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Found amazing Spoken Word content on Spotify that I decided to make a playlist for it. Give it some love and appreciation.

I’ve never found sunsets to associate with hope, if anything they are the most depressing of the things.

The best love stories are the ones which lasts enough for you to love and find yourself and ironically they are also the worst.

The night I realised I needed therapy

It was 2 in the night, and I was watching

a reaction video on my phone. It was 2

in the night, so I let my mind go and let

it roam freely wherever it wanted to. It

had been on the leash the entire morning.

It was 2 in the night and I didn’t anticipate

what might happen.


I remember distinctly that I was breathing

fine. I was breathing fine, a moment and

the other I was racing along with my

thoughts. It wasn’t too late, and my body

started racing around my room too. It was

2 in the night, so I decided to not wake

people up. People, what people? I’m alone.


Sometimes I wish to sleep this feeling away,

but if I sleep now, I’ll be caged in my mind

where my sleep demon awaits my arrival,

and I am not ready for that rendezvous.

Hence, I’m awake. Trying to breathe, trying

to sleep, failing at both.


I clearly remember, meeting him, them,

when I briefly closed my eyes. It happens,

not a lot but in the night, when it’s 2, that’s

the only thing that my brain does. When I see

them, I don’t see colors, I don’t hear their

voice, I see them and I see myself through

them.


When I look at myself, through them, I see a

sack of blood and flesh, lying on the bed,

Immobile and frozen. I see a pathetic body

not even trying to fight it, using the 21

seconds rule as an escape to not move. It’s

almost as if she wants to stay in this state

forever.


When I see myself looking at me, I feel

frantic. I hate myself at that moment, but I

can’t, I just can’t move. I know if I stood up

right now, I’ll fight it. I’ll fight with everything,

I’ll run away, and I’ll be gone and if I lay there

all night, without moving, my judgement

would stare me down and leave me in my

misery.


They are getting closer with each thought

that chokes me. I want to break the barrier

and just hide in the bathroom. Why am I

resisting this? They are here, reaching out

to me and there’s nothing more for me to do

than join them and live in this vulnerability.

ज़िन्दगी का फलसफा भी कितना अजीब है शामें कटती नहीं और साल गुज़रते चले जा रहे है.

-पीयूष मिश्रा

Translation -

How strange is the philosophy of life, the evenings do not end and the years are passing by.

- Piyush Mishra

25. Anxiety

One moment you are sitting still,

the other you’re not. The worst

moment for anxiety to hit is

probably when you least expect

it. Can you expect it though? It

waits for you to be weak, or to

be your happiest self. It strikes

when you feel nothing and then

your whole world comes collapsing.

Anxiety, holds you hostage in your

own body. Sucks your soul and

keeps it that way, lifeless and

unattended. It’s the feeling of heat

in an air-conditioned room, the dip

in your heart while taking a dump,

the paralyses induced when you

hear about that one trigger that you

just discovered is triggering.

ANXIETY, the word is enough to

render you inactive, perplexed,

agitated, sad, and all the other

emotions you can’t name. This

blank document writing itself

and bringing within it the anxious

scrolling while the heart still dips

and beats in tones not understood

by me.

24. A paranoid hate poem

The walls piercing through their plaster,

as if watching me, mocking me, there

are four. I’m locked in a room and my

demons are feeding on my mind. The

bed shakes sometimes, and sometimes

it refuses to move, it holds me close

and screams that it’ll never let me go.

I’m locked in a room and my demons are

feeding on my mind. My bookshelf sits

there, waiting for me to run my fingers

through it like I used to, but I don’t have

that childlike enthusiasm left in me like

I had in November. I’m locked in a room

with my demons who never let me sleep.

I’m locked in this room with my demons,

and they are feeding on my soul. I’m

locked in this godforsaken room, seeking

an out and these demons are sucking the

life out of me. I’m locked in this room

awaiting my sweet release.

I know it’s a difficult time and a difficult world that we are living in. I hope you haven’t lost your hope. I won’t say that it will get better because I don’t know if it will but I’m certain that we can live this through, one day at a time. I hope you all the power and strength.

Love and prayers your way.

22. To whomsoever it may concern


Can you breathe?


The air passing you by, the

moments too. The undesired

quest of knowing and not

knowing. The inability to rest.


Can you smell?


The bodies, rotten and dunked

in blood, with no one to pay

heed to. Then waiting in despair

with no one in the waiting.


Can you taste?


The salt in their eyes, the misery

imposed by the system. The

horrible, sour, bland flavor of

a failed regime.


Can you hear?


The screams, the wailing, the

howls, their cries. They are still

waiting and screaming. Can

you hear them?

