“When we all meet” – Nayana Nair

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The silence was deafening
because there were people in it.
There was a tiny space made of granite,
a smallness born out of the spacious halls
now crowded with people.
the air stale with staring. The long moments
of confused and alienating gazes.
The wait. And for what?
Everyone knew they must speak,
only then a god will be formed,
only then we’ll have a reason to meet again.
But they were afraid of everything.
which was not really a problem.
They also felt among many other things
that only they felt and knew fear,
that fear kept only them as a pet to be played with.
They felt good and miserable when they though that.
They also felt special.
And because we were all special and doomed
and carried poetry in us to be looked at, to be listened to
we all stood there staring.
We stood shoulder to shoulder, sorrow to sorrow
trying prove to others that we knew life,
and that once, once we really did live.
But all we were seeing and feeling
under our feet, in the hollow of our hands
was that place, the house on the slippery slope,
the home we could never leave.
We were all there alone. Trying to avoid the weight
of another person who might just end it all for us
by saying something stupid as
“you are a bit too much for me”
and “this generation is not capable of love”
and “poverty is a state of mind”
Or something as true as
“this was a bad idea”,
“you do know that we will never meet again, don’t you?
at least we are all praying for that.”

“Reduced” – Nayana Nair

One of these days
I might just stop loving you
and that might just break me.
But I feel
I might be less cold,
less reckless,
and less pathetic
in that sort of breaking.
I want to be reduced to myself for once.
For once I don’t want to carry around
the magnificence of undelivered love on my shoulder
and stand outside stores with doors too small.
I dream to become the whole of my skin
rather than just the wounds that hurt.
I think only this dream can save me,
make something peaceful out of me,
make me someone harmless.
One of these days I will look at you
and nothing in me would ache,
at least not because of you.

“from where i stand, you are the only star” – Nayana Nair

Now that we have buried all the clocks,
a day passes only when our eyes meet again,
night comes only when we say goodbye.
And when I walk away from the shade of her smile,
I think that I am forgetting something,
something that would have made me sad.
But her name, her words have grown
ferociously, violently
on whatever I once was.
So it doesn’t matter I guess
what kind of person I was
till I can continue to be the person she loves.

“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.

“Closer to Me” – Nayana Nair

Now the dark corners
are the only safe place remaining.
The loveless days
are the only memory where we can rest
where we can hide from
all the passion that we wished for,
all the feelings we couldn’t handle.

You once wrote to me about the night
that hung as a curtain over your window,
about how you can’t gather the courage to see the light
until I came along and tore away those curtains,
broke your shields
so that you could see what lay beyond.
I once took pride in being the one
who destroyed all dark cells within you.

But I realized too late that you were a flower
who could only bloom in dark,
that shields exist for a reason,
that each step you took towards your fear
thinking it would bring you closer to me
was just the beginning of sacrifices
you made to stay in my world.

As I lay beside you
trying to undo my harm
trying to teach you how to forget me,
what I regret most is that
when you struggled with what you are
I was only proud of my love that could make you do all that
instead of being seeing your love
that could do what I couldn’t.

“Easy” – Nayana Nair

I am an easy person
for if you really care for me
and do something for me
that my distrusting mind cannot make sense of
for even once in your life
and I would end up thinking
that I somehow need to look out for you forever.
So, you surely understand
why I need to look unbothered and hostile.
You also must have had your share
of playing friends with all those
who are really nothing like how friends should be.
You must also have blamed yourself
for not being satisfied
with what everyone considers normal
or waited for that moment
when you would grow up to see the bigger picture.
Though my life is nowhere near its end
(sometimes I sadly wish it was)
all I have learned is to either ask for less
and apologize to the world for being so needy and small
or cut off the world with rudeness
so I at least become deserving of the loneliness
that I have to live with.

“Where I Stop” – Nayana Nair

Every few days
I feel the urge to get out
of this house that feels so full of myself.
Guilt of a comfortable life
forces me out,
so I take a stroll
through supermarket.
I wish I said that I went to a park
but I didn’t.
But I do remember going there once or twice.
Or was it a whole month of healthy choices
and healthy promises
that I knew I would never follow through.
The morning was sweet, and air was nice
and I felt a happiness I had never known.
They were probably the lightest hours
that I ever lived.
In short,
it was too much for me to take.
In short
it lured me to a different life
and asked me to change.
And that is where I stop
in front of racks of cookies
and chips,
in front of billing counter,
if front of calories I have no hunger for.
Knowing that I won’t change,
but hoping that I do.

“Turn Your Face to Mine” – Nayana Nair

The light I can always return to-
that’s who you are.
The darkness I can always sleep in-
that’s who you are.
An amphibian who moves away
from what it will always seek
sooner or later,
who seeks two things
(or too many things) at once;
dancing with and writhing in
not one but two bodies-
that’s who I am.
Turn your face to mine
and see
which monster you have to feed today.

“Substitute of Light” – Nayana Nair

Here in this night glowing with memories
placed as substitute of light in the face of storm,
I sit with all the words my body clung to
in spite of its bare, aging and passing spring.
I scratch out all the definitions of what I am
from the paper that seemed to once shine
and reflect an image that could have been me,
if only I didn’t have to live till this day
to realize what a mirror really is
and how painful it is to look into one.
Now when I write down new rules and new directions for myself,
I envision another day in future
when again I will have to strip myself
of all I believe to be true.
And knowing that a day like that exists ahead of me
makes me look at myself with certain pride
for trying again and again.

“Hiding” – Nayana Nair

The noise of the crumpled tissues walked upon
fills me up again.
Without the colors of reasons or pain
that once made it unbearable,
I envy that me who could be so passionately
sad for the someone else
or even for myself.
Now the the rivers of concern run beneath the surface of my heart
almost lost, in hiding.
(Or am I the one in hiding.)

And now I can finally be almost happy in life.