“What I Remember (15)” – Nayana Nair

I think of the clothes that are too tight or too loose for me,
of my skin that doesn’t like me the way it used to.
How the mirrors in my home are hidden
by the growing towers of books.
I wonder what this says about me?
I think of the fear that I feel when I am alone,
the fear that I feel when I walk into happiness.
I think of the kinds of fear that fill my heart.
I count them for a long time
but nothing happens when I finish counting.
I wonder if knowing myself
is really the first step to solving my life.
Do I want anything to be solved?
I count the people that who no longer speak to me
and half way through I remember
that it was me who had thrown them away first.
Silence is my weapon, not theirs.
I realize I need to always hold a grudge against someone
to live with strength.
I wonder when this strength became so important to me.
I wonder when this love that felt like a lemonade in summer
actually became a commercialized product
with an expiry date stamped on it
before it even reaches our hands.
I think of my skin by which I am stuck to a world like this.
I wonder why I pretend to be better than this world by saying such stuff?
Why am I so into acting all deep and philosophical?
I wonder why I love to call myself broken even though I hate to be seen so?
Don’t misunderstand me.
I do not want answers.
Answers are painful and pointless,
answers are a tasteless end
to the struggle that otherwise makes my heart bleed colors.

“Sweet Nothings” – Nayana Nair

i crawl into another embrace,
scratch the surface of my fake love
to find something true.
hopes.
hopes.
is this what they call hope?
it must be.

the coffee turns cold as my story ends.
again i am wearing a skin i have stolen.
the one breathing beside me
has a knack for sad stories recited by happy girls,
of being a knight to one he doesn’t have to save.

me,
i love drowning the world in sadness
(the only way i can take anyone’s breath away)
i love leaving loose ends,
leaving people behind-
i call it the fear of being left behind.
i have a list of similar innocent motivation
for every mess i make, for the mess i have become.

when he leaves
i throw away the coffee he never drinks.
i get over my urge to be seen for what i am.
i dip my fingers into another color
that he might like, or at least remember.

“The End of My Sad Story” – Nayana Nair

I want to tell myself
that my sad story had ended,
that now I can write a better one,
where I won’t be suffering again.

–

But I have known myself more than anyone.
In the waters that choked me,
even when it hurt,
even when I was about to loose myself
the only thing on my mind
my only sadness was for the love I never found.

–

And there lies my failure,
there lies the source of my misfortune.
That even after everything ends,
after I have cried my last tears,
nothing would change.
I would walk into every new day
and I would only see the broken yesterday.
I would end up in front of doors
that have never opened for me.

“I keep looking for you” – Nayana Nair

I am floating towards you
against my own will.
I struggle and loose
against my fate,
against what my heart loves.
I am floating in your eyes
in spite of all my flaws.
I am happy
that you love me.

I am floating again,
floating away from you
and my heart has forgotten
the love I had for you.
But I fear
somewhere in me your are still there,
hiding at places where I won’t look.
So I keep looking you,
so that I can be free from you.
I keep looking you,
even when I don’t want you.

In my sleep,
I open a door to another dream
where I drift in the endless ocean
wearing the clothes I once wore on a school trip,
on a boat that capsized on a show that I saw long ago.
As I lay blinded by sun, by hunger, by life
I uttered your name again and again,
as if you are somewhere near,
as if you would answer.
Your name was the only happiness in that world.
Your name was my only sorrow.

“Have a Good Day” – Nayana Nair

I was sat down and told repeatedly everyday
that though the world belongs to all of us,
sometimes it is better
to step back,
to only take up the space we need.
I misunderstood it to be a lesson in humility,
wanting less, and sacrifice,
but I realize now that it was not so.
I was told to stop before I anger someone,
before someone got jealous,
or before they saw the weakness of my gender.

–

As I stand on the balcony at midnight
and hear drunk shady men shouting, cursing, and stumbling,
as they make their way to their broken homes,
I remind myself
this is what I am supposed to fled,
a person who is allowed to loose their mind,
a person who will always have excuse to hurt.
This what everyone wanted me to become,
someone who is proficient at spotting dangers,
who can conjure up the worst possible scenarios
when they hear another’s footsteps on deserted streets,
and see the worst possible demons in the face of men.

–

These days I often hear people say
that the new meaning of a powerful woman is
the one who walks into misfortune willingly,
before she is stalked and defeated by it.
Is this the only alternative to what I am living?

–

I wish that when I walked past a stranger on streets
I could smile and wish them a good day,
without having to fear being misunderstood,
without the echoes of ‘she asked for it’ in my mind.

“Fading Heaven” – Nayana Nair

You asked
“Is this what becomes of love?
When this star falls and loses it’s distance,
when it loses it’s light
does it become nothing more than a stone
to be kicked around?”

I knew better than to tell you
that the stars do not care
for such trivial things as our love,
that the stars are more than mere stones,
when they fall they will take us as well
and that no one up in the fading heaven
is rooting for our happy end.

So I stay silent,
never meeting your eye.
I won’t let you see
all the faults of ours
that swims only in my eye.
I don’t want to say things
that I don’t want to come true.
One of us needs to be blind to reality
for this love to continue.

“Reflections in Failure” – Nayana Nair

I realized in my failures
that I was not nearly as good as I thought I was
and whatever I am was not worth that much
at least not in my own eyes.

And nothing I did could change anything
unless I could see the significance
of what I am and what I do.

I worked hard.
I lost sleep.
But my efforts to become worthy of my dream
turned out to be too less.
I turned out to be too less.

But somehow I was relieved to see
that even when I was empty-handed
I knew how to find my way to the beginnings
and start again.
So I couldn’t pity myself in that moment
but feel almost an admiration for this person
who didn’t know how to give up.

“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.

“Scarier Element” – Nayana Nair

Someone told me that is how love works out for people like us
who approach love as if it is an animal that can kill us at any time
and who only move towards it
when they become aware of the other monsters that are eating up
all that they could rely on.
We only find the strength to move to a riskier spot
when chased by a scarier element.
We move only when our hope turns into our source of fear.
That is how we find all the things that we keep in our heart
and that is how we lose everything we call ours.

“What I Remember (3)” – Nayana Nair

 

somehow that is where i always found myself.
crushed between the expectation that i had from myself,
even if these expectation in no way could be ever called achievement,
even if i could fulfill them.
maybe that is precisely why i felt
so crushed when my plans didn’t work out.
it was not because i asked for something small
and didn’t get it.
but because even though i had set such
an easy goal to achieve
i was not able to reach it.
the problem with those small goals were
that they didn’t exist because i was humble
or because i didn’t need much in life, or was satisfied easily.
i set them up within reason.
i set them up within my reach.
i found them as something that could be a stepping stone for me,
as something small that i can hold in my hand
wherever i went
to remind myself
that i am capable of something,
even if it is not something great.
and that’s why i used to be frustrated with myself
that i was not even capable of the minimum.
i could say it is almost in past though.
this calculation of what i could do,
finding something smaller than my assumption of my capability,
failing at it in epic way,
and reducing my own worth in my eyes.
i can say it is in my past
because now the circle of what i can do
is so small
that it has only space for me to stand.
that would explain by blues.
that would explain a lot of feelings
whose origin i can’t seem to trace these days.
that would explain why i am no longer afraid of dreaming
but incapable of doing so.
because all my efforts are spent on keeping my feet firm on this ground
which i now know is too easy to loose.