Day 318: Islands & Me

"No man is an island entire of itself.." John Donne wrote this as he explained the great connect and divide among men. In the passing of time form strong bonds that you get to keep and disconnect as needed and only when needed, Say goodbyes with much pain and anguish and lament for a while, it is necessary to give pauses as we move. It is in links so strong that the heart stays connected, it is in gut feelings sometimes that you find a way back home even without maps. Such are the nature of these islands we are and claim to be, connected somehow or maybe breaking free.

Islands & Me
I have seen the earth move underneath my feet
Finding winnings and yet somehow accepting defeat
I am an island if you find me even without a map
Just tell me you are here but don't tell me where I am at

I am the backstory of grand paintings or sketches on napkins
I am feeling that move the world right underneath my skin
I am an island in the making just connected without thought
I am among many I have lost and among a few whom I have sought

"No man is an island" for now, tell this to trips from shore to shore
To the rafts and boats and backpacks, to the unplanned who need more
Some who are brave, they have taken their share of journeys ahead
Who are restless without sleep, they are tired of the bed

I am an Island at best, and yet some sailors they call me home
I am what I am by choice, and yet among many I am alone
To the map makers, explorers and storytellers alike
Here's to places we cannot reach, and to the impossible we strive

Day 317: Evening Wine

I wonder about what we pour in a glass, is it the drink that matters, the moment or a spirit that is set loose in the real world. As I learn about the nature of things I am fascinated by art works locked in bottles and aged over time, they are material things we cannot touch or feel or even taste immediately for that matter and that is what makes it all the more elusive. In the utter chaos of putting an evening together from thin air that seems just as aged. I wish I could bottle up some of the things we don't get to keep, and age them till they have been given a perfect hue by time itself. I collect the corks for that matter as nostalgia we have unbottled and shared.

Evening Wine
My evening wine maybe lying undistilled
Bottles that once opened can never be sealed
Spirits that fills bottles and glasses for now
They have found escape in depth of my taste somehow

The colors I see as the sun wishes a farewell good bye
As the light glimmer of sunlight fades from my eye
Constrained in the ale that touches the lips
That are found in journeys we take & on long trips

My day seems drunk enough even without the wine
It keeps reminding me "I am okay, I am doing just fine"
Maybe the understanding is such that some days I will be quiet
I will fold my napkin on my table and sit down to write

Cherished among many but like time by itself
It hold on to the stem of the glass & in moments we dwell
But it will find a way out, it will find an escape
And it will  leave an aftertaste, make no mistakes

To the warm afternoon ending or evenings as they may
They are vintage wine, I find in moments every single day

Day 316: Reckless Heart

I refuse to sometimes speak of things that are proximal. Things that effect me up close and some that don't matter. I often feel I run the risk of talking too much and not that I am afraid of running out of words, it is more about not letting listening when I need to the most. I wonder if we play reckless with our heart, or our heart gets to be reckless at times. I am with eyes wide open and yet I cannot see. I am troubled but by nothing else but me. I keep remembering and forgetting all at the same time. For now in the new I find my solace and in the old I sometimes find my comfort.

Reckless Heart
My reckless heart, so it tries to reconnect
It dials the same numbers and then somehow forgets
In the missed calls & voice mail it somehow stays
Leaves behind reminders of everything that has changed

We are trying to reconcile and make things whole again
We are forgetful just a little bit and mostly insane
I say this because we do the same things in our head
We write about about them before heading to bed

With eyes wide open and as the day may go
I feel sleepy for now and seem to doze on my keyboard
These looped playlist they blare in our head & over our ears
My reckless heart seems to look for music it can hear

Don't try to be nice, there is too much of that
We are reconciling with each other forgetting where we are at
So we start again from scratch and yet we cannot seem to forget
Why my reckless & sleepy heart refuses to get out of bed

My lazy days writing, it comes in phases too
It speaks to me as headphones blares & nothing gets through
What the heart and mind hear what they want sometimes
It is for you to figure out the meaning, as I simply write.