21. Notes from the journal

For those who alone did trot,

waiting for a miracle to come,

they often are not looking too,

for a sign to pass them by. Done

with the world, evading their

shadows, holding it by the helves.

For they don’t need anyone to survive,

they are whole in themselves.

20. Incredulous

They tell me not to read mythology and

believe aimlessly what is forever told.


Of the formation of this universe, the

chaos that metamorphed into the sun,

the stars, the planets, you and me. The

violent rage and act of defiance by

Amnon and his death acting as a deterra

-nce, probably the first where the crime

did someone free. Did you know of all the

Greek tragedy, my favorite is the one told

bySophocles? It talks of love, honor, the

duty, oppression and tyranny as it unfolds.


They tell me not to read mythology and

believe aimlessly what is forever told.


I recall now that I once read, of woman so

strong, warriors she fed. Madhavi was her

name and she bore it with pride, she was

used as a fortune by them. Alas, it was

written by men. Forever, I did try to find the

genesis of his highness Macbeth or of

Sisyphus, who twice cheated death. If you

close your eyes, you can hear poor Orpheus’

lore.


They tell me not to read mythology and

believe aimlessly what is forever told.


When they ask me to believe, I do often

gather, the four horsemen making their way

to end the world, but I’d take hurricanes and

tsunamis rather. Fearless as they are, it’s the

women who call me from the narrative they

are written in, always longing to be at par.

The mightiness of the men, their heroism is

at what the story is often sold.


They tell me not to read mythology and

believe aimlessly what is forever told.

19. Questions unanswered


In the quest of knowing and not

knowing, the remembering is

what baffles me profusely.

For I shall never know

what it holds for me

and what it holds

against

my solemn

self.

18. Yugen


Can you hear the music

echoing in the streets?


There are voices too doleful

to take no notice of.


Can you hear them scream

and crying in the streets?


The voices now deafening

destroying the credence.


Can you feel their voices

calling out for help?


The agony, the distress

still calling, but now it’s too late.

17. We exist

I don’t know which type I am. The A

type which is always ready to for an

adventure, would want to talk on the

phone and not really on the message

Or the B type, the one who really lie low,

loves to be left alone with their

thoughts, just need a book and coffee.

I don’t know which type I am. I am the

one who wants to be there, always,

with my friends, having fun and seeking

adventure but not always, I carry my

favorite book to my favorite places

alone and in that quest, I start feeling

lonely, the kind of lonely that comes

when you’re surrounded by people. I

don’t know which type I am, I think

these types were created by us to make

the people conform to the set principles

and to understand ourselves the way

we perceive everyone else, ordinary and

vanilla. So, I don’t know which type I am.

I am the type who gets a bout of spunk

only sometimes. The kind of courage that

forces me to download a dating app but

doesn’t help in actually going out and

meeting people. The type that enables

my every act of sneering insolence and

makes me believe that I am a product

of these baseless by-laws, and I’m ought

to be like this and act like this. I don’t

know which type I am, but I know that

I am not what the world wants me to be.

We exist.

16. Welcome to my Ted talk

I’ve come to a halt. My body

doesn’t want to move, it is

breathing out air, inhaling and

exhaling but moving, no. It is

done, I am done, my brain, my

body, every nerve in my system is

done. I recently watched this

show called “Feel good” in hopes

to feel good myself, and it hit me

like an epiphany, how comedy

often masks the complexities

of nature, we call it mental health.

So, now that I’ve watched

something that was supposed to

be feel good, and I don’t feel good

after it, I think that the feelings that

are resonated by my mind, my body,

will go unnoticed. I don’t know how

to feel about it and whom to talk

about it. So, now, my body is in this

state of self loathing with an ounce

of anxiety because I wanted to watch

something that’d make me feel good,

but instead I watched something that

made me miserable.

A Tender Violation - Effy Winter-I had the pleasure of getting to design this piece for @fleurwomb,

A Tender Violation - Effy Winter

-

I had the pleasure of getting to design this piece for @fleurwomb, writer and witch extraordinaire. This was such a fun piece to sink my teeth into - let me draw roses and snakes forever


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How Are You?“I’m okay.”At least that’s what I tell youand what I tell myselfBecause for as long as I

How Are You?

“I’m okay.”
At least that’s what I tell you
and what I tell myself
Because for as long as I can remember,
there’s been this odd feeling
deep, deep, deep inside of me
that I can’t quite explain
and it wouldn’t go away

Some days it consumes me
downplays even the littlest of the good things that happened to me
It’s as if I deserve this
and I have no right to be happy
I am easily irritated
I push people away
even if all I wanted was to call out their name
and ask them to stay

But what frustrates me the most
is that I no longer appreciate
all of the things that made my worries dissipate
I look at art; I used to make art
because art is supposed to make you feel something
But how is that even possible now
when the void only keeps on growing
and at the end of the day, you still feel like you’re missing something?

