“I didn’t mean it” – Nayana Nair

I did mean it all,
I just didn’t want you to know.
My momentary courage-
the result of my long sleepless nights,
let’s agree to call it my foolishness.
For I won’t do anything as preposterous as that ever again.
I won’t expect much from you again,
not because I was at wrong.

Even though it was the only thing I could do,
I regret it so much.
I hate myself for trying to believe in you,
for pushing myself to do the right thing
for your sake.

As always you eat fast and cut me off.
As always you have somewhere to go.
There are too many people whom you must keep happy.
Today I won’t throw everything on my plate for you.
I won’t come to door to see your cold back.

I wish I could go back to the dreams
where I told you about my life, about my pain
and you held me as I cried,
where you took me to the doors of my new life.
But instead all I see in every face is your face.
In your face all I see is my pathetic self
who wanted to lean on someone like you.

“How people live” – Nayana Nair

I sat there crying.

–

It hurt to know,
how people live,
how they smile,
how they could look at each other,
how they felt welcome wherever they went,
how they could sing along
and not be reminded of all the sadness
that song carried in itself.
How my desolate riverside
was their ‘beautiful view’,
their ‘venue for celebration’.

–

I saw it and cried
for I realized
that this life could never be mine.
I cried because I realized
something must be wrong with me
to not want this life.
I cried because I couldn’t understand
how to set things right.

“Connecting Flight” – Nayana Nair

I hold my fist close to my heart,
I hold your hand tighter than ever.
How long has it been since we last saw each other?
How long before we meet again?
These few hours that separates
our periods of separation,
these hours have become minutes,
have become question marks
that we pretend we can’t see,
have become the silhouette
of the better women of your stories,
have become the words I never got to hear.
They remind me of your skin that bloomed and withered
without knowing my skin.
I have told myself numerous times
that it doesn’t matter.
I have tried my best not to be bothered,
but it is becoming more difficult
to feel that I am still loved by you.
And again you kiss me with caution,
hold me close, only to let go.
Again all I see is you
moving towards something I cannot understand,
leaving me in a life that I cannot accept.

“Ever If We Try” – Nayana Nair

How long can we stay at sidelines
and watch a flower being crushed.
How many can we save even if we try?
There are many flowers on numerous path
and there are many people who have places to go.

“Show You Around” – Nayana Nair

Let me show you around.
This place that you think as mine
will soon be yours one day.
Especially because you will want to own this mess
more than you want to own my heart.
And though my eyes might roll
at the sound of the word “own”
but that’s just how things are.

One day we might yearn for each other’s glance.
And slowly with unsure lips we pray for more-
for some sweet words, for a secret to keep
for happiness of a day, for hands that don’t let go.
And soon with love drunk lips we demand more-
for reasons, for time we never seem to have,
for guarantees, for becoming better than what we are.

And that day when you will have all that you demand
and still feel like I have not given it all.
Come to this room, and see this mess.
These old clothes, old words;
these unwashed plates with leftover moldy attention.
And realize why I don’t want you here-
in this museum of what I was.
This is not the world I want to share with you.
Can’t we build a better one.

“Find it Red” – Nayana Nair

They make me grow a forest of hate
and leave me there to die.
They give me tiny drops of love
so for getting more I can try.
So that I try and know the taste
of the words that are stamped on my existence
by the eyes of those
who decide what I can be and where I can go.
They tell me all the thing gone wrong
just because people like me shouldn’t be born.
They slash my skin
to check my blood
and are disappointed to find it red
like theirs.

“Take a moment” – Nayana Nair

Can we take a moment
and applaud ourselves
for being almost good,
for hiding what needs to be hidden,
for not abandoning what-we-are-not-proud-of,
for letting it live in a world of its own.
Some beautiful creatures cannot live
in the harshness of this world.
We are not locking it up in dark cells
but are setting it free in a world
where it can finally breathe.
A suitable compromise
when we cannot let go of this world
or ourselves.

“Sway” – Nayana Nair

The only word I kept under my tongue
my name – and yet it is dissolving
into the fog where all things are lost.
As the weight of my name slips
from my mouth,
I feel how latching onto anything is
a suffering.
I feel how letting everything go is
also a suffering.
And I keep swaying in the currents of
wanting everything
and wanting nothing.
I am living
but I do not know what to do with this world
or with myself.
I have no answers.
Words do not have much meaning
on the lips of someone
who has been abandoned by every word.

“Days to come” – Nayana Nair

The trees don’t whisper,
don’t console me with lies
that they have heard too many times.
They tell me that this sorrow won’t go away
atleast not without me.
That there will be days I will look at
the empty chair opposite me
and my coffee would taste of tears.
Days when I would wake up
with a blanket of despair over me.
That I will stop at certain words
and certain names,
and feel too broken in this happy world.
That I would stop taking certain roads.
Stop going to certain places.
So that my ache in my chest
won’t eat me up.
There will be day
when I would have given up
on all that I was.
And sure enough
the sorrow went away,
taking away everything we were.

“Home” – Nayana Nair

I will give you a list houses
that once used to be my home
and addresses that are the only memory
that has not been blurred
or manipulated by my mind.
If you ever want to find me,
go there.

You will see the line of trees that
framed my sunrise
and almost dry riversbeds of
round white stones, where
I slipped once (or more).
You will see the duststorms,
and the heavy rains
I stood in.
You will see the the intersections,
I could never quite cross.
But all this you see,
is not me.

If you want to find the ‘me’,
‘me’ that I do not know of,
that I cannot give you,
go there.
And look for windows I sat by.
Look for the cold floor I lied on.
Sit there and think of a girl
who never felt quite like a person,
who could look at what lay ahead
and know
that neither the path, nor the journey was hers.
Who only wanted a room flooded with
gentle light of drowning sun,
and songs that could make her sadness beautiful.