kuroz-writings

[kuroz-writings]

Thoughts on the past few days.

KUROZ-WRITINGS

It may as well have been a dream. Or a nightmare.

To want something so much as unconditional love. To want someone who doesn’t shy away when they see you, in disgust. Who doesn’t say I love you only to leave you to die in the moments learning up to your demise. Someone who doesn’t stab you in the back at any moments notice. To want a comfortable life in a safe space.

I thought the same. I wanted the same. I want the same.

But, every time I look out into the world, right when I’m at the cusp of getting it all, it’s dragged away from me like dead bodies.

War was a thing of my existence. It was something I lived in constantly, be it with the family, friends or the rest of the world. I could never be without its conflicts. It’s what puts me at home.

Love, true relationships, moments of peace have no place in my life. Even still, I am desperate. I tear away at the curtains of my windows with a glimmer of hope that I’ll find community one day. I haven’t yet. I might never.

Ultimately, everything, even that which pertains to god, is conditional.

[kuroz-writings]

When you open C.AI while listening to “It’s all coming back to me now” by Celine Dion, and you just end up with the sweetest, most wholesome scenarios with the craziest, f**cked in the head characters.

Vanilla and fluff is titillating when you’re usually a freak. 🤷🏽‍♀️

[kuroz-writings]

One Spring Day

KUROZ-WRITINGS

One day was all Afforded to me One day in the Spring sun One day where All I saw was you One day to meet One day to eat One day to rejoice One day was not Enough and you You knew You knew how I missed you I needed you In my life Protection denied Stability denied Love conditional My mother alone But thirteen Going on You left Taking another Pleasant woman’s hand Dust collected Over my bones That I revealed From your Judgements This one day Compare me to the Deadbeat cousin Forget my trials And fruits of my Struggles The only child The female child The abandoned one Forget my identity Forget my experiences Forget my intelligence Forget my preferences Forget my legacies Deigned to marry Whomever you decide Yet with this entitlement you wield Don’t you realize, control Is something you can’t have? If there is One thing I learned I do not have you My father But I have shataakshi on my side

[kuroz-writings]

KUROZ-WRITINGS

The Formed Feeling (Pt 5)

A chill passes through my bones, goosebumps peaking all over my skin. I whisper to myself softly, “What happened?”

I was sure at first that the only sound here was me. Everything was blanketed by the fog outside.

…Thump…Thump…Thump…

I can’t move. Cold sweat forms and travels down my face as I freeze. Those were footsteps. Heavy. Loud.

As they get closer, my jaw clenches harder and harder. My breathing softens. I want to hide away. Meld into the wall with its scratches and be long forgotten, unseen and unheard.

…Thump…Thump….

This thing stops behind me and breathes a gust of air to the side of my face. I close my eyes slowly. If I move, nothing good can come of it. It’s claw wraps around my shoulder, nails nicking my skin. I feel three… protrusions. As it moves its mouth closer to my ear, its bones click in a series, like a line machine. “Fa…lit…” it sneers. I fight back tensing my shoulders. I cannot move. I must not even breathe.

My eyes dart down slowly, and through the side of my gaze I see sharp, talons emerging from knobbed long fingers. The cuticles were red like old blood and grew into a gradient where the points of the nails turned black.

The fingers retract quickly from my skin. It steps from me, thumping away, each step followed by a drag, as if its feet were so heavy.

I stay still, as the thing makes its way past me, and eventually turning out of the hallway. The large Mahogony door, the entrance to Yash’s cabin—it slowly opens, its hinges screaming at me.

Creak…

…and like a punch to the gut, slams shut. Hard.

For a few moments, I stare at the scratches. Finally, I breath out, and with knees buckling, I collapse to the floor, hand reaching out the wall in front of me, body needing support.

[kuroz-writings]

KUROZ-WRITINGS

The Formed Feeling (Pt 4)

Yash wasn’t the cleanest person. Given her hobbies she’d be covered in mud, sweat and scum by the end of the day. Her surroundings would reflect that.

But this? This was different. The glass coffee table she had was in pieces, parts spread on the floor. Her dishes were still in the sink. I could smell them. Old and greasy. I step in gently, passing the broken glass as best I can without getting cut, to the kitchen where the sink was. Water filled it to the brim. Half washed plates and cups sat in there, turning the water a muddy green. A fly sat on top of one of them, silently watching me back with its strange eyes. I turn to my left, looking down the hall leading to her bedroom. A painting on the wall there was crooked. Next to it….scratches. The wall paper frayed from the cuts, popping up towards me as I walked to it. As I reach out, feeling them under my hands, how the wall dipped into their grooves, I could tell. They were deep. Something was here.

