echoes

It puzzles me how the greatest courage comes from the most vulnerable moment,
How you can spend a lifetime with someone, to realize you know nothing about them at all,
That in the moment of pain seared so deeply, you can find numbness

More so,
That in the most fragile moment,
Where you think you have lost everything
& sunk to the very bottom of cynicism....

You realize that you are still capable of loving.
The heart still beats, though out of tune-
You feel it, against the laws of gravity, it keeps you down.

You are still capable of loving...
you are still capable of loving,

& you will keep repeating those words, as if to hold on to it-
so it never flies away.

in echoes.

2013

The only metaphor that clings to my heart this year was a literal experience. I was in a cave in the Toledo District of Belize. Terrified to the point of numbness, in complete darkness as I swam among the company of my peers.

Fear and excitement.

 I was leading my group, but felt less than a leader.

 Adrenaline and calmness circled, and though I felt the drumming of my pulse through my ears, I was collected

Contradiction was as visceral as the trickling of the creek, against my skin...in complete darkness. In a cave where shadows from my headlamp created images and silhouettes, reminding me of Plato's allegory.

But it was in that moment of darkness, I understood clarity. Clarity in my position, as an undergraduate student given another chance at volunteering to rationalize my experience when Guatemala was an emotional attachment to me. To find balance. There was an equilibrium.

I have for some reason found comfort from rationalising: that sometimes it takes complete darkness to find clarity.

Clarity is so profound. It is lyrical, and distinct. There is so much simplicity in clarity. In a matrix of complexities that fill our complicated mind, I now I understand. That sometimes, things shut down and terminate itself, to prepare our mind and heart for a simplicity; that is clarity. When we are caught up with complications, we fall to the ground to be reminded of the basics. 

2013 was a year of darkness. But I am not sadistic, nor am I pessimistic. It was equally the year of clarity.

And maybe I am not sure where I stand right now. I am disoriented again, by my position and decisions that I have made within the past few months. But I have faith in the works of the universe....that maybe if I don't try too hard to search for clarity, to chase it, to pursue it; it may arrive itself, before me.

Let the new year commence, even though I have felt as though the new volume and chapters of my books have already been written. 

I have little expectations from life, but pray for deeper faith and better practising of gratitude.

God guide my heart from darkness.

And I pray He opens the hearts of those I have hurt, that they accept my sincere forgiveness. And I pray He blesses them with happiness, successes, greater love and peace. Ameen.

Mosaic

Broken glasses of different colours,
That is what we are
But how lovely,
For our fragility depicts perfection
Of a lively mosaic

For we were beautiful once
But the shards and sharpness that has become
Makes us real
So hang it on the walls
We have no shame

& maybe in galleries we will display
The many other sides and parts
For our own selves to see

"I believe everything happens for a reason, especially when I feel like nothing is making sense."

-"Me too. Sometimes it makes sense when you believe. And it gives you peace."

The oil from the soap looks like marble on water. And no matter how many times I try to rinse, it will remain. Because it is stitched to the fabric of my being and cannot be erased. I will not be myself without it, nor will I be true to myself if I deny it.

"From hate to love, from love to lust, from lust to truth." You sing of cycles Ed Sheeran, but if you only knew...I am cynical of love. Of truth. And trust. With myself, mostly.

As solid as it may all seem, I crumble like the peanut butter cookie laid out on the napkin before me.

One of my friends tell me I am level-headed. Conversations on couches made me realize my own obsession with "self-awareness". I am infatuated with untangling myself from my environment. But awareness becomes selfishness when I let it overwhelm me. At the opportunity cost of humility, I economize myself and hurt those around me. I don't know what I'm I'm doing. Lately I realize don't deserve the goodness that has come my way..

To feel what you feel, but to be unable to reason. To reason the way you reason, but still unable to accept and understand. To feel does not necessarily allow us to be. To be does not necessarily allow us to feel.

Finding excuses to be on campus because I'm afraid my thoughts consume me when I am alone. Afraid of my own shadows and the demons in my mind that confine me. Liberty is a contradiction.Where is the boundary between isolation and independence?

I can't seem to find it.

I am moving, but in spite of my boots my toes are numb. My heart is frostbitten. When it defrosts, I know I will find myself again...until then, I don't know what to do.

I know you still read me,
I crumble a little to find that you still care,
I don't deserve to be cared.