That’s why I say I’m “okay”
Two letters or four,
however you spell it
It looks simple and easy
It doesn’t ask any questions
It doesn’t take much out of my depleting energy
And that’s what I want right now —
what I think I need

Some people see past my fictitious testimonies,
my false confidence, false smile, false laugh
So it looks like I’m not succeeding
in the illusion that I keep conjuring
They tell me to man up and to stop overthinking
They tell me to snap out of it; there are bigger problems than my own
Gee, Karen, I didn’t know it was that easy! I should have thought about that sooner
Now, I think you’ve cured me!

I look around me and see how people can just simply be happy
My friends are going to med school,
they’ve defended their thesis,
they sleep in on weekends,
they have time to watch a movie
It looks like things come to them so naturally
Then only one thing invades my thoughts in the wee hours of the morning:
why can’t that be me?

Deep down I know that those things can be misleading;
that these people also have things that they’re keeping
We might have the same struggles,
there’s just a little difference in the details
It’s just that these bad brain days
make me feel like I’m beyond repair,
and this distorted way of thinking is here to stay
and keep me in despair

I tried everything there is:
books that help you rediscover your purpose,
catch up with my good ol’ friends,
chant while in the sitting position called “lotus”,
and redirect my focus to school things instead
I’ll admit that it somewhat helped
and suddenly, things are no longer as intense
So here I am, thinking, “Did I…just make that up in my head?”

So one day, I find myself singing again
ABBA, Beyoncé, Kanye, you name it
I’ve set my mind on grad school
I’m working on defending my thesis
You wouldn’t even believe that I got eight hours of sleep last weekend
I also just watched a whole season of good TV
I didn’t even know that the agents of SHIELD had been battling the Kree
Gosh, I don’t want this feeling to end

But that good, happy place doesn’t last
and the emptiness creeps in way too fast
I thought I’ve had a good grip on this new reality
How did I let it get taken out of my hands?
Here we go again
It’s barely been a minute since I actually felt sane
Here we go again with this random period of crippling paranoia
“Can we please chill for a minute, dear brain?”

No.
And it was there when I came to understand
why people jumped in front of moving trains,
why they threw themselves off buildings,
why some chose to drink the night away
— a quick fix
Acting as quickly as the void that swallowed them whole;
as quickly as their desire to put it all to an end

They say that the truth will set you free;
they say it’ll bring about inner peace,
help you go to bed and finally get a good night’s sleep
but there are always two sides of the same coin
and we rarely talk about the other story,
the one where the truth can be filled with pain and agony
the one that makes us feel that we’re locked up in a box
and then suffocated by a bag full of life’s atrocities

I wish more people would see this truth
that I’m still me and you’re still you
that we are not the demons inside our minds
that every day is a fight to no longer be slaves of the pain we feel inside
I long for the day
where I could be honest
look you in the eye, take a deep breath, and say,
“The truth is, I am not okay.”


I wrote this spoken word poetry piece in the quiet of the morning in my favorite café. All 827 words in under 20 minutes. There were no tears shed in the process of writing and practicing until today, where I broke down mid-performance in front of my literature professor and 16 of my classmates. I guess it was only then and there where I really felt every word I uttered. I was so focused on extracting those feelings and putting them into words, I neglected to understand what they meant. So here I am, back in the café, coming to a realization that there’s still so much pain left inside of me, even if for the past few days I feel like I’m finally getting back on my feet. It’ll probably take a little bit more effort (and maybe even that spiritual retreat next week) to achieve some sort of inner peace, but I’m glad I made this progress of acknowledging my truth today.

If you ever find yourself resonating with this piece, I wish I could surround you with fluffy clouds, cute lil’ bunnies, and all the good things. If you need a friend, my inbox is open 24/7.


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NEW YORK

Oh New York ! Oh New York !

When will I see you again

The memories have faded but those feelings remained from when our story began,


The misty eastern breeze touching past my face,

The smell of burning gas from the ford going at pace,

The wet streets, the smokey aisles,

the noisy kids you can hear from miles.

Oh New York I have felt you and let me feel you again.


I’ve felt the black, I’ve felt the white,

I’ve felt the snow of the winter night.

Central Park and morning dew,

A waiting line to taste the brew.

The cheap plays, the shiny lights,

The busy sidewalks every night.


Oh New York I dream of you everyday,

This poem will never be complete until I feel you again someday….!

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