Day 315: Trial & Error

The idea is simple, you try and fail, you try again and fail again, and in between you keep improving. You keep getting better even if it is better at not making mistakes these trial and errors in real life are sometimes more memorable. I wonder if chanced encounters are a thing, whether we are rearranging shelves in our life and sometimes hoping to find everything perfectly aligned. I will place you in an empty room my mind and arrange you as you please, because there is nothing more random than how strange randomness feels. Here's to trials and errors we adore

Trial & Error
Maybe we found each other
Through nothing more, than trial & error
Maybe we were dreams that wander
In minds, when eyes are closed to ponder

Maybe it was never easy to be perfect any day
Choosing to make it such was our only way
We were trapped in between truth & lies today
Digging ourselves from our own mistakes

Maybe when the dust settles somehow & somewhere
After much has been said & done, when we are not there
Some will still sit and paint pictures on these walls
Count the things that have changed, maybe count them all

Maybe we were found by trial & error
In the hope of making it, maybe something better
But we try and fail again and again
We are aptly in love with the utterly insane

Day 314: Wrinkled Inspiration

Some will tell you that inspiration strikes you at random times, times when you least expect it. While brushing your teeth, waking up from sleep and even staring outside your window waiting for it to defrost because you forgot to turn on the heater. These people are right, inspiration is just that random whether it is squeezed in between the time frame it take to write a few lines or whether you have to wait till the end of the book. We are catching up to these moments and for some reason, I am forced to believe that sometimes inspiration catches up to us. For the very best of these are ones that may change a thought in your mind as you fold laundry on a Sunday afternoon. Who am I to figure it out, after all, I am the one folding laundry and writing this in between.

Wrinkled Inspiration
So that I don't wrinkle the things I have owned
I check things again & again, every corner & fold
I have folded them & tucked them safely away
Where ever I had hoped that my memories would stay

These moments of inspiration finds joy in my greatest escape
They are rattled by nothing, not even on a long empty page
They sit with you and stand outside your closed door
They knock once, then twice, and then they are not there anymore

They are sometimes found in the inscription on the first page
I write them in the hope that meaning will never age
Unedited, uncut they are the best and worst versions of time
They are imperfections we love, they are beautiful& unrefined

My wrinkled inspiration on my jacket pocket finds a home
As I write sitting on a wooden chair, staring at my phone
These things that you feel and wear them on your sleeve
You leave me with stitches in life & memories to weave

Day 313: Undefined

It is now exactly 24 hours since I have been awake and when sleep eludes you, every else seems to do the same. I kept thinking about a topic to write today, where it would fit. I have been thinking about our relationship to people a lot today, the need that the world has about fitting it into these neat boxes and how we still manage to find an escape. I wonder what changes in time as we get to know people better, whether we build stronger bonds and if we feel the urge to fit into one of those boxes too. In the span of the entire day that I have been awake, I have learned and experienced much, I have heard songs and listened to music and I have watched people dance. I guess I am still learning about people in my own way, as are people who have tried to know me. To know me is to find my writing unbound, to know you is to know something profound. Such is the nature of the undefined, my relationship to those who have looked for me and the few that I find

Undefined
We are round pegs in these square holes
Somehow refusing to simply grow old
Old pages that have been rewritten for now
Dogeared and found in the know-how

We are undefined at best, holding on to what we can
Still figuring out if we could walk away when we ran
These pastry store menus we don't need to read
You get me the perfect one, every time I wish to eat

We don't fall or fit into any shapes for now
So we keep trying the only way that we know how
Undefined writings come late or early morning hour
So I declare them neither mine nor yours, they are "our"

Underplayed or overspent these hands that don't show
What would we change if these games we play we know?
Some will lay close to me & fade into languages that don't translate
So we gesture in ways we know, the only way we can relate

Drinks that are poured tonight, they are endless for now
I pause and blend in an out of sleep that I missed somehow
Why define they say, "that which, matters least to you"?
We were never meant to go into the night or simply follow through

Day 312: Half Ways

There is a time when all you need to know even if for a little while is that you are half way done or getting somewhere with whatever you are doing. The moment we know we are going somewhere with things. I know of so many who want to know just that little bit to be true. In between all the careful planning and the unplanned nature of things, in between all the unfolding of the half baked, it is the unfinished things which is most attractive and seductive in time. Here's hoping we meet inspiration half ways.