Part 3 linked below:

[kuroz-writings]

KUROZ-WRITINGS

The Formed Feeling (Pt 3)

It smelled welcoming. Warm even. Like joy. Does that make sense? I suppose it did at the time. I reach forward, tracing my fingertips lightly over the wood. Swirls were carved in deeply. Little notches made till a frame and image came through. In the fog I couldn’t see any of it, but here up close, there she was. The siren in all her glory. Long locks wafting in the wind as sea slaps against her rocky perch, frothing and foaming. Above her were ravens, gliding in circles quickly as they eyes their next meal. She sits, looking into the distance at ships carrying goods and trades.

Yash was always twiddling away with her hands. there was always some project she worked on. It seems as though this door was one of them.

As I trace my fingertips over the intricate mahogany door, a slight bit of accidental pressure pushes it inwards. Just like that, creaking it slowly opened…

Inside the cabin was a mess.

Part 2 linked below:

[kuroz-writings]

KUROZ-WRITINGS

The Formed Feeling (Pt 2)

Little goosebumps form on my skin. It feels cold and damp under me. My fingers reach around, and catch something long and….furry? I sit up, eyes struggling to open.

“Ugh.”

It was just grass. I touch my face and my eyebrows knit together. My mouth has this film on it. It used to be drool. I take in the sight of me slowly.

The red substance dried, turning as if it was rust on my palms. I look up. I’m still surrounded by redwoods.

So it wasn’t a dream.

Slowly, I push myself off the ground, bones cracking as I stand up tall. I’m barefoot and covered in nicks and cuts. My gown is torn.

I need to get to Yash.

I start walking through these woods, fog surrounding me. Yash lived in a cabin near by. She was an off-grid-sustainable-environmentalist junkie. Everything she did was to survive without the help of others, especially big corporations. As I walk, memories of the past come flashing in my mind, the ground no longer soft and damp, rather turning rough. I’d reached a familiar gravel path. I continue along it.

We met in college. Back then, Yash lived in the dorm next to mine. We would get into all sorts of shenanigans. Stealing cake from the communal kitchens, pranking the RA’s, messing around with other students. We were troublemakers. I can’t even count the sheer number of times we ended up in an argument with someone else over these things. She was the one to introduce me to so many of my firsts.

In the distance, on a hill, I can see the shadows of a home. As I get closer, the fog gets thinner and thinner. Soon enough the large mahogany door stood in front of me.

Part 1 linked below:

[kuroz-writings]

KUROZ-WRITINGS

The Formed Feeling (Pt 1)

Sometimes I get this feeling, down in the pit of my belly. It’s a feeling that takes on a form. Towering and dripping with sticky dark ooze, it rests there, waiting for the right moment. It wants to claw out. Rip me up as it turns me inside out. It wants to twist and squeeze me. Sometimes…it plays with my thoughts. It…inserts these ideas into me. Ideas that are corrupt. Ideas that in the worst ways appeal to a side of me that should never be.

When I first felt this hot red substance smeared over my hands and face, in a deep daze, I had never known such relief. It felt as if this thing inside me had gone quiet, just for a moment, it was sated. The only light around me from the moon, kissing my face. The moist dirt and soft grass under my bare feet only served to add to the relief. Tall redwoods surrounded me, and my nightgown of little peacocks torn, slipping off the shoulder, hung onto the rest of me where it could. Suddenly, in this midst of this high, I could only collapse to the soft ground beneath me for a restful slumber.

[kuroz-writings]

Dark Feelings

KUROZ-WRITINGS

Sometimes I get this dark feeling again

It sits in the pit of my belly

It branches out from the pit

Jagged sharp and cruel

Piercing my heart and my brain

Thoughts washing over

Like rough tides

I turn pale clutching my sails

Fingers shaking as I reach for

The tool that can grant me a few seconds

of calm before the storm

[kuroz-writings]

Changes

KUROZ-WRITINGS

When I was younger, it seemed as though the world came to my feet, bowing down and blessing me with auspicious circumstance. It appeared my rule was truth and applied to all. For a while it did. But as with all things the god eventually grows weary. And the followers begin their plans to prove the god’s insanity.

