I’m finally starting new again…I’m not sure if that thought’s more refreshing or terrifying.

MK Ireland #247 : leaving you

I don’t know why I am so drawn to endings - sunsets, the last drops of rain in late afternoons, the leaves that fall during autumn. I’ve always found beauty where things are dying. Does that make me a healer or a martyr? All I know is that I still remember the way my heart beat when we were saying goodbye, and even that second when your hand left my skin felt like magic seeping out from inside of me. In a way I was in love with the idea of letting you go, like setting a bird free into the wild, knowing it’ll find its way. Not all endings have to be bitter and tragic. I hope your leaving felt like you were spreading your wings into flight. I hope you go to the places we’ve always dreamed about, somewhere calm and beautiful. And my love, whenever you look back, all I ask is that you to remember the warmth of home I kept you in.

Beautiful Goodbye//Genefe Navilon

There are heartbreaks that are just plain ugly. There is no going around them. They are all teeth and sharp claws. That’s how it is when you love with so much intention, so much hope. This kind of pain we get just once in our lives. One that stays broken for a very long time. Everyone else will not understand it. Sometimes even you won’t. You don’t have to. The only thing you can do is ride it out. Let it bite. Let it stay open. The worst wounds take a lot of healing. But you will, heal. Maybe not today and not as early as tomorrow. But one step at a time. You are strong. You are made to withstand no less. So it’s alright, today you just have to be human first.

Genefe Navilon

Someone once told me I reminded him of autumn. If people were seasons, I’d be falling leaves and the smell of wet wood. He said even my perfume reminded him of the earth. I suppose in a way he was right. Autumn always reminded me of sadness - the trees crying gold, the wind sweeping them off the ground like pretty little yellow butterflies. No matter how beautiful it looked, everything was sleeping, almost dead, or maybe dreaming. Sometimes I feel like I’m withering away, other times I feel like I’m drifting somewhere I could be alive again. I don’t know why I’m so drawn to the idea of someone saving me. Maybe one day I’ll find someone who would call me spring, instead.

Autumn//Genefe Navilon

i want to live in odd numbers of

1 day at a time

because a series of years

looks like a barrage of bullets,

breaths:

1, 2, 3

1, 2, 3

when i am gasping

in desperate search of gravity,

5 things i can see

that make a brittle girl

feel unbreakable

and a crooked world

look steady.

- “odd numbers”

when you feel reduced

to just a human

to just a speck,

to just a stack of atoms,

i will magnify

your every moment,

your every word,

your everything

you think departs

once it occurs.

i will recognize a monument

when you swear

you’re just a shack,

i will behold a sun to orbit,

when you think

you’re the blade of grass.

i will be the microscope

that always finds what matters

amidst your mass.

- “what matters”

you tossed me lifejackets when i drowned in days that turned hours into thrashing waves.

you douse me with extinguishers when i burn down like a house

because i can’t make my body feel like a home.

you put strength in my bones like it’s a gift of love,

but when you feel most forlorn and the universe looks pointless,

i will slip power back into your pockets like it’s something borrowed,

because we are not ever truly alone and you have always been the point.

- “something borrowed”

misery afflicts me like a disease, 

but hope makes an addled physician out of me,

as i devour paintings and poetry, love and lyrics 

and everything in between as medicine,

in hopes that the Polaris 

or a forget-me-not 

or anything, 

anything, 

anything could be

the remedy. 

- “remedy”

i am a fighter even if my fight looks like 

cowering in a black room because bleak thoughts 

make the world spin, when i yearn to be motionless, anchored to ceramic tile—anchored to something.

i am a fighter even if my fight looks like 

cradling my quivering body when the world says 

i should wield it like machinery, 

as if these soft hands could ever tear down anything besides myself.

i am a fighter even if my fight looks like 

seeping blood, sweat and tears as i mourn the wounds instead of stitching them up.

i am a fighter even if my fight looks like

longing to surrender, but lingering for hope to trickle in like light through a cracked door. 

- “another kind of fighter”

i buried the map to my body, my being, like it was something to grieve, 

but you discovered it like treasure; you unearthed places only i knew of 

with such tenderness i would swear we’ve swapped bodies through kisses 

because how could anyone else find flowers in a wasteland? 

how else could i be loved, as i have always ached to be loved, 

if not through my own hands? 

- “buried treasure”

you cannot tell me that time is an arrow, as i stand taller than my mother, 

yet shrink in her shadow like it’s my first day of school and i am 6 years old. 

and often i still am, as i transport worms out of gutters and mourn snails squashed on pavements. 

but sometimes it’s 12 am and i’m 7, dissecting dark corners in my room like it’s a crime scene

and i’m now the investigator searching for ghosts

in place of monsters that once made me the victim. 

other times it’s 6 am and i’m 10, but i’m not stirring from nightmares, 

i’m slipping out of bed and into them, like shackles instead of slippers. 

then i’m 14 with secrets that mark me in scratches, in bruises and insecurities,

but i mask them with lies and schoolwork and sweaters and smiles

that split my face in half to distract from the pit that is my chest. 

suddenly—perhaps finally—i’m 16 in August and every hour is 3 in the afternoon;

the hospital bed feels like the precipice and everything that comes after is the descent

because time is not linear, it is not the arrow or the bullet. 

sometimes it feels like the plunge before the collapse,

like forever pointing the gun, but never pulling the trigger,

or standing with the bow drawn, but never letting go because you’re always pulling back. 