Half Ways
I am wondering where we write from here, somewhere
Are we looking to reach you soon, are we half way there?
Can you hear my footsteps right now? Am I too loud
Why do I keep whispering in between all those who shout?

Am I am missing out on too much or staying just the same?
Just looking at meetings that have been slightly delayed
So I decide to write in between the free times that I find
I am catching up on the more important things that I left behind

Halfway there I have chosen not to plan
I am flavored just with time & served as I am
True to so few and yet I try to keep some things true
I am written down bit by bit, as do I capture you

Here's to the many wishes we wish for, things we ask
And a little warmth that I hope I can pour from my flask
Things that are in progress but almost half done
I keep writing from the edge of my seat, I feel I have barely begun

Day 311: Knight of Nights

As the last call for the kitchen was made, I was getting ready to finish my Darjeeling and Earl gray tea blend. It was brewed slowly as was the night slowly unfolding, reading my papers and then sneaking in a sip of tea. There was more than just sharing the pot of tea and the beer glass that lay, I was the last person to order and as we kept talking about reading futures, you read tarots cards out of the table and read them aloud. I believe in imperfect things and as a person who studies nature I can tell you the best we can do is imperfect, and yet they are the most precious things we get to keep. Uncertainty is our very nature, and that is what we are destined to keep, such are our mysteries.

Knight of Nights
The knight of the night, as he finds escape
As the writings bare on the table they laid
And we found time captured on faces of a card
Choosing to see what we were & who we are

This past, present & future that lay undefined
You gave them thoughts & voices that are kind
They mean something & then nothing at best
Yet they are warm reminders of an evening at rest

These stories that you write about, time we haven't seen
They are imperfect, at best, rewritten every day by destiny
Choose whatever you may call it & then time will get to define
These simple things you look for, are they easy to find?

Why be the average; among so many, I would rather be an anomaly
Be inspired, be an inspiration still and be a hint of madness set free
Beyond that which is captured in cards or in between the lines of our hand
We get to decide a little of what life asks of us & that for which we take a stand

Day 310: Unfinished Coffee

Sometimes it is the expectation of something that builds in your mind, it is like looking at a painting that has not been started yet and knowing the outlines. For me describing warmth and food are similar and such is the story of this "affogato-al-caffe". This is Italian coffee with ice cream and as delicious as that may sound we are in the habit of visualizing it first. As I decided to come back another day for a warm cup of the same and enjoying coffee with ice cream I kept going back to the places we come from in our mind. How we learn to claim some things from life and others we let sit in the coffee and melt and yet it is in the taste that I was told I would taste, which is bliss. For now, I write to an unfinished coffee I wish to claim some other day

Unfinished Coffee
The coffee grounds they lay somewhere on the floor
As I walked in on a cold winter day through the door
I make the best & worst of these times that are unplanned
Time that slips away somehow from my numb hands

We are shots of warm coffee poured into a cup
Reminders that we keep moving, that we have not given up
As I keep writing answering questions to my test
I keep learning just bit by bit and anticipate the rest

I am comforted by the warm handles that I hold
They are reminders of things we find as familiarity unfolds
We write with just this much hope that somewhere they are read
Whether you are waking up just now or putting yourself to bed

Those who have shared their time with others today
Just know you have brushed against some thoughts, someway
In the morning hours that come and collect in my hourglass
I will drink my unfinished coffee, as time will slowly pass.

Day 309: Make me Believe

I start with my qualifier exams today, for those of who don't know about it , it is probably one of the most important sections of your PhD experience. If I were to make myself believe that these are just summaries of the things I need or of perfect things that have yet to be written about. As I finish writing this piece my first question among the three arrives in an email. For now I leave this just for you and I plan for the things I believe in and need to do

Make me Believe
So you start every hour of every day of your week
You wander in search of the things you don't see
And the few you find you rarely get to keep
So I wonder if some of it's real or mostly make believe

In the beginning, today as I write my exams
Am I getting closer to somehow figuring out who I am
These are my iterations and versions on a blank page
These are my answers, that in time will change

Make me believe that over and over again
We are doing the same things and yet we are far from insane
We are writing because there is need for it as such
Tell me when to stop pouring words & when you had much

Till things have settled down somewhere in my head
I am restless as I wake up and till the time I go to bed
So I am hoping you will write back & make me believe
There is much more to this than the unfinished things we leave

Day 308: For Another Day

Chances are that though we may sometimes know the outcome of certain things, we keep fighting for a different one. We keep reminiscing sometimes in what is and what could have been in situations in life. We win a few situations and some fights we keep for another day. We have not lost hope, we have not given up, we have just kept things on hold for now. "for another day" explores this need of keeping things on the back of your head, having a vague sense and aspiration that needs to stay with you keeping you on your feet. For now, I will write of these, I will try to win them over with words.

