Teenage Crushes

It wasn't until I first spoke to you,
That I started to worry about impressions,
And even expressions.
I knew from the beginning,
words were my Forte.
But it was you, the reason why I pursued it.

I don't think you'll remember or recollect,
I don't even know if you'd even noticed
How the silent and bookish kid in the class
Suddenly started to act different.
They say, teenage crushes are a thing of fancy
But for me, the impetus for transformation.

Three years of self imposed distancing
And ten years after,
Here we are today, laughing at the mockery
I had made of myself trying to impress you.
From a school time crush to a friend,
Someone who I treat as an extended family,
We have indeed come a long way.

Seasonal Friends

What do you do with books
That you have read once,
But no longer interests you
For a second time?

You keep them at the darkest corner
Of your shelf, left to bite dust,
Sometimes the termites feed of them
But you'd not really care.

Tell me why would you worry,
About someone who was seasonal?
And never quite had a reason,
To be forever?

Haven't we all heard,
People do change, like seasons?
Have we seen the winter halt?
Not paving the way for spring?

Cut those strings of attachments out
For its only drowning you in memories,
Occasional friends don't stay longer
Race ahead for the forever ones are waiting.

Proposal

Do you remember the time
From our school days,
Where we went onto the stage
How I stood on my knee,
Extending my hand towards you,
The imaginary ring that my hand held.
The shimmer in your eyes that day,
As the audience clapped and
Curtains came down.

Here we are at it again, today,
Only that it is not an enactment.
I wonder how do I profess my love to you,
For all the words I know
Won't be enough.
I knew your answer from the shine
In your eyes even before you uttered a word,
As I silently promised myself
To keep it shining forever.

Wishes

Between the lonely summer evenings and daunting winter nights, I do wish to be able to love again. To fall in love with someone, again. To be able to embrace them without fear of breaking apart yet again. It's so easy to break apart, but think of building yourself back from that. It's almost like moving a mountain. It makes me wonder if I'd rather be in the resounding silence of my room than to be drowning in pain and agony when time flies. Breaking apart is almost like withering away; pieces of what you once were, falling apart. What a daunting task it'd be to reconstruct yourself, after all that you have gone through!

Him & Her

All of the world's fictional stories would yet fail to contain the drama that real life holds. There is way too less that you could put in words compared to what happens in the grand stage of life. We are all nothing but mere pawns, in the hands of the greatest player ever, Time!*
How futile of us is it to try and hold on to time? To the past, to the grief. Time goes past us. We grow older; and then comes a moment when time would freeze. Death. Death, probably, would be the greatest liberators in this world.
I wonder how incredibly lonely would be that moment when you die. All your lives moments flashing through your mind, your eyes moist, of joy or may not. But knowing that your time has time. Would you regret the one life that you lived? Or would you smile and welcome it?
Death must indeed be so beautiful, to listen to the sound silence, to have no yesterdays, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace*

*1 - Quoted from the book "The Place of Illusions"
*2 - Quoted from Oscar Wilde.

Burial

How did it go the last night?
I only remember waking up with a headache. You probably left long before.

I don't seem to recollect what brought us together again. I remember us sitting down near the fireplace, ordering our drinks, one after the other.

I don't remember what I said. Nor do I remember what I heard. But I do get asked; in fact, a lot more than that I ever anticipated. Why do I still remember everything about us.

I must confess, the only thing that went in my mind was two years were enough to start all over again.

I must also thank myself for not spilling it out. Sure, I could have blamed it on the alcohol, but you, you would hear the unheard, understand the unsaid.

Today I can just bury it deep in my mind as an after thought of recollection of the past. Nothing more.

Memories

Balconies that have metal grills - I don't how why these structures often remind me of you. The reflections aren't even pleasant. It casts a shade of blue and melancholy over my mind. My thoughts start to wander about you, about us. Is it representative of my own grief about missing you or is it my imagination of the struggles that you have been through. I think of you every time I see these structures, build on cinder blocks and metal and it has me in splits. Were you supposed to be a painful regret or a beautiful memory? What if everything we built together was built on lies? What if the foundation of our dreams were mere lies that you made up? But then I ask myself, could tears be bogus and laughter, could the eyes sparkle in deceit.

Let's Talk

Let's talk. Over the years, if i have realised one thing about people, it is that they are not looking for a solution when they speak to you about their troubles. They only need someone to listen to their pain. Most people when they open up, are expecting you to be a good listener. They don't need your sympathy.
Empathise if you must. Be there for one another. Depression has taken more lives than necessary already. Be there for someone who needs a listener. Be patient and Kind. Empathise.
Trust me. It doesn't feel alright a bit. You start to question your own existence when you are fighting depression. Talk. Find Time. Open up. Give an ear to your friends, family, that random stranger even. Be kind. We all have that one extra minute of time in our lives yo save someone. To brighten someone's life.

Let's talk.
You will wonder,
About what.
How about nothingness,
Void, desolation and fear.

Dreams, poetry and books.
The drunken nights.
Awkward conversations
The tiring hangover
Our adulation with drugs.

About the scary nights
That you covered your face
Under your pillow, crying
Pondering the why's and what's of life.
The loneliness that you felt.

About how you felt,
Uncertain, chaotic and suicidal
Let's talk about the fears.
The thoughts that shatter your nights
The screams that echo in your dreams.

Let's talk.
About those elderly hands
Wandering down your baby thighs
The uneasiness, the sugar coated warning.
Nobody else should know.

The realization of what that meant,
Years later, after you grew up.
The lump in your throat,
The unshed tear in your eyes
The anger that you hide.

How about those days that
You lived within the confines
Of your own closet.
Eluding social contact,
Never seeing the light.

Let's talk.
About that went in your mind.
Society, isolation and stigma.
Words that never came out,
Tears that rolled down.

Let's talk.
About that one horrific train ride
To home.
Where everything would be fine,
Yet seems unfamiliar to you now.


Let's talk.
No. Not immediately.
Take your time.
All of it.
I have abundance of time.

How about we take a long walk,
Or may be go to the corner tea shop
And unshackle our minds,
Thoughts pouring out.
I promise to listen.

Trust me I know how it feels.
Its been my struggle too.
Remember what I promised.
No matter what time of the day,
I'll listen with all my heart.

I have time.
Abundance of it.
For someone else too had time
When I sought them out.
When I cried myself out.

Him and Her

I don't remember the last time
I looked at the sky in such awe.
A starry night, did a comet flyby?
I did wish upon it as it was 11:11.

I hadn't met you since long.
And here I am today.
At your doorstep.
Taking you out for the dinner.

The way your laughter sounds
When I confess the truth
That I've been awestruck
By your eyes, since years.

The walk across the empty beach
Lonely, yet in the company of eachother.
We do not talk, neither hold hands.
You watch the waves kiss the sand.

I look at you, your childlike enthusiasm
The way your runaway from the waves
After writing our names in the sand.
That night was indeed long.

I have been asked many times
What is it that I feel for you.
I have no answer to say,
But I know that we are not meant to be.