Aditi Vakil

I didn’t know it was happening at first.

Our world has become deeper because we’ve become more observant.

If it is just this remnant that compels you to answer the call you thought would never come, please don’t do it.

And every time I do reach out
All I leave are just more smudges.
But it makes sense, I suppose:
It’s hard to forget people
When they simply touch your heart
And you-
Played. Danced. Then left a hundred tattoos.
Do I really even have a chance?

By all means, pursue that closure if you’re the type that needs to check off all the boxes – but please, please, don’t hold yourself hostage thinking there’s no other way. Life’s too short for that and you don’t want to find that all the oceans in this beautiful universe passed you by while you stared at the mountain.

There’s no winning with some people and certain situations, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You just have to accept it.

That’s also why, when we’re struggling to let go, the way forward is holding on even tighter.
 

They’d warned her it would be hard
She’d get bruised and wounded and it’d hurt all over,
But that it’d all be worth it in the end.

We no longer wonder whether they care anymore. And we know that when we say it, it isn’t with a cold angry defensive front, it’s with the peaceful calm that comes from having taken everything in our stride and having moved on.

When night fell I stumbled in the dark
I thought you’d give me a hand
Or maybe instead just hold mine in it.
You didn’t,
And therein taught me lesson five
On lighting my own candles

Too often we’re reminded not to take people for granted but not enough that the same holds true for our own skills and abilities. We assume that the things we know and can do today will remain permanently, so we forget to put in the maintenance work and to be grateful, till the day it’s all gone.

If you’re a flame, I’m a raindrop
If you’re a dove, I’m a gull
If you’re a storm-breaker, I’m a rainmaker.