For Another Day
I will simply leave this all to you
Leave this fight for another day
When the simpler things are just simple too
We will not regret about what got away

I will rise up from the panic seat
There is nothing more to be afraid
We have been tired and we have been beat
But somehow we have found our escape

I will challenge you as sunlight fades
Call you or tie letters to the letter box
Call you in sunset hues in the many shades
Write them down with all that I got

I will simply win this day and this night
Plans are for a few who need more than a day
I will leave some things for another fight
Some wars I will win over words today

Day 307: Dances we Dance

Simple thing about dancing is that it is expressive without much planning, it is spontaneous and is often born out of the need of the moment. As I sat there participating and watching others dance I kept looking at the rhythm change and the footsteps that were random somehow formed patterns. There are experiences that are shared among those who perform and those who watch and I think for me this was such an experience that came even in the late hours of the night. I see love, warmth and a feeling of being close in those moments we all share, no matter which dances we dance here's an ode to them today.

Dances we Dance
Here's an ode to the dances we dance
Are we following the rhythm or is it just sheer chance?
These nights that don't close they keep going on
As we return home, right back to places we had begun

Here's to all the steps, to the twist and twirls
To the holding of hands as you feel the world swirl
While some say, why bother they are temporary as they come & go
I feel the need to go back to them more and more

These dances that we dance some nights we learn as we watch
These hours that fade away,we cast a net in hope of a catch
I see lovers dance and then friends alike hand in hand
They come bundled together in time & slowly the night disbands

Here's a call to those who play a tune of the heart & mind
Who are out in the open among us & yet they are hard to find
As I watch a few unbound and free on the dance floor
I think of the dances we dance and for whom & what they are for

Day 306: White Noise

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to write honestly. To be vulnerable enough to capture your deepest thoughts and feelings and keep it out in the open. And though we are used to writing every day, somehow we change bits and pieces of it. As I walk through the door into my studio apartment, I see the papers that sometimes lay on my floor, the blanket folded some days or maybe not. I close the window I leave open for the house to have some fresh air and then I sit down on the round table while I start making tea. For me making tea is an elaborate affair not just because I like it but because I feel it is more comforting when I know I have poured out just a little bit of happiness. As the tired cup of tea, some days brews long for me I put a timer to remind me, lest it gets bitter over time. I switch on the tv as it rambles on and I wonder if we are just used to the idea of finding a company in the noise. Finding a friend in the arbitrary presence of voices in our rooms. These white noise or any other noise alike as they may I write to them today.

White Noise
I am but one part of tempered glass
Hard to the world, so that you know I will last
And though you may not be here, but you remain
As I fit on every roof sill and some window panes

I am in the company of the white noise around
Though it may seem lonely it is not a lonely sound
It is just cozy to hear these familiar voices sometimes
To sharing even a few laughs with a glass of wine

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to honestly write
Pour out everything you got & put up your best fight
For men may come & men may go without a trace
As we work hard to make things that time cannot erase

As I switched on the TV and the sound filled my room
I was amongst the familiar now and yet those unknown
For I have thought about this, about choices & our choice
For now, I am but warm on a cold winter day surrounded
                                                                    by white noise

Day 305: My Flipbook

Maybe the only address we have, are the ones we fondly remember, hence we selectively choose to remember directions to some places we keep coming back to again and again. They are like flipbook pages consisting of snapshots of our life that we flip through and as they stitch together they form these fond memories we get to keep. I am fascinated with the idea of leaving a few of these flipbooks behind in between the spaces of someone else's mind. These pictures in our head leave impressions for others to find, so I leave you my flipbook so that you can hit pause and rewind.

