There is so much out there,
but just as much in here, inside.

The world means nothing compared to you,
Won't you make me feel that way too?

Some days I will pick up an itchy caterpillar
with two pieces of cardboard
and move it out of harms way.

Other days,
I will kick a harmless beetle
because it breathes too loud
too close to my home.

I never tried to be not nice,
but borders get dizzy sometimes
I am human on both sides of the coin
after all.

I'm in a beautiful place,
a place where the wind blows and the people smile,
the trees sway and time flies.

I am where I thought I wanted to be,
then what is this crushing feeling that won't let me breathe?

"
There are two kinds of space exploration:
One: you do with physics.
The other: you do with poetry.
The best astronauts I know
Defy gravity with words.
And it gives me hope
That maybe I don’t need
12,000 kilonewtons of sheer force
To know the universe where I belong.
"

we live in a world of concrete
who needs trees anyways?
we're happy with our gases
the ones that suffocate us
but not as much
as the fresh air.
who needs a healthy environment
anyways?
we have our hospitals
and cures to diseases.
peace of mind?
that's been eradicated completely
and quite successfully might i add.
because life's just not fun
without any complications
and in our case,
they're not even natural.

Step by step we move forward
Whispers crowd the atmosphere
With fire in our hands
and hearts torn apart
we keep looking ahead
we walk under the stars,
while you are somewhere beyond.

what is keeping me from reaching out and grabbing my dream?

your A minuses, your rejection letters, your mundane home-works,
your beauty and size standards, appropriate clothing manners
your gender roles and restrictions.

you.

and countless other things that end at me too,
but i am too angry to recall them.

i am surrounded by warm bodies,
but i crave a loving touch.
the world is fast pacing
but i feel like i am stuck.

my stomach isn't doing well, and neither is my brain
                my heart just got up from a  grave, and oh look- it's falling again.

april skies have such potential
     and i never understood why they chose to waste
it away on
r
   a
i
      n
   s
when instead the sun can become a magician
and radiate wonders when it disappears

the sun waved to me
said something about a breathtaking smile.

the moon leaned in
whispered something about sorrowful eyes.

I saw you walking towards me,
green and blue and full of life.

Flowers bloomed, the wind sighed.
They were teaching me about
love and sacrifice.

there is something unsettling in the air

maybe it's the sound of thunder rattling the windows,
                               maybe it's the lightning tearing the sky apart
      or the vibration of the earth below my feet, maybe it's her laugh.
                                        
                 ­     something is adding to that fire ablaze in my heart.

                                                                ­                  whatever it is *it scares me

i am the poem and the poetess,
with irregular rhyme patterns and
dreams in clouds brewed from midnight coffee.

i am a prose neatly typed out,
handed in ten minutes after the deadline
stained with morning black tea.

Why do I need to love myself,
when I have your words comforting me
                 like the cup of hot tea in my hands and the blanket around me
                         this cold winter night.

We are all so worthless
In this vast world.
Us,
with our puny bodies and big dreams,
when we look out into
into the infinity,
don't feel so powerful anymore.
But yet,
every time I look into a soul
I find another world,
another cosmo.
We can hold galaxies in our eyes,
and every imperfection a star,
We can feel as if
we have made a difference,
But not really.
We are yet too small.

WE'VE KILLED IT.

We’ve killed Humanity.
And don’t remember
What it used to be.

We’re surrounded by fights
And nuclear weapons
We’ve killed it.
We’ve killed Peace.

We’ve turned into murderers
Unknowingly, unwillingly,
But now the habit just won’t
Leave.

It’s become habit to
Exploit
It’s become nature to
Destroy.

A steaming mug between my hands
Paper littered around me
I sit, forehead creased,
in my balcony.
I see the sky and the ground
and I'm simply floating in between.

Rolling a pen
between my fingers
watching the hills
they look greener than ever
I'd like to sleep
I'd like to read
But homework does
bind me.

This is procrastination,
level: extreme.

My heart at times
feels like empty skies
devoid of suns and stars.
Painted with clouds,
All the blue thrown out.
Like a slate wiped clean.
Sometimes you feel so much,
that you can feel
no more.
Not cleansed, not neat, not free.
You become
Empty.

I'm afraid I'll end up living a small life,
in a small place,
and my small dreams
are just what remain.
That when I'm decaying somewhere
far underground and returning
to where I began
All I'll be is a small memory
in just another brain.
The words I've scribbled (or typed)
will all be long gone.
the people I made smile
will be all far away.
I'm afraid of when
my small spirit starts to fade.

