Cosmic.

Cosmic.

I visited a dead city once.
It had
no roads, no shelters, no bodies.
There were only broken walls,
shattered roads, and souls –
an aftermath of war.
I believe that after our final lesson
of letting go of life,
the souls learn how to stay
and so among these ruins,
they kick back, relax, and love cosmically
because this graveyard was and is their home.
In the wreckage,
on some stones, I found epitaphs
“A. Stark, died protecting his family”.
On others, I found eulogies written by
one dead friend to another dead friend.
There was destruction here but also a promise
that these souls were safe
from humans.
There was hate but also love,
my fear but also my hope.

I’m scared that the world will end in war,

that the last thing we’ll hear

will be a battlecry or the silent roars of bombs,

that we’ll go out with a big bang too.
We’ll fight for just a day too long

and spit curses,

catapulting us towards oblivion.
I’m afraid that with the flick of a switch,
we’ll ‘factory data reset’ the world

and just like that, cease to exist.
No more history, no more books, no more readers.
Just broken buildings and the howls

of nature. Smoke, ash, death.
I’m very scared that this tendency

of humans to fill in silences with noise

will lead us to destruction
because not many of us understand

that silences and peace are deep conversations

and war is small talk.

But I am also hopeful

that love will save some of us.
When the human call of death comes,

two young souls will hide.
People with hearts so in love that the universe

deems it too big a loss

to lose them.
I’ve always pictured these two kids

finding shelter in the deepest corners

of the world. If need be, the Earth will crack open

and keep them safe inside.
They’ll be put to sleep while heaven

sings them lullabies

and hell itself rises to protect them.
No war, no screams, no hate

will reach them.

And when they’re ready,
they’ll come back up
and be our next Adam and Eve.
I’m hopeful that something as magical
as love
will bring us back to life.

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Into stories? – Let’s live forever
Instagram – @myspirals

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You have not seen ruins.

I know I’ve written a lot about war. Last one for quite some time, promise. Enjoy reading this, though! And please spread peace and love.

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You have not seen ruins
The way 1945 has.

During the world war,
The schools that taught discipline
learned to have safety drills
and teach antonyms of peace.
The teenager that loved playing football
trained in the army
and often fought for the one thing bigger than him.
Weapons clashed so often,
it drowned all music,
and sang the lyrics of ‘Where we left off’.

I’ll share one story with you.
August 9, Nagasaki.
A three-year-old Yasujiro was playing in his house.
He was tearing the pages of a book
when he was blinded by a white light
like a million camera flashes.
Oh, how I wish it was really just cameras.
He was found under the debris of his house
among many other things
like his broken toys and an open book.
He’s grateful to have survived
But he lost so many things that mattered
His sleep, his hearing, his will to live.
He is happy now.

When someone knows they’ll die
and they get to send one last message
it is always filled with love
it is always an ‘I love you’
an ‘I will miss you’.
You know why?
Because they do,
they will.
Is war really worth the open book?

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Instagram handle: @myspirals
Previous post: Stories and poems that we share.
Related post: Wars and families.

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Languages, medicines and magicians.

What has music been for you? Let me know in the comment section below! Enjoy reading. Instagram handle: @myspirals

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“Music is a safe kind of high.” – Jimi Hendrix

Music is a language, a medicine and a magic trick. Dance to it.

• Music was his mother-tongue. His tongue fumbled when he spoke English as if it were a foreign language that he hadn’t heard all his life, but when he was alone, he hummed a tune and did not miss a single note. He stuttered and shied away from conversations with strangers, but sang songs with a broad grin around camp fires. When he wasn’t feeling alright, he would shut out completely and listen to music as he thought and thought about what had gone wrong, but you could find small clues hidden in his playlist to make him feel alright.
• Her soul had been crushed into absolute pieces and her heart had cuts all over. There was a constant ache, that seemed to run like blood in her veins and pillows couldn’t drown it out. But earplugs seemed to drive the pain away completely, or at least numb it. As the lyrics stopped her mind from wandering about, and the music brought her a much-needed gift, she could smile without wanting to scream. Music was her band-aid and no one could rip it off her scars. For her, music was like a steady dose of pain-killers and peace. Music was the only pillow that could drown out the screams, and it was the only shoulder she could cry on.
• He was broke and broken, but managed to get into the bar right across the street. He needed to feel lost and alive, and so he stepped onto the dance-floor swarmed with broken hearts and night-outs. The music was loud enough to make him disappear as his feet moved about in an unsteady pace. The broken pieces of his heart rattled against each other, but no one could hear it. The pieces slammed against each other and broke into smaller pieces until all that was left was dust. He smiled as he took the dust and blew on it, as if it were fairy-dust and his wishes were going to come true.

