silent-contemplations

[silent-contemplations]

I Want to Cry.

Sometimes, I want to cry... and I don’t mean shed a few silent tears, only to pull faces in the mirror afterwards, as if sadness were a crime I must atone for with shame or guilt.

No.

I want to quiver. I want my body to rattle with the sadness purging itself out of me. I want sorrow to come unclogged from the deepest corners of my marrow and mind, until my eyes run like streams and my shirt can no longer hold the flood. I want my clothes to be heavy with tears. I want to wear my sadness and feel the weight of it dampen me.

I want to marry the sorrow, and let it possess me with its passion. I wish to hear the reverberations of my cries, and be comforted by the proof of my aching.

When I cry, I want to be shaken so completely that I forget who I am, and all the stories I’ve used to hold an identity together. I want to cry a cry that shakes my foundations. A cry so raw that it scrapes the throats of those who come to hear it.

I want to cry a cry so miserable that it cleanses me.

Sometimes, all I want to do is bloody cry.

by Sonia Khanna

[silent-contemplations]

You remain alive in me.

It's like someone took an eraser and began rubbing it against the scroll. The friction smudges your name into the margins, until you became nothing more than a faded scribble.

But I remain, still reciting your name.

The lead that stains the rubber is proof that you were once here, and proof that you were more than ink shaped into a letter. You exist within me, even as a fading memory.

I plant myself deep down into the dirt, unwavering and unbent against the wind. I do not protest, but live in the knowing that I knew you, and I know that to be enough.

Even if I too will become nothing more than a scribble, a smudge in the scroll of life, I would be glad that I existed with you. But for now, you remain alive in me.

[silent-contemplations]

Drowning doesn't frighten me.

These days, time passes me by in a haze. I'm wondering where I've been and where I'm heading.

I'm hoping life drops a heavy blanket over me as I sleep, covering my vision with darkness' expanse. I wonder how it'll be like, sinking deep into my mattress, only to shoot back up to the surface; this time, without a body to reside.

These days, I cannot recall how I've been spending my days. I feel as though this is a whimsical dream, but my character chooses to remain in her own cage. I wear it around my head like a crown, but it's slipping down around my throat like a noose.

I wake up with a sinking feeling, as though I'm running in a pool filled with all the tears I've swallowed. The sensation of drowning doesn't frighten me, and that's frightening me,

These days, time passes me in a haze. I feel like I'm running through a narrow corridor with no escape.

I wonder, more than ever, how will I be taken away?

[silent-contemplations]

Yoghurt and honey.

The last thing I ate was a bowl of yoghurt with honey. It was 8am, and I wondered if it would taste better with some walnuts tomorrow.

Little did I know, it would be my last meal.

I've been afraid of living a half hearted life, but when my heart decided failed me, I finally understood its pain. I've been ignoring its silent calls, and now I face the consequences. Is this how it feels to be betrayed?

When my consciousness faded in and out of two worlds, I realised that there was nothing beyond this. I was staring void in the face, while coming back up for air on Earth. I saw my future, and it was darkness. This really was a rare phenomena.

When my eyes could no longer open, my hand was given back into the darkness I came from, with no promise to return back into the light.

The last thing I ate was a bowl of yoghurt with honey...

[silent-contemplations]

The day I finally chose love.

I want to wear boots on my wedding day and run through the mud in a white dress. I want it to flow in the wind like a white flag marking the day I finally chose love.

I want to go to bed that night to my lover playing piano. I've always imaged it, a room with a window overlooking a hill while he plays me to sleep. It'll be a summers day, and the curtains will dance along to the melody.

I hope to have my favourite soup for dinner. I want to see the gentle glow of my husband as he warms up the soup on the stove - and I will be brave enough to hold him. One day, I'll be brave enough to love him just as he loves me.

I want to wake up the next day with him beside me, cramped in a small bed with linen sheets. I want to watch the sun pour into our room as I begin to feel like the world was just built for the both of us.

I want to laugh at his jokes the next day over breakfast. I'll make us toast with his favourite tea, and I'll run my fingers through his messy hair while we soak in another’s energy. From that day onwards, I only want to move through love.

Where I would once run alone, chasing a dream that felt far too distant; some day, I’ll learn that I was always running towards you.

One day, I'll be wearing a dress that'll flow in the wind, like a white flag marking the day I finally chose love.

I’ll find you again.

[silent-contemplations]

When the world ends.

When the world ends and the asteroids decide to plummet towards Earth, there will still be caterpillars going through their metamorphosis.

They will not grow to see themselves as butterflies.

Perhaps that's how it's meant to be. The young will capture each phase of growth within the fossils we'll leave behind; a reminder of patience to the adventures who will rediscover us.

On the Sunday when the asteroids decide to greet Earth, you will have 'I love you' burning through your chest, with no way for its incense to leave the hollow of your mouth.

She will die, never knowing how you felt.

When the world ends, I will not have my luggage ready. I will die during my fight to live, and only then, will I'll be granted its access.

When the asteroids meet me, I know that I will not be ready.

[silent-contemplations]

Why did you kiss me?

No man dares to get this close, but if they do, it's always as a dream. Why did I meet you? You live in a place that I cannot reach.

You were wearing black, standing outside a laundrette staring at the moon. You told me you like ravens, and I noticed that you were dressed like one too.

As you began to unravel the cloth you stained with your secret, I saw that you began to cry. How did I manage to taste your tears while I was asleep?

