Living your own dreams!

Photo Copyright me

I often forget that I am the character of my own dreams…
That distant imaginary, dreamy, blurry person is real & it is me…
It is sad that I often forget what long road I have traveled
And, what trauma that I carry within myself and that I keep alive
The pain, my friends is hurtful because I am the one, often hurting myself
Or thinking about that painful process
Fighting with myself and my own inner demons whom I never let fade away
But Friends,
I don’t lie when I tell you that I am living my own Goddam Dreams!
I question myself often: why this looming sadness, Sweta?
You seem happy, and how can you be so sad?
Well, I don’t know. I crossed very bad two weeks. But now I have come to my own terms on this weather we are blessed with, the clouds, trees, my swing, the land, the house, this pen, diary, every essence around me is echoing to me today:
Hey Girl, you are living your own dreams today!

Some hand written poetry today!

The inherent question

I am not good enough

I have this inherent belief that “I am not good enough”
All my school life, I was made to feel I was not good enough
It shaped my being, psyche and of course, that I believed that I was not good enough.
I go back to being a child and think about what I used to do when I was told that I was not good enough
I always imagined~ I imagined to be good~ I imagined to be a good person like my mother ~ I imagined I would have the best handwriting~ I imagined I would be beautiful ~ I imagined that I was helpful or successful in whatever that meant to me at that time…I imagined I was loved and that I had a partner who would see how good I was inside because for longest time I was made felt that I was ugly.
A lot of times my mother was also told that she was not good enough.
So, we always heard that about ourselves. You are not good enough.
Then what would we know about what being good means?
When our imagined realities didn’t match the real world talks that were provided to us as facts.
When we were never made to think that we could ever be good.
Then we were told we don’t deserve the things we achieved and worked hard for like a mere job? I was 19. How would I know what would make me deserve it?
Then I was 25. Same thing.
Then I was 26. Same thing
Then I was 27. Same thing
Then I was 33. Same thing.
So who decides what somebody deserves?
Who decides that when some is not good enough?
Well, today I decide that I don’t buy this narrative.

So, I tell the world that I AM GOOD ENOUGH. My Mother is GOOD ENOUGH. YOU ARE GOOD ENOUGH.

This poem is dedicated to my mother and my therapist.

Clouds

Always becoming
Shifting, changing shapes, colors, sizes
Aspiring and moving in between the mountains
Chasing this and that
Checking off the the list
One by One
Little carefree cloud
Always in the process of becoming…
Chasing is exhausting
Cloud bursts into the rain
And,
the Downpour!
And,
Chasing continues again

Picture by me: Riva San Vitale, Switzerland, July 2023

New Beginnings

What a year we lived through! With the Global Pandemic Covid-19

Prophetstown State Park, West Lafayette, 2020

As days blend together and become weeks and to months and to a whole year ~

Where we tread into the unknown with little knowledge and fear ~

With the most scariest emotion fear ~ we lived by while

We bid farewell to all the loved ones who went to another world into another space

Where we could never touch them but relive together with them with the memories we have made

As we navigated how to stay safe, keep on living, and keep on having hopes alive

Through our phones, laptops, and let’s not forget the hours of zooms

As we intertwined within the objects to reach to our lovely humans across time, space, and geographies

We lived through this!

Navigating the ambivalence with resilience and diligence

And, here we are a year later~ stronger like never

Cheers to the new beginning and the new year

West Lafayette, Indiana 01.01.2021

Wishes & Dreams

Some Deja Vu.

Some reflections.

Some dreams lost.

Some dreams gained.

Some wishes fulfilled.

And.

Some that remain

~ Puerto Rico, 2019

Waiting for.

the night.

to fall.

and.

dreams to.

knock on.

Flying away with the dreams.

Some day.

I try to fly.

to catch some dreams.

to search here and there.

and.

continually fly.

West Lafayette, 01.02.2020

Secret ~ No More #RageAgainstRape

Secret,

That’s how it started

And, was supposed to end.

Subsumed,

Deep in the corners of my heart

Your thumbprints all over my skin

Was supposed to be the “secret”.

You made me the in-charge

Of keeping your deeds over my body a “secret”

Your “secret”. You made it my “secret”

Made me believe that

it would shame me – not you

it would shame my family – not you

it would make me lose everything – not you

Your audacity

On believing that~ I will keep an eternal silence amazes me. 

But, I stand up to break the silence

I always knew it~ It wasn’t my fault

I always knew it~ It wasn’t supposed to be a secret

And, my voice ~  will make you lose everything not me

I stand to display your thumbprints to everyone

One by one,

Everyone will know it

Once~ it is secret no more

it is your shame- not mine

This poem is written for all the survivors of sexual assault and any kind of gender-based violence. And, against all the perpetrators!

 

#metoo #RageAgainstRape @RiseAgainstRape #JusticeforNirmala #Justiceforallrapevictima

 #Speakup #Listentosurvivors #Lovesurvivors

In between

A surreal memory of Fall Walk… Pic: By Me (: 

a night you struggle to sleep,

it is not pain, it is suffering.

last remaining autumn day struggles to remain still

all those fallen leaves and bare trees,

reveal–time has come~ serene autumn days should go,

should fly away in a blink

such that when you wake up one random morning

autumn is suddenly gone

and, flying snow will flutter around

 inevitable…i know! we know!

 something we are taught and prepared for

“inevitable”

or…in between pain and suffering, may be

an en route to you yourself and the “you” you want to be

is it a suffering?

but new “you” will come always in between you and yourself,

*inevitable*,

And, truth is something in between

 

 

*Footnote to self*: But suffering could be transformed into an energy to continue the journey between you and yourself (:, embrace 2018 (: 

Fairfax, VA, 12.28.2017

and, you think we are equal

And, you think you and I are equal (Pic: Derek Sherman at Celery Bog)

I thought God created us equal,

With bodies and biological realities,

With desires and sentiments,

With hunger and pain,

With senses and sensibilities,

Until the day I knew

We had a hierarchy!

Based on the languages we speak.

Based on yours and mine English

And, we both used it to talk about God and Truth

I couldn’t even pronounce God, you said correcting my pronunciation

And, said My God, and your God is same,

But you forgot to highlight the differences,

With clouds of hypocrisies over your head,

And, you corrected my English~ so that I could talk like you

So that I could speak like you

So that I could learn your voice

To replace mine, to forget mine!

And, yet you talked about God,

And, how humans are equal,

and, you think you and I are equal…

 

Revel in the infinite

Dandelions!! ~ They inspire me to fly in freedom without any attachment

Your eyes must have shone

Like a green emerald

When you typed your passion with the tip of your fingers!

And, added a line~ *you are smart* then after a comma *cute*

In the tiny little tide you sent,

I imagined myself, swaying in those emerald green eyes!

Then, being held by you so tight!

I started losing myself,

With the soothing breeze you sent,

And, like the dandelion loses its florets,

I started flying, all towards the infinite sky!

Your sentences never ended

As you transformed your periods into ellipses …

Neatly typed three dots …

Providing me the key to the box full of imaginations…

To revel in the infinite~~~as you would say!

*Title ~ inspired from a random conversation

Embracing Epiphany

It was like a painting

Dispersed in the white walls

The black dark

Immovable shadow

I was aware: I had been battling for long

And, part of me was tired

And, it remained immovable