My Flipbook
You are searching for the incredible in the everyday
Taking snapshots of life that manages to get away
Yet you don't lose hope you point the lens sometimes
As I try to be myself, knowing these pictures are all mine

My flipbook pages come together in these shots
Where I have gained much in between the things I lost
Black and white pictures lay loose pages at best
I stitch them together, I lie still as you flip through the rest

I will be in and out of frames, some that seem to move
I have borrowed some time if only to pick and choose
You are looking for the right light to hit at the right time
But you keep moving away and as do I

Somethings they change, without any reason at best
As for now these writings seem to perfectly fit on a page
As I follow myself to a brave new world, I will look back to sneak
While you turn over a page in the silly flipbook which I leave

Day 304: Cookie Jars

Some writings are closer to reality than they can ever be, but they are hidden in metaphors and code words only for a few to decode. For the rest the emotion, the anxious nature of things and the pacing in the writing much still carry meaning. For me this was simple and yet a long awaited one exploring the fate of these two cookies that I saved, and as I keep comparing them to situations in my own life I keep going back and forth between the sweet bitter nature of being kept in an anxious state.  I feel these crumbs all around me, these bits and pieces that have been left behind, but even if I look hard enough, some things have moved away or have just become harder to find. Climb into my thoughts today share a piece of cookie and get caught with your hands in the cookie jar.

Cookie Jars
So here I hold on to these two cookies in the jar
We don't care if we are left behind, we are what we are
Lonely somewhere and maybe kept warm & safe tonight
Sweetened & aged we are perfect or maybe just right

The cookie crumbles that falls to the floor
And I don't seem to bother about them anymore
Because the sweetest bits of my life lies in memories I create
There are no secret recipes to these pieces that I bake

So here we are without these words we have much to say
Warm as a close hug and unchanged as such, this way
I write again on napkins tonight because so much
                                                            is left on table's edge
Or maybe just grazed over and forgotten at the end of this page

My hands, for now, are numb & stuck in this cookie jar
Close together and yet somehow I know we are drifting far
Home again this time and as I called out to you
Like these cookies in the cookie jar, then we were only two

Day 303: Just a Pause

I was informed two days ago about passing away of someone in my extended family. Though I cannot travel back and be with those who might need it at this moment, you cannot help but take a pause in your own life trying to recollect times, old pictures that are black and white and memories that are in color. They are about, trying to relive a time that used to be, pull out old nostalgia and reminisce in what used to be. I wonder if we value something differently when you know situations have changed, when you know you have lost chances of changing that something. T.S. Eliot wrote, "I will show you fear in a handful of dust", maybe of what we were and what may become. For now, I take these pauses, an ode to what remains in memory and some that flies away.

Just a Pause
Sometimes no reason is needed to simply write
To just take a pause and in the void look for insight
When we were children we would erase & redraw
We were told to believe we could correct all flaws

The cruel winter it keeps knocking on my window
It covers the ground white and recreates a show
Much that lies buried and covered in the white
Even warm memories that for now seem to be quiet

I will show you that no time is enough time
That we cannot plan for whimsy or even find a rhyme
Some rough edges of the writings they remain
But they are our go to places, that stop us from going insane

There are some things I have been forbidden to see or feel
I have been told that some of this only time must heal
So I plan for that which I can never foresee
I just take a pause from nothing more but me

As the ground freezes over and as the snow may silently melt
There is much work to be done, there is much more to dwell
I am certain that some things will never have just cause
So I find escape in writing, for now as you know me I am just a pause

Day 302: Time-Tested

In the next one week, I will be preparing for my qualifier examinations, something that is dreaded upon and justified in every PhD alike. Though we all seem to prepare for these big things in life, it seems when it comes down to the facts the little things that add up seem more important. Using time more judiciously, knowing when it is time to do something and sometimes not let anticipation get the best of you. For whatever be the reason these time-tested ideas and notions of what should be sometimes don't fit anymore. It is with these little oddities that we find our escapes and for me, it seems these writings at odd hours of the day keep me going.