- “time is no arrow”

if turning water into wine

could make a man divine,

you must surely be sublime

the way you turn a February moon

into a waxing gibbous,

and a city sky’s dull stars

into clusters of wishes,

and the way you make

poetry from prosaic sentences,

and backseats and bedrooms

into replicas of heaven.

you change music of any genre

into gospel, of which i sing

in love and in reverence,

“you are divine,

you are divine!”

of this, i’m certain.

should you ever question your sanctity

or—god forbid—my worship,

may these poems be the proof,

the evidence,

the testament.

- “you are divine”

you were dollhouses and cartoons on Saturday afternoons, sleepovers and shenanigans and secrets our parents never knew, you were my first home away from home, the kind of sister you choose through love, not blood. you were swimming pools and root beer floats and amateur duets in the back seat of your mother’s car. 

you were letters from California and loneliness in classrooms and school buses in Florida. you were open arms and ease and faith that friends can stay friends despite how they leave. 

now you’re a birthday party i won’t attend, but you’re still a birthday i won’t ever forget. you’re a single picture posted on a screen, as i wonder what you sound like or if you still think of me. 

you’re Sunday brunches with people i don’t recognize, but sometimes envy, because i wish they were me; they get to know who you are now and i’ll only know who you used to be.

- “you were dollhouses”

And as the last tear left my eye

I promised myself

You wouldn’t hover my mind

I promised my heart

You wouldn’t affect my smile

And I promised my soul

I couldn’t have you

But I wouldn’t die.

~Shubhaa

I could feel the hate radiating from her. I could see it in her eyes. I knew she didn’t recognize me anymore. Of course she didn’t. Who was I? Nothing. I had known it for quite a long time. I had seen the flashes of that monster inside of me, gradually becoming more prominent day by day.

I was sure though. I was sure that I would never hurt her, my princess, my girl. Yet here she was, standing in front of me, begging for mercy, asking to let her go.

“Show her what you can do. Show her the power you hold over her.” Said the voice I had been trying to fight for months. It always got the best of me.

Not today. I thought. With my heart breaking and my soul dying, I asked her to leave. I couldn’t look her in the eye. But I saw the hurt cross her face. Like she was expecting me to stop her from leaving.

*Trust me baby, I want to.*

I didn’t say a word though. She stood there for a few minutes, trying to find the person she had loved her whole life. I had been trying to find that person as well. And then suddenly, she started walking away. Her footsteps matching the pace of my heart breaking into tiny shards.

Yes, I loved her.

Yes, I had let her go.

And in the end, we are just mere human beings. Drunk on the idea of love, living on broken pieces of affection. Pretending to have the time of our lives, trying to love the life we have even though we all know, that when the end comes, it’s all going to turn to dust.

~Shubhaa

Just like sand

The more I hold

The more you slip away

I cannot make you stay.

~Shubhaa

Random musings.

My heart reaches out to all the people who’ve ever had to suffer the agony of unrequited love.

15. Delhi

19 million people, waking up in the morning,

going about their lives, from one corner to

another, jumping on one route and reaching

another. Delhi, you beautiful beautiful city,

I hear you carry, within, a soul so old that

you age with time. Oh Delhi, you beautiful

mistake.

19 million people, 573 sq. mi long city,

so many lives, so many dreams. Delhi, you

infuriating mess. Ask anyone they’ll have a

story to tell, of a time not known to you, a

time not understood by me but a thousand

people willing to stop and listen along with

their daily cup of tea.

Everyone in here experiences this city in a

way that quite differently do align, and they

are definitely unconnected to mine. Mine

starts with a gate, number 7 it seems,

a chamber block with III written on it and a

floor to see what is unseen. Oh Delhi,

you are so full of mysteries.

On the 7th floor fire exit, you can see the

glory of this city in one place. If you look at

the expanse, I swear you can fly. From the

magnificence that is the Raisina Hill, running

along the Parliament and the tricolored

beauty of India gate. Hold on, wait for a

moment. Absorb the lights, the Grandeur

and move one.

The chilly breeze, often takes you with it to

the never ending work in progress that is

Pragati Maidan which literally translates

to “progress grounds” and to the ruins of

the Old fort, which once was the residence

of the huge empire, resonates the losses

and the gains.

The 7th floor fire exit captures the beauty

that is Delhi, but it also takes you on a

journey to the gems lost in time. If you look

around, you’ll see the Jawaharlal Nehru

Stadium, sitting on the high chair, looking

down at the city. If you go a little further,

you’ll find the Lotus temple.

Right there, just there, stop and think. Look

beyond the temple and you’ll find yourself.

You’ll see where you’ve reached and the

place where you started from. Delhi, you are

the reason for my suffering and the reason

for my contentment.

There are 19 million people in this city and

the 7th floor, Chamber block III is my place

of solace.

14. Sympathy Pains

As she stood there, waiting.

Waiting for a sign, a reason perhaps,

I’m glued to the television, knowing

Her world is about to collapse.

The pain in her heart, is mine

too. Her eyes all cried out, staring,

directly at the camera, I can sense it

in my bones, it’s obtrusive, glaring.

I hear she screamed when she saw,

the pool of blood and people oscillating.

Her whole world destroyed, in a moment,

truly vile, nauseating.

I’m a mere spectator, in this dysfunctional

world. Forcing my thoughts, evaluating.

And there she is, fighting every day,

running, crying, dying, alternating.

I move around my house, helplessly.

For I only know her pain, not understand it,

hating the world, the people, everyone,

for the crimes they didn’t commit.

Will she get the justice she deserves?

I do not know, but I do know

that tonight, we’ll both won’t sleep,

we’ll both see him, alive, breathing, a shadow.