On the shore of time,
My existence bleeds.
The cacophony of voices
Drown my senses.
Directionless, rollercoaster.
Much-hyped choices.
Ruthless ambition.
Hedonic treadmill…
Unending demands for control.
I let go; the need to let go.
I let go.
In silence.
Invoking peace.
Trapped in a gloomy dungeon.
Everywhere darkness adorned.
There prevailed chains,
Brokenness, and pain.
Everything unreasonable and insane.
With all the might, I put up a fight.
Depleting me of my energy.
As I wriggled out of the dungeon, slowly.
There was light so bright.
Dazzled, I lost my sight.
Suddenly, the world was a new place.
As though I was born again!
I trembled as I crawled I got assistance and I survived.
Some motivated me in my despair.
Some offered me kindness and care.
Someone share a laugh.
Someone convinced me I was enough.
I tried to gather my strength to walk.
I was feeling weak still.
The ascent is always a steep uphill.
I saw a hand stretched towards me.
I took its support like crutches.
I walked a few steps and felt powerful.
As the weather changes, so does time.
Those dependencies are nothing but enzymes.
Chemicals in the brain create that fog.
The more you want something,
The further it got!
But I was in an unusual ‘high’.
Love gives you these wings.
Freedom to float anywhere, freedom to say anything.
Fantasy is a flight towards a dream.
Yes, I understand the science behind it all.
Mysteries, build adrenaline rush,
And push us to do hard things.
The ‘high’ is sufficient to move a mountain.
Is this ‘high’ making me an addict, insane?
In your world, you see the same stars.
Awestruck, we see the same moon from afar.
My mind and heart feel so connected,
Though the distance between us cannot be measured.
How do I see a sameness in differentiation?
There is a strong connection in this separation!
Although, I love the thought that we could be together,
This is but just a thought.
I want to feel close, yet I want to stay afar.
I am living in paradox.
Maybe, I am in love with this paradox.
Or is it that, I feel we are not apart?
Maybe I am imagining, what you’ll be,
It may just be my fantasy.
Maybe I distraught the reality,
Maybe I assume what is not!
Maybe there is more that I do not see.
Yet, it is making me the person I always wanted to be.
Someone said, “We mature with damage not with age.”
There is a different (inner) devil at every stage.
Today I am inviting some of them for tea.
These frightened parts of me!
I have kept them hidden, I have denied,
Disowned and shamed them several times.
For I could not do what I was supposed to.
For I could not become what was expected of me.
These are my inner children wanting to be- free. So, today I let some of them be! (seen).
For that kid in me is sometimes three,
It demands all the attention she missed on.
She frets, and doesn’t know how to express and who to explain what is her pain?
The world is lonely and dark and mundane.
Where is everyone?
How do they all function?
What is the ‘normal’?
Who do I question? There is no one near except fear. She is expected to be quite. A “Good child”. Tired of all this, little one cries.
Sometimes, this inner child of mine,
Is thirteen. Feeling the pain of growing up and changes in adolescence.
The world is scary, strange and unsafe.
She hides behind her pride.
Lets loose the inner rebel. She formulates a survival guide. Strong face. Just a disguise. Yet a safe disguise!
Sometimes this inner child is nine. Desiring a new bicycle and a pair of running shoes. Why do people ridicule?
Why can’t I fight back? Break the norm.
Break their bones!
I will be a Don!
Dare they strike!
I will kill. I will fight…!
Some voice mimics, the dialog from the social script of ‘that mean aunt’ in every family, who is always critical, of literally everything!
“Oh my little child, but you are a girl… You will not survive. Uh, accept that it’s your plight. For those boys are big and you are just nine! Surrender! For if God wanted you to be successful you would not have been a girl’!”
My child at nine decided to hide(“the girl”) till whenever possible. Frills and frocks were discarded for rough jeans. Long curls gone just like the story ‘Maggie Cuts her Hair’. She’d defy. I am no less. I am a Tom-‘boy’! Fighting on the street. Bruised legs and feet, it did not pain. It was a matter of prestige! The scars were the pride, of my inner child.
However, these lessons are wrongly learnt it was a survival guide.
It felt safe to defy,
To be angry rebel or to hide.
For long, I let my coping mechanism be my comfort zone.
As that was what could possibly be done!
It’s an un-learning time.
With you, I work, to reconcile.
Today in my forties, I acknowledge this pain,
My inner children, you are not shamed!
Now, I won’t let you suffer again.
I won’t deny, in me, you may confide.
For, we are the same.
Let go of these fears.
You are safe, as I am here!
For you, I will always be here!
Musings - An Endeavour to writing 