Time-Tested
These time-tested things, one or two
Some that have worked, maybe just for you
Some that are but conventional at best
That have been used again & again, never put to rest

These rules of the world, they may be random sometimes
Why don't I end this abruptly and not worry about a rhyme
And the few curious ones, who question everything
They are the misfits, they are misaligned when our day begins

I would rather choose to be the picture frame of the incomplete
Hanging upside down and with just two colors that I need
Be brave today with me, as you write to a momentary escape
Read of things that don't add up, words that find their own shape

Rainy winter night it brews, the passing of cars I feel them close
The coming together of meaning are they random in between what I choose
Time tested or tested by time whatever way you may choose to look
I am still the same writing at my table, this is my unfinished book.  

Day 301: My Ghost

In the inspired moments, the inspirations sometimes have a mind of their own. They are about not about being able to decide on what these writings are going to be but what they become as we start to write. These inspirations are similar to a concept called ghosts in machines where you can't explain an outcome entirely by something that is planned. There are moments of inspiration that guides these, they are whimsy and even surprise that you can't explain. I call them "my ghost", that are essentially thoughts that are set free, that travel and traverse these vast spaces even without me.

My Ghost
Days and nights that seem to disappear
Come together to count as a passing year
Some hours that I can feel as they flee
They are there invisible, for you and me

My Ghost seems to have a mind of its own
A reason to be out in the open & among the unknown
It doesn't even cast a shadow when it stands in the sun
You won't notice when and where it had begun

It is inspiration set free; chasing feats of its own
Moments that don't fit in an hour glass, they have outgrown
As the cold winter night puts me to sleep
In dreams and thoughts, my ghost finds memories to keep

People come and people go, they leave traces for now
That are found in writings & sketches on sides of walls somehow
My unplanned beginnings, as they come and go
It is in the inspired moment that the storyteller finds my ghost

Day 300: Marked as Read

As I neatly arranged my appointments for the day I kept wondering if we are in the habit of checking them as to do lists. Even without the appointments these are the few hours that pass like emails you have marked as read.  There are some things that leave impressions and some that have just faded. As I write the 300th piece today I keep wondering about counts and some that don't matter sometime. For much adds on to the human experience and as I keep writing I learn from all of these folds that forms something beautiful, I share this one with you in the hope that they are read just the same too.

Marked as Read
So I clicked select and had them all marked as read
I wondered if I had marked them as I wrote somewhere in my head
They are just number sometimes, just counts of things well kept
Dreams we don't remember or can't return even if we might have overslept

The to do list on the fridge or somewhere taped to your desk
The things that need attention , the thoughts that are never at rest
They have climbed onto paper and into poetry that I write
These paper swans that on some odd days seem to simply come alive

I am protecting these windows from the draft that blows
The sunshine or cold wind or whatever you need, for now I don't know
I am forging bridges that connect us, to warm places for now
I am sharing a park bench with you as my thoughts take a bow

Marked as read and neatly tucked safe and sound
These incompletes that don't seem to bother us for now
They will be dealt with as the tired ones, they head to bed
As I capture my hours that pass and mark them as read.

Day 299: Here we Are

Here we are looking at the last minutes of the day, these arbitrary 20 minutes, for now, will end too and for those who have a few hours left write again my friend, just write a few. We are homemade tonics of the heart, we are repair shops radio stations that play on full volume as you fix something. Whatever we need it to be, here we are with the very best of it. In the things that close ranks with the day, these last 4 minutes seemed to have something to say while I wrote to every single thought that passes by. So here we are, writing tonight.

Here we Are
Here we are till the heavens turn red
Writing our heart out laying wide awake in bed
Creating but from nothing but thin air
In a lonely world, we are looking for rhymes & pair

Quiet down as the night she sleeps, the lights they switch off
The burnt smell of candle wax but drips from the trough
The dreams are winning; for now, they are taking over the mind
Invisible, they are the hardest to keep; they leave no memory behind

Here we are, we are writing off and from one another
Unchanged pieces in time that we don't let this winter bother
And as we clutch to a warm cup of coffee or tea
We are reminded of warmth in bitter-sweet companies

These heavy doors of my room, they seal out the outside
So I can capture that which may escape while my thoughts I write
Some will say we are minutes of the day finding escape
So here we are piecing back puzzles we can't solve with duct tape

Day 298: 3rd Day of Meaning

Counting days is dreadful and whether they are countdowns to beginnings of wishes or about hopes we keep on retainer. Yet ideas must come from some of the most random places, so as I look at the 3rd day of the year I wrote to simply meaning of the same, of things that remained unchanged. I tell myself if we ever get write in codes, these poems that are givings of our thoughts. But then they are the easy ones to crack, they are open to the world. I wonder if we are looking for such codebreakers and onlookers of meaning.

