To Whomsoever Concerned

poetry | To Whomsoever Concerned

(on the Unifrom Civil Code)

I loved a boy who prayed to no God
His bones made of curiosity and eyes rippling with awe
His blood celled of kindness and voice flesh of warmth
I loved this boy who lived not for long
His identity condensed to criminal, and mine, to traitor
For he loved me whole and all.

I hide behind a veil of blackness,
I abide by laws Absolute, not decided
And see the world tinted a little dark.
I hide behind the back of my man,
I hide, hoping a three-knotted rope of one word
Would not become my noose.

I shot a man who was a criminal of my sect,
Who spoke in poetry, words inflammable
And stained my orange kurta with his green blood.
I shot a man only supposedly my own,
His clean head the victim of my fire and bullet,
Punished merely for the bush on his cheeks.

I wander the streets for a corner to pray,
But when I face forward and upward,
I’m shot in the back with complaints.
I wander the streets for a temple of allowance,
For when I sit down and devote,
I see Him as All and All as Him.

I am the product of feel and of flesh,
Built of gratitude and some vanity,
Built as a human and as humane
I am the product of want and of wait,
Made of two more spheres and one more cave,
Made just as you were.

I am a victim of my law,
In a democracy that is not democratic.
I am a victim of your law,
Or lack thereof.

The Boy Who Counted Stars

poetry | The Boy Who Counted Stars

(inspired by Kakul Gautam)

There was once a little boy;
They who knew of him called him Death.
His hair unruly and eyes bright,
Beautiful so much, he could take away your breath.

His mother would spew him tales,
Look into his eyes, boring into those pales,
She would tell him of people old and anew,
Of how the world was brimming, people now not just a few.

Every night he would count the stars,
Wondering why the sky blinked and gleamed
Only in points so less and far.
For beautiful was the shadowed sky,
Illuminated, not by the single star;
But by the four flickers up above he could see.
And Death watched and thought alone,
Fascinated by the stars, few in the endless sea.

And so decided the boy
The night would shine brighter
He would hunt the world, pick those
That made the world happier, lighter.

He saw a boy, his face smiling,
Crinkled eyes, heart young,
Breezing through the day, his shine overflying;
And Death towards him drove his carriage
And took the boy
Far away from the world’s ravage.

He came across a family
One and all of them alight.
And the sky was gifted its first constellation
Togetherness granted even after the night.

Alone the boy, with the fascinated mind
Lived
Illuminating the entire world
Only with the most radiant stars.

 

 

 

 

On Our Vows

conversations | on our vows

“Promises feel hollow. Something has shifted. Promises weren’t always hollow. Maybe they aren’t now either. It feels so, though. How do I believe otherwise?”

“Maybe they are.”

“You think so?”

“Well, maybe.”

“All of them?” She shrugged. “Our promises? They’re hollow?”

“No,” she said, shaping her fingers around the curve of his face. “No. Maybe not all. I can promise you that I’d stay with you forever, but that’d be a lie. That’d be hollow. But I can promise you this: I love you. I promise to read the back pages of all your notebooks. I promise to sleep away your snores. I promise to come waddling back to you after we fight, because where else am I going to go? I promise to be the one in white beside you on that aisle. I promise to stitch back all your buttons and I promise to smile every time I come across a picture of you, even when it’ll hurt to. I love you, I promise. Not hollow.”

He breathed. “Make them your wedding vows.”

“I promise,” she said.

Of Daisies and Benches

story | Of Daisies and Benches

He loves me.
For someone who’d had a list of all traits and revamps she’d want in a guy, she sure crossed all boundaries when she first fell in love with him. And I say first, because for a girl like her and a boy like him, she’d have to be a little above just crazy and little below the biggest fool, to not fall in love with him every time he breathed.

He loves me not.
“Will you come with me?”
“I’m really sorry, love, I just really need to finish this work now.”

