Haiku: Anti-Closure

How do you tell someone
that you don’t care for them anymore?

I guess you don’t.

Older And Wiser

Tell me what it’s like.

she says.

Does it get better with time?

I pause and wonder what to say.

Can I give her an honest answer?

That it won’t..in some ways.

That heartbreak hurts as much at 30 as it does at 20.

That you never quite get used to the pain of letting go, no matter how often you’ve done it….though you might learn the lesson of numbness.

That love and cheating and tenderness and passion will continue to turn up unanticipated…and unwelcome, no matter how clear your vision stays.

That eventually dreams will become the last survival tactic for those who don’t have God or Family or FairyTales anymore.

No, I decide, I can’t tell her all of that. I can’t paint the next decade in a pall of gloom before it’s even arrived.

So I take a deep breath and say instead…

What does change is all the things in your head.

With the pain, there will be the aspirin of reality,
a little snapshot of the last time that grows clearer with time,
the knowledge that you survived that and so this you will too.

With time, other people’s opinions
will start to matter less than your own
or at least you’ll be able to pick and choose what you want to believe.

And if you’re smart…and I know you are,
you’ll have a Plan B or at the very least…an exit route.

So I end without lies, telling her the truth…but perhaps not all of it.

And I wish there were some lessons one didn’t need to learn.

—————————————–

*Dedicated to a very young and wonderful friend who asked the question. I hope she’s reading…or perhaps I hope she isn’t.

All The Time In The World

Ah, the flush of new love!

And I was lost for words
In your arms
Attempting to make sense
Of my aching heart
If I could just be
Everything and everyone to you
This life would just be so easy

Not enough time for all
That I want for you

– INXS ‘Not enough time’

I remember it from a long time ago, a lifetime ago. I recognize it in the faces of strangers, in the anonymous words I read on my computer screen. In the poised-and-posed expressions on painted actors on screen, I read the yearning that was fed into a writer’s mind to create this.

After the pain has subsided, long after when you reach that place of not hurting anymore and past the cynicism, the despair and the feeling that you’ll never love again….what is there at the end of it? It is this…

The thought that love may never again be the raging forest fire that it once (or twice or more) was. But the burning defined you in a way that you’ll never again be the same. And the only thing that can come next is peace. Absolute peace. And there’s all the time in the world.

Love truly is a hue that taints us forever. And in the middle of a hot November afternoon, there’s a cool breeze blowing across my forehead.

Photographs

I was burrowing through my closet the other day. Buried beneath the long-forgotten scarves and shawls and tee-shirts, I found an album.

Just before he left for his first trip back home to Delhi, he asked me,

What shall I get you from there?

And I said.

Yourself. Lots of yourself.

‘Lots’??

Yes. You with your family. Your school. College. Friends. Festive occasions. Baby memories. Photographs. I want to see what the rest of your life is like.

He looked at me like I was crazy. (Those were early days after all..in the months that followed, he got used to my weird requests). But he brought back photographs. An album full of them.

Sulking

I was surprised that you didn’t care so I went away

And now I’m stunned to discover how much you actually do.

Why does my absence make you feel so much more than my presence does?

In and Out

I like to make a grand entry and a quiet exit.
At events, in situations and other people’s lives.

There’s nothing quite like making a splash since most people believe in first impressions.

On the other hand, goodbyes for me, need to be quiet,
Like they almost never happened..so perhaps it will be the same again if we meet
It could be that goodbye just isn’t a word I like
Or maybe I just like leaving behind a lingering question mark - as a final gift.

Leaving was a hard lesson to learn but one well-learnt.

~o~o~o~o~o~o~

Update:

Within ten minutes of writing this post, my phone buzzes with the following note:

From what I remember, you went out as quietly as you came in.
But you hover in ways I cannot describe.

With that last line, you just made my day!

Fear of Falling

Todd Faber, in SANDMAN: “Fear of Falling”

Sometimes you wake up.
Sometimes the fall kills you.
And sometimes, when you fall, you fly.

(Image courtesy Osho-Zen Tarot)

I’ll take my chances.

People Person

At 2 a.m. I reached the conclusion that I am not much of a people-person anyway. Why else would I be deeply annoyed by the thought of a packed social life? Perhaps the most people-person person I’ve encountered is Neil Gaiman‘s Death. And then again, nobody loves anyone else that much, do they?

To you I come at the very end
I wait for you and look for you
In all the dark crevices in the world
And in the minds of men

 

At least I know you’ll be waiting
Smiling, but waiting nevertheless
It is good to know that all the twists and turns end at the same place
And that all roads lead to HOME..and to you.

~o~o~o~o~o~o~

Speaking of which, Neil Gaiman says,

We are creators. When we begin, separately or together, there’s a blank piece of paper. When we are done, we are giving people dreams and magic and journeys into minds and lives that they have never lived. And we must not forget that.

I leave you then with a mouthful of moonshine.

~o~o~o~o~o~o~

I was just about to hit ‘Publish’ when the phone rang. We used to be classmates, with nothing in common except the classroom. But we understood each other’s silences well. Oh how sappy that sounds! But we were never in love with each other. All we were, were good friends. For no other reason than that. And that’s all that matters. He would totally know what I mean by this post, even if the words sounded strange to him.

So even if I’m not a people person, there are people for a person like me.

It's Either Forgive or Forget

Forgiveness, that elusive quality, is so not like forgetfulness.

To truly forgive would mean being able to face the truth of what has been done to you and accept it for the rightest thing that could have happened and move on.

Barring that of course, for us less worthy mortals,

Break-up

Operation

Stagnation

Frustration

Surgery

Negligence

Harassment

Ennui

Betrayal

Failure

Bereavment

Guilt

Rejection

Your pain is mine too.