“Towards that lesser life” – Nayana Nair

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Once I was told
by my own shattering image
that I would learn to laugh at this moment.

It was not a pleasant sentence to hear.

It reminded me of all the sentences
that are manufactured in the factories of peace.
you will forget this bruise.
you will forget those words.
you will forget this love.
you will forget this face.
forgetting is what you really want.
far away from every “here” is the place you want to be.

It reminded me of all the meaningless words that were born
everyday in the mouths of strangers –
words that awkwardly held me not knowing who I am
or why I must be consoled
but convinced something in me should be put to sleep
before it learnt to cry in the audible ranges of pain.

There are too many words in this place.
Too little heart.
There are too many people who look like they have known pains
that I might never have.
But they are the same ones who want to bury things
that are only broken.
So I am going to run
towards every “here” out there,
towards that lesser life filled with loss.
A life where things that are lost are allowed to matter.

“Temperaments and Thoughts” – Nayana Nair

We once loved this world
more than ourselves.
Now we just like everything
only as much as our own temperaments and thoughts permit.

The oranges reminds him of view from his broken home,
the sour taste of everything that should have been beautiful.

The glowing beads fill my mind with the images of meaningless gifts,
the faces of men and friends that always fall short
even in the face if my plummeting expectations.

Going out of our way to hide
is the measure of our love somehow.
We sit across each other for every meal
and talk about things that make sense,
everything and anything that can’t cause more harm
than the things close to our heart have already done.

I feel the rustle of a world buried deep in me,
he must feel the same.
But the world that is lost and the hope that is no longer mine
can only do so little.
There is a happiness that doesn’t look enchanting.
There is a kindness that isn’t grand.
There are things only we can be for each others
even if there are thousand things we can’t.

I would have told him “I love you”
if I didn’t know how hearing these words
have only made him cry.
He lets me love within the boundary
of my temperament and thoughts,
he stands by these walls and knows why they are for.

“Reply Button” – Nayana Nair

This where my moment of collapse,
where my undoing starts.
Me, sitting in front of something that I used to love,
something that used to carry a part of me.
Me, in front of bookshelves,
looking at the list of movies that broke open my heart,
moving my hands over the quotes
that I took pains to scribble
on everything I own,
half-hiding behind the high dining tables,
not really eating,
not really listening,
making cracks on my glass skin
with the fork that has forgotten how food feels,
hesitating to touch that reply button,
hesitating to hold his hand.
“i am empty, i can’t find in myself the will
to love anything in this world”, I want to say.
But it would be so unfair
to break another’s heart, only because I have lost mine.
But won’t it be equally unfair
to give someone hope with my meaningless smiles.

“Collecting Meaning and Beauty” – Nayana Nair

I am stacked with all that belongs to you
and nothing that you have feels yours.
It is as if you were busy finding things
that didn’t look like you
and hoped that if you surrounded yourself
with all kinds of right
then your fault that people talk about
could find a mirror to fix its face.
Or maybe
you just wanted to welcome everyone in this mess,
like you welcomed me,
and leave us in this ocean of objects and words
of overwhelming meaning and beauty.
So that after an absence of million years
that ticking clock forgot to register,
when you come back to find us
and ask us how we take our tea,
we could see your meaningless broken smile
as the only hand that can save us from
losing our sense of self,
losing the idea of what we are
that we had barely put together a downfall ago.

“Loose me in a storm” – Nayana Nair

The paint will flow onto these papers
that have been starved of purpose and meaning for long,
and they will loose themselves in the meaning
and they can be never written on again.
Look at this meaningless morning
in hours that don’t need to be filled.
Hold my hands one last time
before you give me a name, a meaning
and loose me in a storm of expectations.
Look into my eyes and I will do the same
let’s give each other a memory of light
to search for and suffer for in that storm.