happiness

The art of living

You were the obsession of my young years; the one who taught me much, with encouraging words; the one who listened to the secrets of this heart; you were the little that I had to give away in a season of silence.

You took time to listen; never saying a word even when you were bored. It was real, I know, your interest was not feigned because your heart was big enough to keep people in.

I was naïve pouring out my dreams of being a writer and you said in jest to dedicate my first book to you. When you went away, I was lost, for it was in your absence that I understood that I made a mistake in letting you go.  

You were no love; but a mentor; yet the songs speak otherwise; for in your absence, the heart grieved for you, made you its monarch, mulled over the alchemy of a bond that needed no words. All the songs were a way of coming to terms with a sad reality without you.

Yet you are an epic moment in my evolution; one who taught me an art of living in the moment and holding a mind like an open cup; so much that

I feel that I thank you more for what you were, in an amazing season of silence.

Reading between the lines

You felt strong when he was around; as if you could break down every rule and do whatever you please as long he was with you.

You never saw with what tenderness I had built up a dream adding years for detail across those moments of togetherness, more valuable than anything in this world.

Yet you broke my world, calling a devil of a decision, an Angel and pretended indifference to enforce what you wanted. You valued faith in god and what people thought of you.

You read too much between the lines based on the wreck that you were. But in a way, some of what you understood were misreadings, assumptions of events that never existed.

And I like the fool that I am listen to your words, looking at what might have happened if I had chosen my happiness rather than obedience.

Boomerang

You uttered your platitudes and filled this head with more throughout the years. It was as if you wanted love not to flow only in your direction than yourself.

You heard but never understood the muffled tears, the heartbreaks and the disappointments. You never bothered to see what these eyes craved for or what this mind longed for.

I who had modelled your acts of rebellion than your platitudes,see how you have wrecked lives through your emotional tugs of war, ruined any chances of happiness by your fixed rulebook and when it comes back, this boomerang of indifference, your tears at not being to handle a heartbreak surprises me most of all.

Endless

You live a life of hope that everything will turn out to be alright while I hold this mixed life with laughter and tears.

Your dreams stand apart like strangers who wait to be introduced while I plod on weary with the little that I have.

But some days when I really make an attempt to listen, I realise that you and I are not that different at all, only two names for the same endless quest for fulfilment.

Home

You have always held me back;  with your words, your written and unwritten rules, your opinions on everything, teaching me to lose again and again rather than win.

You have never given me breathing space; instead choked whatever breath I let out, holding me by the neck so much that in your absence, my words were like a fountain.

On days, when you are away, your voice enquire in subtle tones whether I have missed you day or night; and I answer that I have found my sacred space again.

Even the walls don’t hold me back any longer; the sunrises and sunsets looked splendid in the vantage point that I had, of being a demigod in my solitude.

But these days are past now; it’s again time to relearn your rules, your language and your way of thinking; do nothing except what you say; it’s time to go home.