During a period of my life where the only thing to have any consistency was rapid change, my parents grew apart, eventually graduating in relationship to divorce. I was alone. While they were busy tending to the fires of their anger, I fought to fend for myself amongst my peers. I let my audacity be the offense, and my indifference to consequences of my actions be the defense. I thought it would keep me safe from others, from their piercing remarks and taunts on my personhood to constant gaslighting, and it did. It was a guarantee that I would survive them. What’s interesting about guarantees, though, is the length of their validity and credibility. They are only last so long. Very soon I would see my resolve break down from my peers overwhelming pressure, and in an instant all they said or did to me became the only truth that mattered. When other people’s thoughts of you are all that matter, two things can happen. First, you integrate their thoughts into your own and use it as like a fuel to push through with the intention of seeing your goals achieved to the end. This of course, is best done when the support system is in place. Very much like the first instance, the second involved integrating other thoughts into your own. However, it is not integrated so that you do well, but rather so that you do terribly. These thoughts turn into negative obsession, repeated in cycles with no end in sight. Just when it feels as though you are at the brink of insanity, a decision is made. This decision can take away life if you choose to go through with it. I was in the second instance. Thinking back, I was lucky at all for it getting noticed by the school counselors, as I made it a mission to rarely take on the attention of others. I wonder how they knew how badly I was. Maybe it was the way I slumped alone in a corner outside by the old tamarind tree in the school courtyard, eating my lunch in silence. Maybe it was the way I covered myself head to toe in layers upon layers of fabric, hoping I could not be seen at all, disappearing from the sight of others. Maybe it was the way in which my speech slowed and slurred when talking. Perhaps it was the way I would pull up the sleeves of my hoodie just up till an inch from my wrists so that no one could see the thin red marks of self-infliction. Occasionally they peeked through and even when I was sure someone saw, no one said anything.

On the day I decided to go through with the decision, I made sure to check everything needed was there. I ran my fingers through the rough black three-yard rope, the touch burning through the tips of my fingers. It smelled musty, like old cardboard. A short, creaky wooden stool. One of the legs was missing, but it still would work. Lastly the location for the deed, a closet. No one would know unless they walked into the bedroom to see me. I pulled on the light switch in the small space and set everything up. My letter sat outside on a dresser where a year prior I had haphazardly placed and arranged the idols of our gods. They stood quietly, keeping the envelope in which the letter remained safe and nicely upright. I lit a rose incense stick, making sure to watch the first ashes fall into the plate of its stand before putting my palms together.

“Namaste.”

I opened the window, letting in fresh air, and finally went back to my little set up. I hung the rope to a hook and tied the characteristic knot before stepping onto the stool, rocking back and forth, side to side. Silently I looped the noose around my neck and tightened it. In this silent moment, time slowed down. The world was quieter but also louder. All I could hear were the little ticks of the clock hands moving, the lightbulb hanging from the ceiling buzzing, and the wind pushing leaves against each other. At the same time, silence was not just with me, but all other life outside. No birds tweeting. No car gears shifting. No people chattering. It was just the rope, stool and me.

Taking a deep breath in, I kicked the stool from beneath me lightly, enough that it toppled over with a loud clack. With ground swiftly disappearing from under me, I drop, hanging a foot above ground. My mother entered the apartment calling for me endearingly.

“Babula, I got some cake from 85 bakery!”

My only instinct to respond, I only let out a soft hiss of air, unable to speak. It’s hot. My feet twitch. I want to tell her that I can’t eat it. That I won’t be able to lose weight that way. That I’m too big. That I need to diet. I want to chide her and resent her. I’m stuck. Time starts up again, moving faster now. Her steps are soft, but I can still hear her. It’s going dark. The last thing I hear from her:

“Where is that idiot?!”

I don’t know how I came to, but when I did, I was in her arms in front of the dresser. The noose was still on me but loosened. She held me close like a porcelain doll that had just broken, and she couldn’t put the pieces back together. The letter was still in its envelope, untouched, sitting up as nicely as it had before, held by the idols. It was still quiet. She wasn’t saying anything. I didn’t either. I was ashamed. I closed my eyes and rested in her arms, letting sleep take me.

