2021

 

We as humans have a tendency to believe that the current moment we live in is the most important/momentous/worst one. So much so that we tend to look at our 5minutesback self more rosily  than our present self. This peculiar trait is amplified the most when we post stuff like 'this year was the most soul sucking / earth shattering / eye opening one of my life'/ 2020 sucks/ 2020 > 2021. While i generally disagree with such statements, I am going to make a categorical one myself right now. At this moment. 

2021 was the most challenging year of my life. 

I think it started well enough. I was in peak comfort zone personally, professionally and socially. I loved how everything was but didn't want anything to change and I definitely didn't want to push myself. You know what they say- If you don't, life will. 

and life did. 

Nothing that dramatic really. I just contracted a mild case of COVID  in the second wave. I was and am lucky that nothing devastatingly permanent happened in my life. However, I was in a prolonged home isolation with myself for 21 days and that did the trick. 

The thing is I like many others don't like to think about the 'big stuff'. I like it to keep it light and 'cash-ual' and keep flowing through life like that runner in temple run. Truth is whenever I have thought about my plans for my future or think too hard  about anything of substance I get into a full blown existential crisis mode. This is true since 2007 and I am just 25 y'all. Do the math.

When you look at something for too long it loses all meaning. Look at any word for too long it just looks and feels wrong! That's what happened when I started thinking about life in general. 

 Almost 3 years of life done after college, suddenly you realise life has no institutional structure. You can do anything you want with life. No one to tell you what to do. This realisation was terribly exciting for like 5 seconds before it turned terrifying. 

Then I started discovering ways to just control myself and not think about things. That went well for all of 2 months before shit hit the roof lol The longer you contain the pressure inside the bigger the blast will be.

Don't worry. There is a light at the end of tunnel for this tale of doom and gloom. (even though it just might be the headlights of an oncoming train) 

I survived all of the crippling anxiety and tension by making conscious good choices. Actions speak louder than thoughts. Doing is moving. By the last quarter of the year I was in such a good place mentally that I took my abrupt job change in stride (with teeny amounts of deserved drama) and can look back at this year with gratitude. 

I feel like I have matured considerably this year. The fact that I didn't flinch by the word mature itself is a hint. (lol) I am ready to take on bigger commitments without flipping out. I thank all the humans who helped me get to this point. Y'all know who you are. I couldn't 

P for Pain

 

            P for Pain

 

                                           

P  is for pain,

is also for pleasure.

 

That drop of blood

Which is supposed to torment me

Actually excites me

excruciatingly enough

P is actually for perspective

What pain is for a masochist.

 

Pain is the paint

I brush my body (heart) with

So that I don’t have to

Process my pertinent emotions.

 

Pain is the feeling I embrace

The bruise which I keep on picking

A gift which keeps on giving.

 

The obvious physical pain of

Broken bones

The odious psychological pain of

Broken homes

I embrace it after all

only because 

 I don’t know how to exist

 as a person

Without pain

 at all.

Sishya

 

When I was a kid I remember reading this famous mahabharatha story on Karna and parasurama. Karna a Kshatriya lies to Parasurama that he is a bhramin to get trained in archery and stuff. Parasurama is very pleased with him. One day when parasurama was like napping in Karna’s lap, a scorpion bites through karna and he doesn’t flinch ( not wanting to disturb his mentor’s beauty sleep ) His hotheaded mentor wakes up due to the blood trickling down on him and instead of being touched by his pupil’s devotion realizes that his disciple can’t be a weak bhramin and must be a strong Kshatriya to withstand such pain. And curses karna. That’s the end of the story. You heard me right. You can read a more proper version of this story here.

Firstly, how flawed and cool is mahabharatha lol love it infinitely more than the boring Ramayana ( Don’t come at me haters)

Secondly, this story is pretty dark, I’m glad I didn’t understand the overtly casteist nature of this story when I was young.

What I am focusing on today and what has been running in my head is the fundamentally toxic guru-sishya bond which is so revered in our country and which is so firmly embedded in our mind that even acts of cutting your thumb (ekalavya I’m looking at you) , withstanding scorpion bites may not be sufficient to gain your ‘guru’s’  appreciation. And you just need to keep trying harder. Anything remotely resembling labour law is seen as a favour done to you. Having no work life balance is glorified. Even the good ones act like they’re performing charity. I remember an  office where my friend worked Monday to Sundays at – they used to say how lucky he was that he was even getting paid. I am not just talking out of personal experience. Sadly, I see workplace exploitation and burnout in all fields including but not limited to medicine,engineering,C.As, architects….basically my whole friend list is one unhappy overworked mess and no one seems to acknowledge that the system is rigged. They just blame the individual as whiny or a ‘millenial’  *sigh*

(359 words)

 

Shark Tank

The flow of blood

through your bod

Calming the oceans of

Your cochlea

Being a Buddha

Without even renouncing it all

Is this what it is to be god?

Just change your course

To coast along the crashing waves

For the first time

I see land

And don’t want to drown

But Is floating akin to swimming?

Atleast better than being waterboarded

By choice

And pushing a metaphor too far.

Adulting

 

Cristina yang once told Meredith something on the lines that - just because my life doesn’t look like yours (with a husband and kids) doesn’t mean I haven’t changed or grown. Although I am firmly team Meredith almost at all times, those words ring very true to me now. I am in this transitional period between college and settling down aka ‘adulting’. What are the signs of this dreary process?

