“Easy Girl” – Nayana Nair

in my cramped world
you find a place for yourself.

you become one with all the bright things
that i collect at the cost of breaking myself.

as you smile, i wonder
whether you have a thing for girls
who have forgotten the taste of truth.

i wish you do.
i would like to love you once,
before you learn to hate girls like me.

this room was gift from my ex
whose hobby was to be loved
by the one he wrongs.

but it is a story for another day.
my story with you is not that deep.
you don’t need to know
that my corners of my lips are ripped
from smiling while being hurt,
that they still hurt when we kiss.

it kills the mood.
it kills me a bit, to be honest.
all your words, the beautiful things
you want me to have, want me to be
they are enough
for me to love you for a while.
it is enough for me to forget
the demon i see in you.

aren’t i an easy girl?
one day you would hold that against me as well.
i fall for you knowing that.

“Surely, I will love you” – Nayana Nair

The memories I burnt away
have turned into spirits, into thoughts
that hold me back from naming and keeping this happiness
that sits at my doorstep, waiting for my love.
And though the shadows of my past are tied to my legs,
though they rattle on empty roads
and never let the the dust of my life settle.
But ‘it is not so bad’ is also a sentence
that I have learnt to say with ease
and I sometimes even mean those words as they leave my mouth.
For there is a doorstep where a heart like yours
waits for me to heal, your wait makes the plant of trust
grow in my heart again.
Every morning I find myself, my lips
a bit closer to the the words
that only you deserve to hear.

“Red Sonnets” – Nayana Nair

red sonnets.
every morning,
you always gift me red sonnets.
and i always kiss you back,
the color of my lips fading
in front of acts of affection.

–

i put them on my bed
as i sleep on the floor.
i stir my soaking noodles
with a branch broken
from this bunch.
i bite the sides of my mouth
make myself cry a little bit more.

“Ending the Blue Days” – Nayana Nair

as i walk among all that should be ruins, i feel humbled. i feel stupid to think that these small sorrows of mine are something that could end this world.

i find another overused word on my lips again – promises. they remind me of promises. they remind of having something more important than ones own life. what does it even feel like to have something like that? do i even want to know?

i wonder who dreamed of a place like this, where all the birds seem to be running away from same things as me.

here, maybe here, i could forget all that i shouldn’t forget. here, maybe here is where my endless toil, my yearning meant to take me. this is good place to end, to kill my love for this world, to kill the hate i have for myself.

“December Moon” – Nayana Nair

I could no longer taste
the nameless fruit
that I held in my hand,
that I hid in my mouth a moment ago.
I fled from one home to another.
I sewed my heart to another
even when it pained.
I tried to find myself back,
pry out my heart from the cage of love
even when I was happy.
I wanted to miss someone.
I wanted to call out a name,
so that my life may not feel empty.
Since I had many names on my lips,
I came to know that the emptiness of my life
came not from the lack of people I loved
but by the lack of people who treasured me back.
So I let the fruit fall to ground.
I let my hunger gnaw at the my own skin.
I forced myself to think of myself,
by hurting myself,
by asking myself to forget.

“Absolutes” – Nayana Nair

From my grip I lose
yet another word-
now alien to my lips and life.
From the corner of my eyes,
I watch it die the same death as me.
Now the stories I told myself have become
a little more unreasonable,
when the words and ideas that
I took as absolute
turned out to be just shape-shifting feelings,
the echoes of my lives I could have had.
Is it possible for a voice to be a mirage?
Can it sound more real
than the world trying to get rid of it
Could it be that my hands,
my eyes were always empty?
Or were they just filled with wanting,
a wanting only for things that cannot be obtained,
that cannot be denied,
for they do not exist?

“All Over Again” – Nayana Nair

All that led me in life-
Sometimes towards you,
sometimes away.
My pride, my greed.
My sense of right
and my lust for wrong.
All have left me alone in life,
as you breathe your last.
Struggling to be free from me.

…

Your eyes found me hiding
in the truths I created everyday,
so my lies didn’t become apparent to myself.
Maybe because of that you have been tied to me
by what I now know as love.

…

The questions
of deserving love,
realizing love
no longer haunts my mind.
I wish I could go back to the world
where you breathe,
where you smile,
where you lips, your love, your tears
do not know my name.
For I know,
even if I could do it all over again,
it would all be the same.

“Smiling Fate” – Nayana Nair

The time that burnt your lips blue,
only burns my hair white.
It burns everything so fast
that the image of your smile left in my heart,
could only be my fate smiling at me
and showing me what I can’t have.

“Eroding Structures” – Nayana Nair

I checked my diaries
for the hints of regrets,
for the eroding structures of demands
I once made from life.
I checked my skin for the trace of scars-
the remains of the unreasonable
yet necessary decisions.
The sharp bleeding memory
of the blade,
of the hatred I inflicted on myself.
I checked the outline of my mother’s lips
do they finally approve of what I am.
While I eat all three meals
that were supposed to keep me full,
I wait for the forgiveness that never comes.
The pardon
that my heart
(half eaten by my self loathing)
can never grant.

“Sleeve of Silk” – Nayana Nair

An ornament blue that reminded me of your eyes.
The sleeve of silk that had finally felt like mine.
The black of my eyes, the blood of my lips.
They took it away one by one.
While you looked on
almost happy to have avoided my fate.
My life became colored with
a dazzling red of sun
being devoured by sky and sea alike.
And no flowery word you use
to soften the memory- of what I felt
and what I suffered,
could remove me from the hell that I was thrown
only for you to climb out.
Maybe you never considered
how I had to pay the price for your dream.
Maybe you never thought of me
when you walked the evening roads
lit with the warm light of possibilities.
Maybe that’s why you stand in front of me
asking why I am bitter.