“Painting Summer” – Nayana Nair

.

As my teacher with broken voice
dictated another question on radius and heights
and the mountains where no snow, no season, no name sticks;
I turned another page and wrote the name of an emperor
who died even though he believed he won’t.
I smiled and tried to correct the very very wrong spelling
of a national political party that my friend wrote. It doesn’t matter she said,
when I couldn’t figure out what was exactly wrong with it.
At lunch, she leaned against the wrong window,
the one with fresh coat of blue paint,
and told me a joke which she memorized
only to remember it wrong.
I again gave her the laugh that meant nothing in particular.
But I knew she loved it when I reacted like this-
as if she is forcing a laughter out of my silent somber heart,
as if she is winning over me all my resistance.
But I was nothing like that.
I was nothing like she thought me to be.
My heart was already open. She was already inside me-
writing melodies with her soft steps beside me,
painting summer sun over every window I looked out of.
But these are things that need no telling,
there are my treasures I won’t allow her to take back,
these are the answer she will never realize.
I hand in another assignment, another answer sheet
that looks too little like me, that raises the eyebrows of people
who realize they couldn’t teach me a thing right.
I walk back to my seat wondering
if my shirt is tainted red with my love
like her back is filled with butterflies of blue.

“What I Remember (27)” – Nayana Nair

i think this suits me most-
to lose myself
and yet look okay.
god gave me a face that always looks okay
even when i don’t want it to.
(there have been only handful of days
when i want to look as miserable i am.)

i wonder how it feels
to say
“do i look broken today yet?
“i cried all night”.
i have never cried at nights.
i have never skipped a meal for my sorrow.
i feed my heart too much fats
and instant unhealthy happiness.
i cut down my green trees
and kill few birds, make a fresh trap
that smiles through my gaping wound.

i live life the only way i can.
look okay cause all parts of me are
still working fine.
god gave me a heart that doesn’t break
the conventional way.
i walk this world fearing this heart
the most.

“Keeping alive the happy me” – Nayana Nair

My day to day wanderings
take me to places and people
(and websites)
who have never known a happy me.
I ask them “am i fine today?”
and they answer “yes”.
So I search the map
for a river in a distant city to cry by.
So that they continue answering ‘yes’.
So I can continue calling this hiding a “fresh start”.

“Flower Everyday” – Nayana Nair

Walk towards me
with no hidden agendas,
only openly declared intention to use me
for gaining whatever you want.
Call it love, if only it makes you feel better.
Not for my sake.
For me, it only makes it worse.

x

Walk away
with apparent contempt
at what is left of me,
when everything in me wilted.
I know you can only love the spring and its freshness;
the gentle and the forgiving.
I understand, so leave with a light heart.
It was too much trouble anyway
to flower everyday,
to hide my sorrow every time you looked at me.
My real skin is now almost colored in the darkness
that it was hidden in.

x

Thank you for always holding my sleeve
and not my hands.
Thank you for not staying too long.
Thank you for being forgettable

“You are the difference” – Nayana Nair

On evenings such as these
when the all the withered flowers of my heart
have regained the life that once left them,
when I have known what is it to die,
when I have known how rare it is to find a road back to life
when I have known the pain of losing,
I feel even now I can try once more.
I can try to hold your hand.
I can try, I can stand at the edge once again
because even though you are not mine yet,
but the thought of days without you
seems grayer and sadder than all that I have suffered.
No, I won’t die. It won’t pain even if you don’t end up with me.
But the possibility of a life with you
has made me a bit more greedy.
I have started expecting a bit more from life
and you are the only difference
between between my now and my dream.

-ooO0O0O0Ooo-

On evenings such as these
when the soil of my heart have been dug too deep,
have seen the seasons of happiness
that never stays,
when it has known how tiring life can be
and finding my way back once
doesn’t mean I won’t be lost again.
Though the memories of your smiles
are as fresh as the ones of filled with your resentment.
I find my heart filled with nothing but you.
I am where I once was
and I want to stay here forever
always in love with you.
Praying for one more day with you.
Praying to always be the one who gets your love.
Even when you are here,
even when you are mine
I want you more,
a little bit more of you.

“All the Time” – Nayana Nair

Some part of me is lighted up today
in the light that is most probably your doing.
And when the light hits the less cared for parts of me
contrary to the expectations and images of
decay that ate me away and the dust that filled me up,
what I see is an empty expanse.
I see you ready with the tools to build me
something more prettier, something more comfortable,
something more me.
You wait for that picture to reach my lips.
But I don’t have a picture yet.
I don’t know what to build here.
I am in love with this sweet emptiness,
this fresh start that I thought I would never get.
Can we just sit here for a while in this innocence
that would be soon tainted by us.
You say, “We have all the time in the world.”
No, we don’t.