Sleep holds no comfort
Burning eyes don't
soothe the soul

Broken and jagged
pieces of me
litter the floor

No poem, no song
no kisses or hug
can make me feel
whole

my thoughts are paper planes
that don't seem to see the runways that i drew
on the blank sheets in front of me.

You came over and
sat next to me
I froze the moment
and that is where
i'll be.

you carry the burden of our histories on your shoulders,
not to repeat them but to know where we went
wrong to end up this way.

You carry the pride of our histories in your heart,
not to repeat them but to know someone's always cared,
and that it's our turn to care now.

इस बोझ को अकेले मत उठाना, इस ख़ुशी को बिखेरके चलना।

I've heard people who are away from each other say-
"at least we're under the same sky"

but we're not,
because it doesn't rain here the way it does back home,
the sun isn't warm enough to tingle my bones.
the sky here bends to meet buildings and towers,
not the hills and mountains and their wonder

So I say-
*"but we're not. the sky here is different."

I am a lot of things.
But not everything I'd like to be.
And in this I find myself
To be worthless. Boring.

I am not the crashing waves
I'm not the burning fire
Or the rumbling, sturdy ground.
Or the breeze or wind.

Why, oh why, can I not be
Everything that seems so exciting.
Why am I stuck,
In this flesh and blood?
Far away from my dream.

We're here now,
and theres more than the two of us.
But there's one feeling, and the same ache
yet different struggles
- * -
We all think the same things,
yet in different tongues.
The histories do not include us.
Our taste buds have had to adapt to the wind here,
we have learnt from the best of the chameleons.
- * -
It's the same stage set up and the curtains were never drawn,
but our eyes see a completely different story being played out.
Collective whispers greater than a shout.
Peace of mind has been a while, it'll take long...
Home isn't where the heart is, when the heart keeps moving around.

thoughts hang around my head like an itch that won't go away
       and they're *making me scratch my brains out

i wish people still wrote letters,

i wish we still penned down our thoughts,
so that your tear stains could guide me to your heart
and the coffee or wine stains to those sleepless nights

so that the scent of the sheet could tell me
what perfume was your new favourite
and your lazy handwriting showed how tired you were

theres so much more of you on paper,
and theres so much of you i miss.

I was told to write about how I feel.

But what I feel isn’t just a noun I can express in words and pages. Tremendous waves of emotions come crashing and I forget how to swim. Rarely are they a calm sea, where sooner or later, I find a boat and am safe.

There is no boat today. The sea is churning. The sky is enraged.

Sometimes the emotions are a fire, orange and warm, fueling me to keep moving on. But when they are blue and searing hot, it burns me from within. I’m afraid you will catch fire too.

But the fire is my light in the darkness, my lighthouse. Not attracting boats, but giving them a signal to stay away.

I am torn between right and wrong, and the only way I can talk about my ‘feelings’ is by referring to them as natural occurrences and disasters.

Disasters. That reminds me of a lot of things.

Maybe I wouldn't
mind being myself,
If others didn't have
such a problem with it.

the regions that mother nature spares,
the places saved from raging oceans, and trembling grounds,
from erupting fires and disease and drought,

those are for you to go and ****,
with knives and words,
guns, bombs and
those are the regions for humanity to destroy.

The silence and darkness are like twins joined at the hip,
like lovers holding hands,
like tress rooted to the soil.

Why do you let fear fill up these crevices
that form because
anything dim yearns for the quiet,
and silence curls her fingers around the dark,

The bond remains, however twisted,
till the end of time,
a bond of love.

Sometimes I feel comfortable in my body,
and sometimes I feel like ripping off my skin.
At times I like what I see
I like what I wear
but then again at times I feel
like shattering the mirror and
the images in it.
Sometimes I feel like ripping off my hair
removing the fat with my bare hands.
But then I feel stupid for whining about
something so trivial.
because it's the inner beauty that counts
isn't it?
and after that I set off in another trail of despair
am I pretty enough within?

There is a lot I love
About spring and summer,
The warmth, the freedom
From scarves and coats.
The flowers in bloom,
The outdoor pools,
The hot days with ice cream
And cold coffee and slurps.
But most of I all I love the trees in my city,
that sway in the summer wind.
And I can stare at them forever
As my car passes by.
And they are colored not only green
But of many more hues pleasant to my eye.
There are orange, and purple (my favourite ones), and pink.
So when the ground I walk upon
Is littered with these colored petals,
I feel like nature has a lot of beauty to show
But all we do is step on it.

another day
a few more hours
till this time comes again.
look out, for i will make
the same mistakes.
but these errors are not random
they are natural fluctuations.