A familiar longing haunts me,
for a face I've never seen,
a body I've never held
and a mind I've never known.

You, my darling, see me like no one else.
Every blemish on my face—a work of art.
The way my curls refuse to comply
makes you smile.

You, my darling, hear me like no one else.
All my thoughts are sacred.
All my jokes are funny.
All my woes are real.

You, my darling, fail to hold me.
You just stare when I cry,
look at me with those piercing eyes
when my clothes don’t fit well.

And when the lights are off,
you disappear.

I will see you again in the morning—
if I survive the dark.

My darling,
life is hidden in the maybe’s.

Maybe you are looking at your phone,
knowing that one message can
change it all.

Maybe you are feeling my absence
when you look at the sea.

My darling,
maybe you are overwhelmed
and don’t really want to hurt me—
but do it anyway.

Maybe you wish things were easy.
Maybe we don’t fit.
Maybe it was too good to be true.

My darling,
life dwells in the maybe’s.

Maybe I will be right here
if you come back.

My happiness is in my hands
But I've realised
It slips through my fingers
Like sand

I was unsuspecting of love.
You sang my name
and reeled me in.
You called me pretty—
my teen self felt seen.

I wanted to write about sadness,
but you turned it into sunshine.

Now I see you,
walking back slowly,
alone.

I stand at the threshold,
waiting to be chosen,
as you did thrice before.

My mind says you are right.
This happens all the time.
Happiness and love is the sky.
You, my dear, are the ground—
ground that is dark,
wet with
buried dreams
of what love could’ve been.

I was born with abundance of love.
It has found spaces all over my body—
in the way I tie my hair,
in the way I make my bed.

It spreads to my family
through snide remarks, inside jokes,
shouting matches through the roofs.

This love reeks through the faucets,
in the ground that makes the flowers bloom.
The shade of the large banyan tree is because of me.

My love is in the cat,
the same pebble I loved basking in the sun.
The birds sing my song.
They fly away to the sky.

I was born with abundance of love—
forgiving those mean boys.
You can find it in sorrowful rhyme.
You can find it behind the eye of the witch.

Now,
now this love stays hidden,
smothered by my ribs,
underneath my chest,
with no way out.

I was born with abundance of love.
Because you don’t want it,
I will let it rot,
let it poison the flowers,
and paint the sky grey.