He loves me.
Day one. Hour two.
When he first sat beside her, she had not expected to fall. No, literally. Like, off the bench. It was hardly her fault, though, as she would so strongly convey if you ever happened to ask her of it, because when a boy like him sits beside a girl like her, things happen. As an immediate reaction, for example, the girl jumps off of her seat so as to save them both the embarrassment of someone happening to see them together. He looks at her, bemused or amused, she can’t tell, and asks her if she’s okay. She nods and sits back down and their stories continue. Two hours into this arrangement though, she finds him humming lightly, like from the back of his throat, and, for another example, jumps up again, her legs losing their balance, her rear finding the softness of the mud.

He loves me not.
Brewing her coffee and waiting for her toast to pop, she often wonders why. It was so out of character, out of her character, for her to have decided traits. She did, though, possibly because of the psychology-major co-worker she’d just happened to be joined with, and mentally crossed-off all points. No, crossed-off. Like, cancelled. No toothy grins? Cross. Blonde, combed hair? Cross. Non-singer? Cross. Non-hummer? Cross.

He loves me.
“Here, I got all these notes. You want?”

He loves me not.
Two hours and some minutes into their arrangement, a light laugh echoes a thud.

He loves me.
It was quiet, as was the usual norms in such places, save for the constant scratching of a pencil, the lazy scrawling of a pen, and soft thudded beats that resounded in her head from across the table. Similar song choice? Cross.
A sudden zooming startled her and with a gasp and a large stroke, her pencil slipped from her long fingers. Taking a moment to calm her startled pulse, she turned to look at a boy playing around with his pencil as if it were an airplane. Stifling a sigh, she turned back to her book, the constant buzzing now a constant source of annoyance. Pushing her spectacles up, she chose to ignore it in order to be able to work. When she couldn’t take it anymore, she turned to the oblivious boy with a glare, not having the courage to ask him to stop.
“Psst. Psssst. Hey, boy?”
The buzzing paused. “Yeah?”
“Shut it, will you? She’s studying.”

He loves me not.
“Which is your favourite flower?”
Breaking her gaze from the sky painted blue, she looked into his eyes. It was as if they were a crystal clear colour, like a clear pond, only reflecting the blue of the sky. Up towards the sky, or down, into his eyes, she could see the same shine and the same shade, as if he contained her skies.
“Daisies,” she told him.
“Daisies? Why?”
She looked away. “I don’t know. More petals.”
He laughs, “More petals? I thought you were a lily girl.”
Green eyes? Cross.

He loves me.
Two hours, more minutes later:
“Hey, are you okay?” She heard some shuffling. “Here,” he said, his hand appearing within her line of sight.
She kept looking at it. His hand?
She took it.

He loves me not.
“God, no. They’re Sarah’s notes. I just borrowed them.”

He loves me.
“Excuse me, miss, this is from the boy from across the street.”
When she looked out of the café’s large glasses, she saw him waving at her. She waved back. Turning to her table, she took in the smell of daisies. White. Big. More petals.

He loves me not.
“Oh, come on, live a little! You can study later, I will study with you too, I promise. Come on, let’s go now!”
She shook her head.
“Please?” Big eyes. Cutest pout.
She shook her head.
“Fine, I’ll go without you.”

He loves me.
“No wait, I can do this work later, I’ll go with you now.”

He loves me not.
“You look better with those glasses off.”

He loves me.
Her phone rang.
“See? I asked you to come with me. I’m having so much fun without you. So much fun.”
She laughed.

He loves me not.
She rang his phone.
“Hello?”
“Hi.”
“Ah, did you finally really call? I thought you’d never.”
She rolled her eyes. “You could’ve called me yourself.”
“True. I could have.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Where’s the fun in that?”

He loves me.
The daisy stem fell to the floor.

White Blank Page

poetry | White Blank Page

(based on Legends by Rose North)

It is a jolting question,
And her reveries obliviate away:
‘Have you ever been in love?’
Her silver eyes breeze agape.

The leaves rustle with the cool wind,
The woods burn in the crisp air.
And Aryn blinks once and again;
To the Cold War they were both heirs.

Her voice is dazed while his is deep,
Drifting into the caves of her ears.
‘Have you ever been in love?’ he asks again,
And she disbelieves what she hears.

Tempted to question his stupidity,
Temtped to deceive him in her defence;
But foreseeing the failure of her attempt,
She draws a breath and says yes.