Why did you kiss me?

I wonder if you knew I would grieve you. I'm spiralling, thinking about the last time someone ever got this close… all I could do in that moment was freeze. He frightened me.

Why do all the gentle men live within my head, meeting me in my sleep only to leave the next morning? I cannot imagine you again, and I've lost all hope to find you.

So, do not let me cry and do not come close if your only intention is to leave. My heart breaks because you kissed me... now I'm left feeling incomplete.

[silent-contemplations]

The unbearable freedom of life.

Sometimes I sit in silence without the company of words as my counsel. I've left my pen in the other room, and I'm wondering how my eyes are able to look further than I can reach. I can see andromeda; there was an image of it burned into the sky years ago.

My brothers wear linen shirts. They almost look like angels, and some of them already know they are. They often run around the garden, staining their clothes in the grass' emerald hue so they can gift it as a jewel of their love. I find beauty not in the materials I can hold, but in colours that brings me evidence of life.

I am yet to sit with Freedom. He's a vast, expansive friend who I find far too deep. Sometimes he invites me to meet him on the balcony, but I cannot bare to be alone with his depth. I've already seen the chasms through his eyes; I am afraid of the thought of falling.

When I drift away from familiarity, I am a child that is still clueless to their name. My identity is destined to be learned and forgotten, and I will learn to forget it again. Some day, my brothers will let me run around with them, and maybe then, I too will be friends with Freedom.

[silent-contemplations]

I yearn to kiss your gentle lips.

Holding you felt like holding a bouquet of tulips. It was as though God gifted me a moment with you while your flowers were in full bloom. You filled the room with your fragrance.

As we sat together, marvelling at our place in the universe, crumbling each other’s perspectives until they were molten sand, we were able to build castles in each other’s minds.

As the Merlot began to stain our lips, and the rum began to warm our bodies, I wished nothing more than to stretch time with my own two hands. I live in this moment only with you.

I have spent twenty summers in my warm nest, watching the birds fly across the seas, returning as another’s third wing, but with no desire to use mine to help another fly. Well, not until I met you.

As I held onto your arm, like a thick pillar keeping me afloat, I wished nothing more than to use the fabric of time to clothe us in this moment. Could it have drawn us closer? Would you have heard the silent words I failed to mutter? Would you have drawn closer to me?

As we sat there, with our Merlot stained lips and our gentle bodies, I yearned for nothing more than to kiss your sweet lips. My love, my love, I hope you’ll kiss me soon.

[silent-contemplations]

We speak to another through the ether.

I feel him draw closer at night, as though the red rope between us tightens - we’re children who have learned to place cups at the end of our strings, whispering silent secrets into each other’s ears.

He sends me the rhythm of the oud, and I send him the melody of a violin. The strings remind me of the subtle vibration our voices carry as they travel across the ether - sometimes, I feel my words shooting through our cosmic orb, wrapping around the oceans just to find you.

I wonder how many knots we can find across of velvet tapestry. How many times have you pulled me closer towards you, only for me to grab onto another’s string? My wrists are bloody as I’ve tried to push you away.

I swear I saw your face the other night. As I closed my eyes and listened with my chest, the faint image of you began to burn with colour. Your hair danced in spirals, your smile was sharper than a pin and your eyes were darker than any night I have ever seen. I swear, my love, I saw you.

I’ll whisper a gentle secret across our crimson string tonight. My love, talk to me.

[silent-contemplations]

Yesterday, you were a word.

I wish I could pick on the words I write. Do they feel pain too? Do they know whether I’ve weaved them into a flower crown or a thorny rope?

Have the words I’ve written befriended their neighbours? Has ‘fire’ befriended ‘thunder’, has ‘bitter’ befriended ‘sweet’? Do they repulse another, or are they magnetised?

I wonder whether the words feel me. Do they see me as the blood that runs through their veins? Do they feel big when I mutter their sound into the microphone? Do they see me as their instrument?

Or, am I a slave to their desires?

I wonder where the words lived before we met. Were they watching over me as I took my first breath, far before they, themselves, were birthed into a poem? Do they laugh at me as I try to capture them in ink, or do they cry when I forget them in a fit of sorrow. Do they tease me by dancing at the tip of my tongue before disappearing into a dark corner of my mind?

I wonder whether words were built to be weaved into flower crowns or thorny ropes… regardless, I think a poet will wear them both.

[silent-contemplations]

What am I being prepared for?

These days I’ve been waking up with a tender longing in my chest. As though love strokes it with a white feather as I’m asleep, so I can feel it flutter as I wake.

Sometimes, the longing feels heavy. I feel my heart pushing itself back into my spine, pulled down by the weight of the pearls that form within its dark corners. I almost feel as though I’m dying…

I’ve been spending months alone, tending to my own soil, getting my hands messy as I try to pull out the weeds from my subconscious. Day and night have blurred into the same thing.

The sun pulls my flowers out of the dirt, and the moon guards it against creatures who dare to feast on its roots.

I’ve built a wickerman. He’s my only friend. He almost reminds me of myself; skeleton of which Gods reside. Maybe my God is settling onto Her throne, pushing the cushion of my heart in all directions as She settles onto Her velvet seat.

These days, I feel my heart pumping the syrup of longing and love within my organs. I wonder who will feast on its meat? Whose sacrifice am I? What am I being prepared for?