3rd Day of Meaning
It is just as easy sometimes; to summarize
To sometimes catch yourself in your own surprise
To hold things, some that are close and then let go
To write with meanings of which, you don't know

Some surprises that come in things we repeat
Are among times we let our mind win & yet our heart lead
And the little victories that we get to celebrate
Are left on the pages we write, the folded napkins beside your bed

My 3rd day of meaning, the beginnings of a new year
Are still too recent to understand, and yet I hold them just as dear
I climb places where we sometimes used to go
And write of things in codes but for the whole world to know

Remember me like paintings on walls, in pauses during a day
Like a sunrise and sunset on repeat, but never here to stay
It is easy sometimes to write, and not remember why
Of this more than we know, I write and you help inspire

Day 297: Call me a Stranger

Sometimes our fondest memories are random ones, they are about conversations that were not relevant to anything. They were about things that you might have easily forgotten but somehow stuck behind. Call me a stranger but sometimes the best conversations are with people you know and somehow you can't recollect. Call me a stranger; for now, someone who you talk to and write to and yet whose name you do not know. Someone who finds the best part about a conversation is about finding a common ground to connect. I find myself a stranger and surrounded by a few, but these are the familiar ones I talk to every single day, & yet they are never too new.

Call me a Stranger
Tell me that we are still capable of simple things
We know how to start from scratch, where it all begins
Invite me to just a cup of tea; if that's okay
Let me know you just a little bit more, as you find out my name

Come call me a stranger and yet pick me out of a line
Tell me I am without instructions and sometimes hard to find
You have lost letters in the mailbox, or maybe posted one without an address
So it keeps coming back to you, as my name you try to guess

Call me a stranger, you might have never known before
Just let me be home when you finally knock on the door
I am in the dark while you look for the light switch
Making up stories with a candle light hoping for a glitch

I have forgotten how to walk barefoot or maybe climb a tree
But I have left some clues behind, back to being just "me"
I am familiar to you by now, I intentionally leave things behind
Call me a stranger for now; someone who for now borrows your time

Day 296: Auctioneer of Memories

Would you be surprised if I told you that there are over 428 million results if you look for memories? Everyone likes to begin a new year with a resolve, it doesn't have to be something you declare, it doesn't even have to be declared to yourself. For many of us, these are small things we want to change about our life or situations we face. For a lot of people, this time, is also about transitioning, it is about forgetting something painful or letting go of something that you have held onto for a long time. For me this idea of keeping memories in capsules, time slots always seemed amusing. So I wondered what it would be if we could auction away some of our memories, and my auctioneer would be myself. As we get rid of the few selected pieces and make room for now, would you somehow keep only the happy ones behind, would you let go of something that doesn't fit. I guess this will always be a question for me, if I could would I be the auctioneer of memories. I leave you with your resolves, the ones I hope you get to keep. With inspiration unbound and unmatched and with hopeful nature of making new stories as we go along.  Make a list of things and keep collecting.

Auctioneer of Memories
This is to you where ever you are and where ever you may be
You are keeper of things once lost & auctioneer of my memories
My secrets, my expectations, my hopes that are set free
I wish this year goodbye and yet I keep hoping you are still with me

You are just me placed in a different time
Words that follow my thoughts, just a little behind
I escape disappointment as the calendar changes a page
For now, I only accept that it is time that has aged

My auctioneer of memories, pick them carefully from the lot
These are the very best of me, the only ones I have got
I will make new ones; for now, I will collect time as my year's resolve
I will break them and make them, these puzzles that I solve

I take them one at a time, things I have done & ones I need to do
So I write from a heartfelt place, hoping somehow it reaches out to you
At the end of things or new beginnings, I am overcome by time & its ecstasy
Carry me home with you, my storyteller & auctioneer of my own memories.