Something Something Going Through The Streets Of The Town My Mother Grew Up In. She Grew Up Here. She

there's no evidence that growth is painful.

then how do you explain the ache in my chest. how do you explain this constant urge to carve out my heart and leave it in a dark room, away from all eyes, in a place it can't be touched.

last month was so hard, so fucking difficult. but now it's over. and i genuinely can't believe i've made it this far. i can't believe i survived through all of this one poem a time. i can't believe it was just the thought of this poem that had to be written at the end of each day that kept me going on so many of these days. that it was these words that kept me alive.

'i've hated the words and i've loved them. and i hope that i have done them right' (the book thief)

i haven't been able to let anyone read all of them. they're too sad. maybe i will, one day. i know i need to. it's only for so long that you can scream on paper, that you can bleed through words. someday, you have to show someone the cracks in the walls so that they can come in. i hope i have the strength to do that. i hope it's not too late when i do that. i think, the most important thing i've learnt this month is that, you have to hope, no matter what. because that is the only thing that keeps you alive when all the light is sucked out of your life and the world feels like it's run out of oxygen. you have to hope.

'sometimes the saddest thing is to hope. sometimes, the only hope is the constant sadness' (yashodhaan burange)

day 8

6:50 p. m.

remember the feeling of the autumn sun on your face. the way your old fall playlist brings only the good moments back. the way your flannels will always smell of coffee. of collecting falling harsingars in the mornings. rose pricks and paper cuts. all the dark academia vibes. remember them.

i would like to live a small life with a small love. which is not to say it will be less. it will be all that we need. nothing too big for the world to see, just ours. no grand promises of forever. but holding you through the night will be enough.

'i would like to step out of my heart

and go walking beneath the enormous sky

i would like to pray'

i have been strangers with my words for a while now. my words, the ones that helped me let go of my pain, helped me breathe. but some things you can't let go of. you can only bury them so deep in that you won't ever have to think about them again.

some days, i think i would be alright if everyone i've ever loved, ever held close to my heart would leave me. i tell myself it wouldn't hurt. that it would be for the best. some days, i forget how my heart feels everything too much, how it can't help but hurt.

i look back at the past few months and i try to detach myself from the pain, the grief. i would go for days and weeks without thinking about it, without shedding a tear. until one day, a random thought, a reminder, a realization. they're gone. and it would hit all over again. a blinding pain that leaves me gasping for breath.

when i was a child, i would pray to god to take my pain away. it didn't make sense for me to have to feel all that. god never did, and i am no longer a child. i haven't prayed in a very long time, it makes me angry.

when grief comes knocking at my door, i turn the volume up and pretend i don't hear. i pretend it's fine until the walls start to crumble around me and grief barges in through the broken door. it holds my face in it's hands, looks into the eyes that refuse to shed it's tears and tells me, "it won't be the end of the world if you feel"

maybe not the world, but it would be my end. for how will i ever stop, once i start?

day 14

11:11 p. m.

the words escape me tonight. stranger reading this, won't you forgive me tonight? i have no words for you. but do you even listen? do you even read?

i feel like radio... except radio had someone listening to them. radio had frances and february and thousands listening to them. who do i have? does my voice even exist?

So I attach myself to people who are not those who are long gone or those who were never here and I listen to bands whose members are dead and movies that no one else watched and I talk to characters from books and stories and tell of my sorrows to the words for they don’t come to me telling me to be someone I’m not expecting me to do things I’m not capable of

day 13

11:32 p. m.

the lost feeling after waking up from a nightmare. scared of something but not sure of what. to just sleep until it all ends. to be or not to be. to stay awake or go to sleep. to sleep. to never be.. never have been. unless in daydreams. dreams far away from now. a lighter heart forgetting these days as memories. an easier breath, exhaling out these words... no longer a part of its body. but the waiting. dear heart, the waiting. how long till i breath again?

all this love would make sense if it wasn't for me

day 12

2:51 a. m.

someone, somewhere, won't you ask me how i am doing? please, won't you ask me if there is something heavy on my heart that i would like to get rid of? won't you just listen to me talk through silences and tell you what's breaking my heart? won't you please hold me tight without my having to say it? hold me and wipe away my tears and tell me it's all going to turn out fine. tell me it'll be alright so i may sleep now.