dear lavender
my phone still automatically assumes i'm talking to you when i'm texting people- after i type 'hey' i'm given 'honey' in my suggested words. i've been told to clear my keyboard dictionary, but i can't do that. why erase the memory?
the real reason i'm writing to you is that i feel the need to justify. justify further, even though your copy of lavender & lace is somewhere in your house.
you may have noticed that i get confused between my left & my right really often. now, as contemporary and ballet dancer, that's really not a good thing. so let me explain why i still get confused.
when i was little, i was struck with a little thought. my right hand is the one i do everything with; it's my powerful hand. i write with it, i open things with it, i have more control over it. so little me had decided that my heart was also in the right side of my chest.
which, by the way, it isn't.
i remember being so confused; my heart, my most vital organ (apart from my brain) could only be in my right side. it made sense. my right was powerful and important, so my heart must've been in the right side. constantly hearing how crucial the heart was, of course my heart was to the right.
why would the most powerful organ be on the left, my weak side?
poetically speaking, it took me ages to figure out. biologically speaking, i already knew.
but i'm not a biologist, i'm a poet.
our hearts have strength, yes. but god, they're weak. my heart is on my weak side because as tough, as important as it is- love, love melts that. all of it. it leaves me with sugary emotion and other mushy shit that i adore.
but i cannot afford to let myself be weak.
well, that's what i told myself.
you made me weak, and in that way you made in strong, too. but i was constantly torn between being your constant, being the rock you could tie yourself down to when things got heavy. i would be there for you. i couldn't let myself be weak, because if i was weak, there was a chance of you getting hurt. i couldn't have that. i still can't have that.
i hope you find the strength to let yourself be weak. i hope i find another reason to let myself do the same.
(in the end, the book didn't end the way i wanted it to. maybe because the rings of me crying and begging you to not let me leave still echo around the pages. maybe.)
आप पढ़ रहे हैं
ur sleeping on the couch
कविताsticky cantaloupe sunrises & kissing ur soft honeydew mouth
