The rod of wrath upon me, Affliction and yawp within. Surrounded by bitterness and brokenness. Weighed down by my chains. In the sea of calamity, Filled with inquiry and confusion. Holding my pierced heart, Deprived of peace and comfort.
Yet this, I call to mind. This, I recite to my soul. For He is faithful, I won’t be left in my downcast. By His compassion, He heals the bitterness of my soul. In His goodness, He will come for my unquiet darkness. In His great love and mercy, Therefore, I have hope!
You and I, Once, our paths crossed, The stars wrote our fate. Bound us on the road. Then we stumbled. Crossed each other’s path. And depart, Away from each other. Bereft of ourselves in each other. Piece of me left with you. Perhaps, we’ll bump into each other once again. Maybe you will return part of me. Or maybe this will be like it never happened. Maybe I’ll always live missing a part of me. The part of me I’ll never find again!
You and I, We are like the two faces of a coin- You’re the obverse, And, I the reverse. We may not be on the same page, ever. But always together, Always have something in common. Parting us, Would hurt. Keeping us, Should ache. Till we melt, Of the passion we have, And be in the same page.
For someone who lives on edge, On the edge of every little thing, I was brave for a while. For someone who repressed every emotion and thought, I wasn’t in a hole for a bit. For someone who is pessimist, In every aspect of life, I wasn’t that negative about it. For someone who is afraid of love, Being loved rather than loving, I survived the unnatural feeling for a minute. For someone who builds the walls high, I let my guard down for a moment. For someone who was a closed book, I left the door ajar. For someone who stopped feeling a thing, I came out of my numbness for a second. For I am that someone, Now I’m back to where I was. I no longer want to question, Who is this someone I’m becoming. I’m back to my islet of reality!
Aren’t we supposed to engrave a big smile On our faces Inspite of all the ache and turmoil? Aren’t we supposed to look happy Even when we are in a great sorrow? Aren’t we all actors of a play In clearing our face from emotion Aren’t we in rehearsal of the biggest show Denial of our pain? Aren’t we always in nostalgia For the good moments we had Aren’t we in a daydream of what life would be If we could just change a variable? Aren’t we fixated on that day or moment Where we started to see life as it’s meant to be seen? Aren’t we more scared of living truly Than facing the inevitable death? Why not then, A frown for joy. A cry for a bliss. A morbid look for happiness. Just for a change. Isn’t that the same thing anyway? Only a different act?!
I had a dream about you, Back in the day. Or may be it was real. It’s all blur now. I remember you flourishing- Spreading like a wildfire through my heart. Heating the wet moldings, In to precious shapes! Becoming the walls of my heart. Fleshed the wall of my thick vessels. Giving me the sign of life. Beating! Not once, but unceasingly. Even for a second.
I thought you were my passion. I thought you were the air I breath. I thought you constituted every ounce of me. Until you smashed me into pieces. Broken my heart like I was a cheap vase. You stumped all over my heart. O expectations! You’re not just an ache of my heart. You were once the drizzle to grow my heart. But now- You’ve become a tornado to destroy it.
Here I’m now, My broken heart is still beating. Only trying not to fall for expecting. Again-all over again!
One thread pass through, Then the other enters. Imagination vs truth, Reality or abstract. Another thread comes in. The selvage is done now. Highly a truth. Partly imagination. Weaving another thread, The sensible abstract. Tearing the physical world apart. With the magical touch of thought. Then follows the other thread, The valuable people around. The portion of our lives. The apprentice of our reality. Now we have the sense of it. Maybe not the grasp of it all. Just the hint of it!
I can hear the weariness in her voice. I know she is tired of me.
On our first days, I remember hearing the sincerity in her voice. When she asked if I’m okay, I knew she meant it. I knew it from the deep pit of my heart and from my ears. She used to ask how I am doing holding my hands, putting my head to her chest as if it was all that mattered in the whole world. I remember her caring eyes looking through me. Not just at me.
And everyday, I used to say “I’m okay”. I know that I am not. She can tell that, too. But I wanted her to hear it from my heart, not from my mouth. My soul screams, but my lips are glued. She listens. Then she hugs me. I get healed. At least for a little while. Even though I can’t be raised from the grave, I come alive just for a little longer. I start living inside my tomb winning my own death for a while. I breath a fresh hot air. Even though I hate living, the bitterness of it leaves my side for a bit. I call it the neutral world. Like the purgatory. Neither heaven, nor hell. For someone who is used to living in hell this is a slice of heaven. So I breath! For someone who is used to being hated, not being loved is a heaven of sort. (Dislike is grey shade between love and hate, perhaps.)