The thriving forest lullabies,
Gently cradling her to sleep,
Guiding her to a world of no limitiations,
Where impossible does not breathe.

He turns his head, she feels his eyes;
Her own eyes on the empyrean above.
That casts the golden bars on them,
The oak tree shading them with love.

‘Who?’ he whispers quietly,
His whisper rough as the wind.
And she is urged to snap at him,
Because in his love is Aryn ginned.

A tight grimace and much a thought later,
‘You know who,’ speaks she.
‘I don’t,’ he denies,
And she is left with much difficulty.

‘Catharyn,’ his voice whispers,
And Aryn’s heart twists and soars.
A sound she thought she’d never again hear,
Her heart drums a beat from long ago.

A beat of a song on the stars and the moon,
And of the darkness in between.
The song that to her her mother singed,
And she gazes back at his eyes so green.

‘Alexandrius,’ she enjoys the name on her tongue,
And his eyes widen just a fraction.
‘Have you ever been in love?’
He asks on the third occasion.

She turns to her side and ignores her pain,
He continues to stare at her.
His lips are parted and a soft expression,
One that she can never decipher.

‘Yes,’ Aryn answers again,
‘Who?’ Sander repeats.
‘You, I love you,’
Aryn grits her teeth.

Her gaze is defiant as she holds his,
No regret allowed space.
And Aryn’s heart hiddenly marvels,
At her new and brave admittance.

He breaks his eyes and his eyes wander,
Down the length of her body.
And she was exhausted and in so much pain,
Elles her cheeks had been ruby.

She drinks his dishelleved semblance,
His looks tattered and worn.
His face stained and bruised,
And he looked beautiful never more.

He turns to his side and edges closer,
His hand lifted and Aryn freezes.
He brushes away her black hair,
And gently wipes her bruises.

‘You’re bleeding,’ he tells her dully;
Aryn fights her urge to cry.
They are battered and bruised and she is scared,
And that is all he can recite?

His warmth presses against her lips,
And Aryn takes her sweet time.
Her eyes flutter close and lights explode,
And she’s never felt anymore sublime.

Her attention is undividedly on him,
On the feeling of midnight under turning galaxies.
Her heart is close to imploding in her chest,
And as they part, they are panting and dizzy.

And Sander laughs a musical laugh,
And it’s a sound she hasn’t heard in a thousand years.
But it’s also the sound she’ll wait another thousand years for;
Sander leans in close again.

‘Catharyn, I love you,’ he tells her,
And Aryn feels so lost.
Because soon they’ll have to stand and run,
And fight, no matter what the costs.

But then again, that is soon and this is now,
A rare moment of peace in the burning world.
And though soon death will resume its chase,
Aryn is content and so is Sander.

They are two in number and so are their options,
Run or burn in this world so new.
But they both know the trick and they’ll do it together,
It is to not let the fire catch you.

Red

poetry | Red

“All the world’s a merry stage, and I was looking around. Red streaked through to my rib cage, and you were handed the crown.”

It was in the midst of summer when you first held my hand.

The grass was greener than it’d ever seemed and the trees were shadier than they’d ever been, and there was this growth of little violet flowers beneath the tree that we were leaning on, and. You were fascinated. Your blue orbs were dazzling, reminding me of the time my father took me to the Walden beach and I watched the sunlight break into a dance on those roaring waves. I was fascinated. I’d never been to a beach since but looking into your eyes, I could easily see the boundless ocean. I could hear the waves rushing after another in their haste to reach the shore. Even under the cool of the tree, I could feel the sun boring warm holes in my arms, like it did the one time I visited it on the beach.

We were, quite literally, in the midst of summer.

Your hands graced through the bed of flowers as mine wanted to through your hair. I went ahead to pluck some of the violets for you and you swatted away my hand and I held my breath as your fingers curled around my fist. A wild thought entered my heart, and I was sure. I was sure if at that moment I would have closed my eyes for longer than a blink, I would have seen red instead of the ever present black. That if in the republic of my body there would’ve been a vote, my heart would’ve been king.

