Tag: poetry

TO THE GIRL IN HER MID-30’S

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I said girl, not woman. Because it doesn’t quite fit, does it? The mom jeans and the extra weight and the heaviness of the world on your shoulder. But somehow, none of it makes the word woman quite right just yet.

And still, our lives are nothing like when we were just girls. There’s so much pressure. Of life. Of love. Of living. Travel, friends, health, and babies. Marriage, if you’re married. Marriage, if you’re not. The people that never stop telling you how you’ve failed them. The disappointment of not living up to someone else’s imagination. The disappointment of not living up to our own.

Realizing earning a few million isn’t as easy as we thought. The house they had us draw as kids comes with a cost. You can have the house, or you can be close to home. It’s exhausting. And don’t even get me started on loss. That’s a thing now. We’re old enough. It happens and it just feels so rushed, doesn’t it?

I remember playing Barbies and running around the apartment like it was a few years ago. I’m a 90s baby. Wasn’t it just 2005?

I hear you. I feel what you feel. I am you in so many ways. And when people tell me, “Stay positive, it’s gonna be alright,” I want to grab a glass of wine and roll my eyes.

So this letter’s a little different. This isn’t a ‘don’t lose hope’ or ‘life gets better’ letter. Because let me be real – I don’t know jackshit about what life gets. But here’s what I do know – “fuck it, what can you control?”

Your client is driving you insane? Fuck it. You can’t make stupid people smarter.

The “elders” troubling you for a kid? Fuck it. They don’t know how good wine tastes in the middle of the day.

Society asking you why you’re not married? Fuck it. Why would you repeat one dish when you can order from the entire menu?

Career not quite there? Shitty boss? Shitty work? Shitty pay? Fuck it. The system, it’s problematic.

No hate to the girl who wrote a letter full of hope to the girls in their mid-20s. She needed that to get through that decade. But that’s not this decade. No, this decade is not for hope and stars and glitter falling from the sky – if it does, please hide as it may be hazardous.

But no, this decade is for us dreamers. Actually – This decade is for those of us who’re realizing the dreams they fed us isn’t quite how the world works anymore. I think the word for it is…. bullshit? So we’re really the anti-dreamers? I can’t tell, but you catch my drift.

This decade, that’s still got a few good years to go, is for those of us who want to laugh out loud, think out loud, speak out loud. It’s for us to be ourselves, messy buns and a messy home. Or if you’re like me, messy buns and an extremely clean home. Whatever works for you.

But really, it’s for us to learn to come into ourselves. To embrace the quirks, the little nuances that makes us who we are. To let toxic people, relationships, and things go – Unless it’s paying you good money to fund your life. This decade is for us to be unapologetically ourselves. Bold, abrasive, silent, introverted – whatever the heck makes you feel like you’ve come home to yourself.

So let the noise drown out. Let people with loud opinions be who they are, wherever they are, in their own ignorance. Coz you know what? Fuck it.

Put on your favorite clothes. Turn on your favorite show. Read your smutty books. Get on OnlyFans. Roll your eyes at the Karen at work and fake-smile until it hurts. And every now and then, treat yourself to something a little nice. A dinner. A bag. A great bottle of wine as you tell Karen to go fuck herself? Actually, no, don’t do that.

Because here’s what I’ve learnt as I’ve found love, doggos and a home away from home while dealing with loss, anxiety, depression and a permanent state of existential crisis – Fuck it. What can I control?

Poems from the Past

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It has been a rather sick week and I didn’t get out of bed for the most part. The only two things that kept me company was my sketchbook and this little guy :

Dala

As someone that gets bored very, VERY easily, staying in bed is possibly not the ideal way I’d like to spend my days.  As and when I felt even a little better, I tried to do something or the other. One of those things was to clean up my old bookshelf. I swear, bookshelves are the only thing, no matter how much you throw away, they still make you feel like a hoarder. And amidst those books, I found a special something.

We all have those things we loved doing when we were younger but just quit with time. Things we quit for no reason. The thing I quit was writing poems.

I used to love to write poems. I was in 3rd grade, I think, when I started. I stopped when I went to university. I don’t know if I grew out of it or something. I just randomly stopped. I highly doubt I’ll ever start again. I’m one of those people that just keeps finding fault with her stuff. So I’m possibly going to tear up page after page if I every try again. But anyway, when I was cleaning, I found my old poetry book. Since I’ve been sick and haven’t really had much thoughts whatsoever to rant about, I thought, I’d share my two favorite poems, from the bunch that I’ve written, with you.

A little background information : The first one was written right before I started university. I’d written a poem for a friend that is pretty much like my brother and the guy I was with at that point made a tantrum asking me to write one for him. So I did and hence, the cheesiness. Please don’t mind. The second one, I wrote when I was in 9th grade. I was about 14 years old, I immensely believed in fairytales and it was written whilst day dreaming about my “knight in shining armor” during Science class.

 

SANTA’S GIFT – 23rd May 2011

“You’ve been a very good girl this year”

“Thank you, Santa”

“Tell me what you want and it’s yours”

“I want..”

 

Ten years down the road

I think of that day

When Santa asked me what I want

And I said “I want..”

 

Time went by

And I lost all trust

In Santa’s honest words

Until that July

 

When I remembered that day

Santa asked me

To tell him what I want

And I said “I want..”

 

The first date, The first kiss,

The first touch.. The way you look at me

The first time my heart itched

To hear you tell me you love me

 

Forever, it’s not enough

But today, I won’t complain

Sometimes, love is rough

But with you, I’m me again.

 

When I was a little kid

Santa gave me one good wish

He asked me what I want

And I said “I want..”

 

“I want an honest man

Someone who will love me for me

Take me to the moon and back

Live his life just for me..”

 

That July I got my wish

When I found you and I realized

Santa thinks before he gives

Something I was mesmerized with.

 

Santa said to a little girl

“You’ve been good, what do you want ?”

She pointed at you and told him softly

“To be everything he’ll ever want..”

 

 

I’LL NEVER LET GO – 2007

If this is a dream,

Let me never wake up.

If this is reality,

Let me never sleep.

 

If this is a maze,

Let me never get out.

If this is the world,

Let me scream and shout.

 

If this is day,

Let the moon never shine.

If this is night,

Let the sun never rise.

 

If this is him,

Let him never go.

If this is me,

I’ll never let go..

 

 

Happy Easter 🙂