She asked me for the thousandth time. I replied “of course I am”. But I broke down when she asked me once again one day. I felt like she deserved the truth. She at least earned it to know how I am right now.
“Truth be told,” I said. “I am not okay! I don’t even know what being okay means anymore.” She was relieved I told her the truth, but sad for my state. She reconciled my soul and my lips, for once. She smiled while her eyes were tearing up. Then I told her my pains. Multiple pains. Things I haven’t been telling myself, things I have been covering up with the phrase “I’m okay”. I talked until my soul felt bare naked. I showed her the most ugly version of me.
She listened. Intently. I even started to wonder, doesn’t she get ever tired of listening? She listened me through her whole body. I couldn’t even hear her breathing or sighing. She heard everything until I felt like I defiled her ears with my foul stories.
She heard me thoroughly. Not once, but many times more. And me, I felt like a baby who started talking for the first time. Pouring out my pains to her ears become my customary thing. I forgot she was just a human who has her own pains, too. She became my listening god. Sometimes, I judge her for it. Who told her to poke my everyday dying body? What else would be poured out except a sour potion?
Today, “Are you okay?” She said. I was shocked. Really shocked. I can hear the frustration in her voice. Sound is miraculous, isn’t it? You can hear the emotion of the speaker along with the words. I realized it’s like an encrypted message which can only be deciphered within the rhythm of a heart. How magical!
I read her voice. I heard the deep notes within my heart. I unrevealed the code. She is worn out. She has grown tired of me. I see her ears. They seem older than her entire body. Listening to my continual painful tales has burnt her out. She never said the words. But I heard it. Words may lie, but not voice.
Now my soul is in the fire pit of regret. I saw how selfish and self involved I was. I resented the moments I felt better by telling her my pain. Does being okay means transferring your pain to someone else? Do we even heal ultimately? Or do we just learn to manage and accept our pain? Does sharing our pain to a fellow human being makes us feel less pain?
I wonder if the law of conservation of energy applies here. Pain is neither created nor destroyed. It’s converted from one person to another.(Law of Conservation of Pain)
I felt all the ache now. I felt it all more than ever. May be even more pain than the other times. The twinge of hurting someone with my pain. Is there more painful thing than that? I don’t know! I really don’t think so. It hurts to ail someone. Putting someone in affliction for the sake of momentary relief is really painful. I swear it is!
“Are you okay?”, she repeated the question when I indulged in my silence for longer than a while.
“I’m really okay”, I said swallowing my tears from my eyes to my heart. I know it will boil my heart to death. But then, it felt worth it.
She smiled at me. Unlike her tone, I couldn’t tell if she meant it or not.
I smiled back my false grin trying my best to make it look like real!
#the_confused_world
Translated from an Amharic piece by an amazing writer I know – Yonathan Getachew
If a disruption in the spacetime continuum would happen right now, can you imagine how your day would be different? If temporal anomaly indeed become a real thing, and you are aware of it, what would you be doing right at this moment? If the rest of the world doesn’t know, but it’s just you who knows there’s temporal anomaly, living the same day again and again, how do you think you would be handling it? Well, having infinite second chances on a single day would add some spice to life, wouldn’t it?
If, suddenly, time is looping, where do you want to find yourself again and again? Where do you want to get stuck? How long do you want it to stay? In a way, what is the most notable and favorite moment of your life that you want to circle back to?
Isn’t freedom a prison of kind? Even when we are free, Aren’t we imprisoned? Isn’t being in a physical prison, Is an actual freedom? Less choices, Less option, More freedom. But outhere in the air, Full of opportunities, Too many options, Aren’t we more bound? Which one to choose? Which one to discard? May be my heart is chained up, The moment the chains break free, Only then I will be free!
Listening to thy human, More often than not, Makes thee a cynic of sort. Hearkening to those, Who don’t even listen- Or think before sayin’ Elicits pain thoroughly.
Why do I live in resentment? Isn’t it because of Things I could have done, The journeys I wish I could’ve chosen, The overthinking I could’ve stopped, The moments I wasn’t spontaneous ? Isn’t it the moment where boldness left And fear took over it? Isn’t it when love becomes the enemy, And life becomes a nightmare? For once, I lit the sparks! And I’ll follow the lights. Take the risk, And move along!
I used to cry outloud, All the pain I carry inside. In time, as pain deepens, It took away my voice too. I surrender to my torment. I no longer know how to cry, Or how to carry the burden. My groans are plenty, And my heart is faint. My whole body is in ache. Drained out- almost dead!
As soon as we are fully conscious we discover loneliness. We need others physically, emotionally, intellectually; we need them if we are to know anything, even ourselves. •C. S. Lewis[The four loves]
Unabridged Manuscripts 