Flight 172

story | Flight 172 

The difference between us is that you are the pilot and I am a passenger.

And I know what you’re thinking. And yes. We are like flying. We are all about beautiful views and moving high up there and going places and emergency escapes and long journeys squeezed short and doing things we aren’t meant to. We are flying.

But you are the pilot, and I’m just a passenger. There is a wall between us that keeps you in your cockpit, with all your controls and your buttons and your co-pilot, and a belt around me that keeps me rooted to my seat, where I’m safe, and supposed to be.

The difference between us is that you are all about going to the beautiful views and I am just about seeing them.

When you’re sitting in there, about to take off, you will maybe think of me. About the passengers you’re about to not kill. About the passengers who will be thinking of you and your capabilities and your inabilities as you fly them past white and grey clouds.

When I’m sitting on my seat near the window, I will think about you thinking about not killing us. I will think about your capabilities and your inabilities as you fly us past white and grey clouds. I will pray for faith in you and thank you for all that you can do.

The difference between us is that you fly past turbulent weathers and thunder renders me powerless.

Your hands will be on the yoke and you will be doing your best to move us past the rumbling, tinted clouds with thunder showbizzing between layers. You will fly us above purple deserts of thunder-loaded masses and you will make me realise there are clouds I do not wish to jump upon.

We’re not the only people on the flight. There’s the airhostess, who’s friendly but not my friend, your co-pilot who I cannot see the face of, and another person I see, hear, feel, but do not know the role of. When the thunder scares me, I can probably turn to them when you’re busy moving us away from it. But if I am to fall in love with you, I will need you to sit beside me and laugh and hold my hand through it.

The difference between us is that you’re more about taking off and I am all about the flight landing home.

The flight is big, and the journey is long. The distance is high and the runway is invisible. Where we’re going, my boarding pass does not state. But where we are right now, mid-air, suspended, but moving, I love. The sky is just almost the right shade of blue and there are still streaks of sun raining through the clouds but there are also five stars scattered around already. I have the perfect seat to give me the perfect view.

But the direction is not to, it’s away. I’m more in the flight that just passed us, going the other way, than I am in yours.

The thing about us is that you’re the pilot, and I am your passenger.

And love stories and flights, and love and flying, are all very common and all very together, and the thing with us is that we are very common and we are very together but we are anything but typical, right?

I meet you through the plane, not on it. I don’t find you occupying the seat next to mine, or you saving the plane from hijackers or you being the guy that everybody on the plane hates and I love, or everybody loves and I hate. You just are, and I just am. I am a passenger, and you are the pilot. And it’ll be too cliché of you to fall in love with the airhostess anyway.

The thing about us is that you speak on the mic and I never take off my earphones.

I hear you when you let me. The only way I have to hear you is through the static you allow to carry to me what you have to say, to all your passengers. In that instant, sometimes you feel like the flight itself, and your brain, the cockpit: shut and off limits.

Your announcements may be too important, and may save my life. But the music I’m listening to is necessary to let me let you take off, the movie I’m watching needs to create more noise inside than the thunder outside. I cannot let the earphones fall.

The thing about us is that you have your rules and I have mine to follow.

When the oxygen is low and the people are more, the masks will fall. We will all find ways to breathe.

But these will be few of the only moments I will find myself wishing I were the pilot and you were the passenger. When I will see you forget your mask and put on somebody else’s first, I will wish I were your pilot, wish I could control you, wish my words could become announcements, orders, for you, wish you would just put on your own mask, wish you would just let yourself breathe.

The thing about us is that flying is your profession and words are my life. 

On your flight I will have my laptop and in my bag I will have my books. You will give me magazines to read and allow me lights even when you have to turn them off. You will do everything right, but motion-sickness is an inbuilt disease I can’t battle with. And I need to be able to write and to read.

Flights are unsettling like waters are drowning. You fly, but I’m more of a train person anyway.

The thing about us is that you are a pilot, and I am a passenger.

You’re more about different aircrafts and different models, and I am only about seeing what you can do with the same. You can pack light and pack little, and my suitcases carry almost my entire world in them. You belong to the airlines and I keep changing my preferences according to my conveniences. You see the directions and you see the ways, even through clouds and all the haze, and I cannot even understand how it all works.