In the following days, I gardened. I stayed home, away from school. The feeling of soil in my hands, on my feet. The smell of it after watering. Watching the seeds bud and sprout into something other than its firstself. Grow and expand. I spent my time out in sun with this garden. When it rained too hard or the wind was too rough, I stayed alongside it. I was silent for the time my mother was near. But when she wasn’t, I would speak to the plants. It sounds ridiculous, but they understood me in their own way. I told them stories, prose, and sung songs to them, something not too far off from what I’m doing right now. I gave them affirmations. Soon the garden was all lush greenery and not a spec of brown remained. In my family we have a goddess of fertility, harvest and war whom we worship. I owe a lot to her.

[kuroz-writings]

Prosperity’s Queen

KUROZ-WRITINGS

Gold sits in your hands Silver in theirs I hold only dirt You say I am blessed By Prosperity’s Queen Her palm on my crown But Prosperity runs away Her hand fleeting My crown cold She arrived once Stars spun in her gown Promises dripping from Glittering lips Her words like fog Dissipated with The rising sun I reach out to her Unable to touch Her image like an illusion Promises stick around Wrapping around Burning my skin Blessings mean nothing Lethargy takes over My body chained By false promises Gold sits in your hands Silver in theirs I hold only dirt

[kuroz-writings]

Come Rest

KUROZ-WRITINGS

When hope is lost When the wounds don’t do much When blood spilt isn’t enough Come to the Hills Come to the forest  Rest under Prithvi’s Canopies On the green blades bursting through  Her dirt See the light peek through Into her shadows Let Surya’s rays kiss you And heal you Family Friends Others May not be with you Darkness may cloud Your Buddhi But come  Rest with us anyhow  Breathe

[kuroz-writings]

Aaji

KUROZ-WRITINGS

During hot summers I often think about Aaji. Her shaking wrinkled hands. The way the skin was thin enough to see her green veins but was soft enough to not pull away. How warm her hands were when she held my little ones. How she welcomed me with open arms and a smile. She somehow smelled like rain, all the time. We would sit on the cold, tiled floor of the flat and as she cut bright yellow mangos for me, the juices would dribble down her hands to the ground. She never knew a word of English and I could never speak my mother tongue properly, yet somehow in the time I spent with her, in the silence, I was content and understood that we were the same. 

I remember when the time death came for her. I wasn’t allowed to say goodbye. Something about family feuds being enough to put such rules in place… I think life would be the same anyhow. If I was allowed to say goodbye, see her one last time as the cancer consumed her, she would have still passed away, and I would still cry in the middle of the night when I miss her. I would still think of her. Her shaky hands. Her white ringlets. Her pale wrinkled skin. Her warmth. There does not go a day where I do not. Every time I look in the mirror, I see her in my features. I see her in the way I stand. In the way my eyes crease at the bottom when I smile and in the way my lips curl. 

My Aaji was an intelligent woman. Even if you could not talk to her, you would see it in way she carried herself, in the way she acted and treated others. You could see it in the gleam of her almond eyes. She had a way of teaching lessons without needing to say a single word. 

[kuroz-writings]

A House's Walls

KUROZ-WRITINGS

Etched along these walls are the memories of you Dark shadows of the past burnt against them No water No soap Could ever rid you of these walls These cursed walls made of skin Your fingers traced along each curve of my home Your lips kissed each wound Each one serving a reminder of how you used to be When this house started to rot Started to break Started to flood You tried to fix it, at first Though now you sit  Now you break it more Now you flood it on purpose Leaving it to rot I no longer feel at home

[kuroz-writings]

The Device

KUROZ-WRITINGS

These chains tighten And carry me All day All space Exuding from the device Fated to never  Have freedom Who is there  on the other side? Red runs  Pools under me “Listen!” To the device “Watch!” The device “Feel!” With the device These ears These eyes This brain no longer mine Oh tell me Where am I now? Who is there  on the other side? “No one”

[kuroz-writings]

Wish Upon a Shooting Star

KUROZ-WRITINGS

Be quick to wish upon the star As with each step down it takes the gifts offered are raked This star is not like any other It shines bright It shines strong Its eyes are wide Its smile is happy Be quick to wish upon the star As with each step down it takes the gifts offered are raked This star reaches earth It waits on its dirt For its rebirth Into something great Be quick to wish upon the star As with each step down it takes the gifts offered are raked This star has none to give Its shine washes Its strength wanes Its smile falls Be quick to wish upon the star As with each step down it takes the gifts offered are raked All the gifts taken Wishes are made All it had dropped and laid This star is broken