really, but why stop walking?

Our lives are neatly arranged two storey bungalows. Some have large porches. Some have a backyard overgrown with weeds. Some have beautiful flowers on the dining table, while others have papery curtains dancing in the wind. The music we play changes, evolves.

And so we grow and change. As do the paintings and vases that break all the time. A tap and bulb are changed so often you lose track, and we make our lives as we go, with new carpets and old cushions.

People walk in and some stay forever. Most walk in and soon leave.They outgrow their seat at the sofa. Their feet curled under them is no longer comfortable. The tea that was once perfect is too sweet. They've outlived their stay. Sometimes they leave silently and there's no rupture to the quiet calm of the house. Others slam the door behind them, shaking you, leaving you perturbed. The sound doesn't go for a while, the empty spot on the sofa yells out.

But eventually the ringing of the slammed door hushes and the wind-chimes are heard once more. The seat is taken by a pet, or perhaps another person walking through. But I guess that's life.

Bad at Math

What do I want? I'm not sure. It's hard to keep count of the things you want when you're bad at math. I don't know exactly what I expect. From you, from myself, from the world. I just know it's never enough.


It's like we live in the shadows, afraid of the sun. And I do admit I have often found calm and comfort in the dark. But can that be living? Isn't it human to feel, and to feel fully? I don't want half measured glasses of gin, or incomplete moments. It's the little things, we say, with bright smiles.

I want to be able to fall fully and hard. To cry wholeheartedly. To fall down, scrape my knees and keep going. I want my hair to be a mess from long bike rides, and my fingers to smell of cigarettes always one too many.

"Aren't you afraid of getting hurt?"

Of course I am, but god, I'm more afraid of not living.