1. You’re tired all the time for starters.
2. You enter the real world and it slowly chews you up -with sheer routine.
3. You end up forgetting what your dreams and goals were.
4. Your priorities shift. We just want to be peaceful now.
5. You cringe about the missteps you made in your troubled teen/ cherubic childhood days.
6. You realise you have maybe outgrown this phase and want to ‘settle down’ 

Atleast these hold true in my case mostly. I was trying to maintain the momentum of college and just have fun with my career of being an advocate. But after three years of dealing with other people’s problems, I admit that I tend to ignore mine blatantly and ‘go with the flow’. I realise now that this has made me stop growing emotionally. I am afraid of making mistakes, I don’t even like risks anymore yet I jump between one bad impulsive decision to another. That’s because I push every thought to some deep recess of my mind and it just  comes up when I’m vulnerable and I end up doing things I regret the next second.

Yet people who are around me have no clue about this because I do not give them a clue and then I hold it against them without them having a clue about it still. I have words like ‘strong’ and ‘robot’ being thrown at me and it cuts deep because I seldom feel that way but always wear that mask. I don’t know if everyone else feels like an imposter living their life, I certainly do. I feel deeply unworthy of my life but hey I am atleast trying to face it and move on from this vulnerable state by looking at it straight in the eye.

(368 words)

More-ish

Less is more?

Snores & s’mores! 

I called him a bore 

                        Now he is no more.

Wordsmith

 

The world spinning

I don’t see

When I am in the zone.

Words are all I have

To weave art

To create

 A quick restart.

Maybe it is out of fashion

To get your hands dirty

With all the ink

and  mental stink.  

Fragility is art

I cup the words with my

Tired hands

And when it stands

On its own merit

I show it off like simba.

Sometimes I just let it dry out

And adorn my wall.

Other time I just mush it

Into senselessness

And devour the meaningless of it all! 

For the awesome picture prompt by Sunday muse  

and sunday pantry in Poets and Storyteller's United

All that angst

 

The Scream by Edvard Munch

Mood - I don't wanna be by Gavin DeGraw

I studied the Geography of the room I lived in,

Every crevice and corner

Couldn’t comfort me enough.

I kept wanting more

How much is really enough?

How big do you want your cage to be?

Animal size?

Room size?

Street Size?

Earth Size?

WE will always feel imprisoned,

if that is what we truly want to be.

We will always wish to be a bird

Only to be greeted with its turd.  

We are bound by certain chains

Which makes us human,

Why not wear it as the jewel

It possibly is

Rather than choke ourselves

With all that angst?

By 

Samyuktha Semi Jayaprakash

Second Wave

 As I am sitting home testing positive for COVID, all i can think of is this virus. I am writing for the being hunted theme of Poets and Storytellers united. This Second wave has been devastating, so many of my friends and family are positive and admitted. Do your part and stay home and follow the lockdown guidelines and donate to those in need if you can. 

How do you run from a virus?

It is in the air I breathe,

The Food I eat,

The words we speak and

The fear we breed.

 

All I had to do was stay home,

But too late I have it now.

The second wave has crashed India

With a sickening spell

All I can do is watch,

Already infected,

From the comforts of my home.

While I watch my country be persecuted

By a pernicious pandemic,

Preying on the poor and the privileged  alike.

 

Virus does not discriminate,

But people definitely do.

While some of us stay at home,

Others beg for beds, oxygen and then some.

 

This is the time to for the former

Predator and prey to join hands,

Make astute amends &

Bring this pandemic to a hopeful end.

 

The third wave Is already waiting for us,

What are we waiting for?                          

Blames can be shifted after the fact,

Now is the time to act. 

 

 

The lines we crossed

Clenching till
My molar broke
And puss pour
Still biting down the pain
Of the secrets of yesterday

A peerless phantom
An invisible limp
The line you cross to know me

She shrugged.
A sardonic hmph
Was what my secret amounted to.

Felt relieved & reviled simultaneously somehow!
What now?

Black and white beauty

 Written for poet and storyteller’s united’s ‘beloved companions’ prompt.

This one is about my furry friend Laika ❤️

Paati means grandmom in tamil.

Cuckoo

 

Firmly rooted at the same spot

For Two decades and a half,

I was jealous of the monkey a lot.

Jumping between me and her

He wreaked havoc in my heart.

I yearned for bold adventure

Till one day he snapped me in half.

 

Then I began developing slow respect

For this lovely bird,

Who was content to perch on me

He enjoyed my silence &

I his comforting baritone.

He decided to call me home

And nested in my bosom.

 

We would watch double rainbows

And hilarious humans

With equal interest.

 

It was magical while it lasted

But he was a bird and I a tree,

One day I had to set him free

To migrate to new places

Will he come back?

And when he does

Do I want him back?

 

Soon I’ll be old

And I live in India

They will tie ropes on me

And start calling me goddess

And worship my bareness

Call me wise &

Never let me rise.

 

Or worse

They will forget me

And the clouds will stop cooperating

They will cut me with their axes

And make me into a table

Or whatever the hell they want.

Oh god I hope not!

 

We are what we believe

And I believe I hear in my green ears

The handsome music of tomorrow ~

 

Time remnant

 

Dedicated to you who has been there always with me in crisis - Srishti ❤️

If I knew then 

what I know now

maybe I would have fought hard 

or 

not tried at all. 

If I knew then 

what I know now

I would have definitely not have been THAT worried

Or 

Maybe I would have invented a new form of

Iknowmyfuturenow worry. 

If I knew then 

what I know now

I would have still said 

how? 

I am what I am now

By the percolation of priceless wisdom

Borne through experience 

Good and bad

Even a few milliseconds gone not

I would always wish upon my

Slightly tenser time remnant.  

So I don’t want to know

But be. 

But if I Do know

What I do now

Would it still be me?

Who is typing this now. 

Maybe a parallel me

Who can outrun to the

Edge of horizon 

And holler me back the answer. 

If I know now 

What I know then 

Won’t I still ask how?

Or worse,

When?

Or even worse,

Then?