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Whisky Words: Project (10)

This is Submission TEN of The Whiskey Words. The Whiskey Words is a writing project (and a giveaway), and if you’d like to participate, here are the rules.

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I want to break free.

She walked with him on the beach.They rarely meet and this is one such rare day. She withheld her craving to hold his hand. It was a public place and they could not be seen like this. Just them together would bring up questions, unwanted questions… forget holding hands.

They have known each other for years, decades even. What started out as friendship became close friends and then something that shouldn’t have happened did happen just like that. By then he was married with two children and she was separated. Why did they cross that line when they did? He just claimed that he wanted to make her happy. She took that as a valid answer and left it at that. When you are best friends with someone you love and respect them, a lot of their flaws are pushed behind. Probably that is what she did too.

Why do we do the things we do? Nobody knows. There are reasons which are very valid, but others do not see it. Only we know and the reason however flimsy it might seem to others is very valid for us, at least at that moment.

As I said, they met rarely, maybe once in a few years. She still remembers meeting him for the first time. He sat across the room from her. Her eyes darted to him every few seconds as she was talking to the others but neither of them made an effort to talk to each other and not even the next time they met. Once they started talking though they spoke and spoke, sometimes all night long. They thanked Graham Bell for his invention which brought them so close together even though they were hundreds of miles apart. When you bare your heart and soul to someone, share all your secrets that nobody else knows then I guess the wall breaks. The wall here broke too.

The initial stage was fascinating, but it started to wear off soon. The topic now came back to sex irrespective of where it started and it starts to get boring beyond a point. Especially if you are used to discussing a whole lot of things about every single thing in the world. They also slowly they started feeling guilty. That was bound to happen too. She didn’t know how to articulate her feelings. He would show his guilt by avoiding her completely and give her no rhyme or reason for doing so. They were playing emotional hide and seek, only, in this case, he would hide away and then seek her when he wanted to. There would be phases of silences which would kill her. Anything she tried to break his wall would end up as a failure. She would go mad and then when she just gave up everything and started building her wall up again, this time only higher, he would come knocking again and break all her defenses.

Today she has been fighting with her own thoughts though. Something told her that she had to stop. She had started recognizing things that she hadn’t done before. She was sick and tired of the patriarchy. She could call him only when he wanted to talk to her yet he wanted her full attention when he spoke to her. She got replies to her messages only when he felt like talking to her. Even if she wanted to go back to just being good friends he said once the line was crossed it was difficult to go back. He told her how women could never get out of an affair because they have nothing else to do and their mind was not busy they kept thinking of the same thing over and over again. Today she had to decide.

He asked her if she wanted to cuddle up with him somewhere quiet. Amazingly she stopped walking, turned around to look at him in the eye and said “I don’t want to do it. Not now, not ever. I don’t want you to feel guilty and surely not because of me.” She had a wide grin, She was happy she could say it finally and felt so free just saying it. She looked at her watch and said “Time for my flight pal, have to head to the airport. bye” and walked away leaving him in the sunset. She felt happy to have had the courage to break the relationship which till now she thought was her lifeline.

Till now she had trusted him and he had let her down many times by not being there when she wanted, while she has ignored his faults and dropped everything to be with him when he wanted her. But today was the day to break free, to make that change forever.

Sometimes we do things which appear as though they do not have a reason, but there is a reason, a very valid reason. We get inner peace when we don’t let others control what we do anymore.

– Shyamala Sathiaseelan

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