The thing about you is that you are you and I am not even me. I will say I’m not, but if I were to fall in love with you, it would be just exactly as a passenger does with a pilot: curious, ignorant, fleeting, and unpermitted-ly.

About Firsts

conversations | about firsts

“I know you’re in love with the idea of firsts. I remember when you first finished reading The Kite Runner, you jumped around for a week straight because the sheer magic of it wouldn’t let you sit but do you remember how you kept yourself locked for the better part of the month that followed because you thought the same magic wouldn’t come back to you again?

           “When you visited the top of the Eiffel Tower and you looked down, all you thought of was how you would remember it as a memory the next time you would come back. It wouldn’t wash over your brain and leave you stupefied like it did the first time. When you watched Fight Club the first time, you were amazed for a day but you cried for the next three days because you wouldn’t feel the same amazement the next time you would watch it.”

          She laughed, “Yeah, I remember.”

           “Is that why you’re still so in love with him?”

          She stayed silent for some time. “Look, I — ”

           “No, just listen to me this one time. Firsts are beautiful. Firsts are the most special. I know. I know. I just want you to remember how when you read The Book Thief, you fell in love with it the first time, too. You cried about not feeling the same when you read it again, too. When you watched The Bucket List, do you not remember how captivated you were with its brilliance? I will never get over the heartbroken look on your face when you realised the loss of that first moment. You went to the top of the Eiffel Tower, but love, I will take you to the peak of the goddamn Everest. Why don’t you see? There will always be another first. I will not tell you that if I relive the things I have lived once, they still take my breath away, and they will, again and again because they are just so beautiful. But I need you to please understand that you don’t have to go back to it. We won’t go back. You can have other firsts too.”

On Home, With Home, In Home

conversations | on home, with home, in home

“Do you ever wish to be other people?”

“Yes. So many times. Yes. I want to be other people – preferably all the time.”

“And do you ever wish to be every other person at once?”

“God, yes. There are at least a hundred flights that take off towards my home, every single day. At least ten, where I am right now. There’s possibly a flight taking off somewhere, some place, right now, as we speak, towards my direction. Towards where I truly am. Towards where I always want to be. I wish I could be every passenger occupying every seat on every flight, every pilot who gets to take his flight to my home. Yes. I wish I were all those people at once, right now, always, so I could always go home. But more than that, I wish I was every person breathing the air of my city right now, so I would not have a reason to come back. I will just always be there.”

“Do you know?”

“Know what?”

“You’re kind of my home.”

About Me

poetry | About Me

(with the core by Kelsey Danielle)

Each time I’m asked to introduce myself, I find myself starting the same way: “My name is Tanya and I’m eighteen..”

but what I’d really like to say is:

“I have been in love with the stars since the explosion they created me but my parents decided to name me sunrays, not sunshine but sunrays, like I reach but never alight you, and to this day, it’s the biggest irony of my life.”

A teacher once told me, “Your handwriting is the easiest way to know and recognise you,” but my handwriting changes with each person that holds my heart and I thought, nothing could define me better.

I keep looking for the places that will allow me to let myself be seen, for places where cars would stop and windows would roll down and people would make an attempt to know you, keep looking for the places where the rains would drench me anew. I keep looking for the stars that would shine unabashedly on my head, for the winds that would make the trees swing towards me. I keep looking for time to rush with, for my moment to tell you:

“I am the chatter of streets that prefer silence, the hum in hearts that doesn’t buzz. Often I prefer to sit in invisible corners, and I am more like me when I’m pretending to be someone else. My definition of love is family and there are few things in life I love as much as Harry Potter. My life has been one earth revolving around the sun of five boys, and I keep waiting for new explosions that would take me back to my first. Twirls of poetry make up the grounds I bounce upon and rain thuds are my favourite lullabies. The stars dot my eyes even under the sunlight and the cold of the snow on my nose is my happiest feeling. I have no corner of me that isn’t made up of some other person, so much that even this About Me is inspired by another.”