“50 goodbyes a day” – Nayana Nair

There are no dances waiting for us,
no innocent moments of sunlight,
no darkness or headlights striking our windows,
nothing worth the wait.
We are stranded here in this life.
We are stranded on a planet
far away from our home-
a home that becomes more and more beautiful,
the more we are convinced there is no way back.

Here the days are longer than our lifespan combined.
Here we record 50 goodbyes to ourselves a day.
The air, the hurricanes,
the rain, the smile,
this peace of mind
are all just luminescent chemicals
that delivers more than its promise
of a near death exhilaration.

The rainbow of lies is our constant sky
the friend we cannot live without.
It is the only thing
that helps us live with the dust of betrayal
that settles on the clothes left out to dry-
another thing we much dust away and forget,
another thing we must do to be called a “good sport”.

I sit here knitting another version
of my beautiful glorious past,
another tribute to the world filled with rare ordinary
and you sit across me
complaining about what the world has come to
as you paint my brain to match the new you-
one less insecurity in this perfect world.

“New Scarf” – Nayana Nair

knitting-with-pink-yarn1

What really happens
when I untangle my lies
from my heart?
Could my heart bear the harshness
of cold glance?
Could my fingers really stop
knitting a new scarf of falsity?
There are better questions out there
that cannot touch or hurt me.
There are stories
where God has planted my struggles
in life of others-
for me to witness,
for me to relive,
for me to cry,
for me to heal
for me to forgive myself.