I didn’t know how to get to the other side

Now I don’t know where to go from here

Undeserving of an ordinary life

Roads going into the wood leading nowhere

Is there an escape from this?

Or am I doomed to forever wander these roads

Of memories

Of the could haves and should haves

The path paved with stones of melancholy

How do I escape from this?

Running hard with the invisible hands pulling me back

Into the grey clouds

Of loneliness, regret and nightmares

Close my eyes tightly

Only to wake up to the echoes

Of my own head

it used to scare me

getting older

i felt i was running behind catching up

surely i should have done more by now

seen more by now

felt more by now

but

to be still running

to be still hoping and dreaming

is a privilege

i can play the catch up game all life

we all are

just keep me running

just keep mine running

I like the moments just before you fall

When you’re at the precipice of something

When it’s too soon for you to be thinking of the future, the why’s and the how’s

When uncertainties don’t matter

All that matters is the anticipation

Promising a warm future

When your lungs feel full of breath

When you allow yourself to imagine what it could be like and soak in the possibilities

Without the shackles of life

Allow yourself to be caught up in the presence of them

Allow yourself to be reckless with your heart

Playing the strings to release some of that breath in your lungs

And fall asleep with a smile on your face

No expectations

But just a promise that you can feel in your being

That you’ll be okay

If you’re still capable of feeling this way

Then maybe you’re not broken after all

You’ll be okay.

And all feels well.

Jealousy has wrapped me in it's tempting arms.

Everywhere I look around, each scroll on the screen of my phone

takes me to a place in my head where everyone is better than me

It's like I'm in a room full of people,

impossibly alone

Standing still,

lost in the fuzz of people moving briskly ahead in their brilliant directions

I wish...

I wish.

All my thoughts puckering into existence

make a beseeching appeal to the universe to make it all better

I look for the yellow road with my name on it only finding a thousand paths

swirling into one another

until I can't make one out from the other.

'Me. me! Pick me!'

'.. but what about me?'

The yearning to be someone turns

into a haunting realisation of mediocrity

The weight of being no-one in the midst

of the glory of others pulling me down

further and further

Until I cocoon into myself

crippled with fear,

dark clouds hovering over my head

Afraid of finding out what the future holds

Still

in the chaos of the universe.

Today, I typed my name on a blank screen hoping to find myself.

Instead, I found two wavy red lines appear below the words. And that seemed to be the perfect metaphor. 

Something erroneous, something wrong.

Add to dictionary or auto-correct

Or 

delete it all?

I know you from your words

Not your hands

Recognize you and the matters of your heart

From the punctuation marks 

And not the cadence in your voice 

So when my mind decides 

To conjure up a memory of you

It's your name that I see flash 

In the window of my mind

And not your face

"this conversation is encrypted on both ends"

It's wrapped in a special place in my heart

Cushioned by hopes and dreams and

Almost(s) that threaten to prick it sometimes

A beginning and an end entwined together

Intangible, for no one else to see

Fragile in its nature 

That could never survive outside

Of the refuge of my mind.  

Sorrow. Grief. Despair. Sadness.

Emotions that you can never explain. And for some reason they feel so much more powerful than happiness. You might not remember all your happy moments, but the moments that wrenched your heart always stay with you. Sadness makes us questions everything, makes us look deep into our hearts and fight with our demons. The one we didn't know existed. The ones we pretended don't exist. When something clenches your heart, all your fears wash over you all at once. And you feel almost paralysed. Lost. And exhausted. 

Sometimes it creates a storm inside you, wrecking everything, forcing the tears out of your eyes that you seem to have no control over. It's like an uncontrolled blazing fire.

Then there's melancholy. More like a controlled burn. It's been inside you for so long, you've even forgotten that there's a cause to the ache that you feel. It simply becomes a part of you, not going away, chipping away the rest of you, making it's presence known occasionally leading to long restless nights. 

Sometimes you feel angry for feeling so helpless. Tired of the sinking, heavy feeling that has grasped you. You want to let go of it. You want to cry, but your eyes won't acquiesce. You want your brain to shut up but it won't. Your heart seems too heavy to carry around, every breath you take requires extra effort, and you just want to cocoon into yourself under a blanket, never come out, and escape reality.

So you lie awake at nights, willing yourself to feel anything but this heaviness that has enveloped you, eventually falling asleep with dreams coloured in the dark colours of your soul. 

Then one day, it happens. The trigger can be anything. Innocent words spoken by a friend, a distant memory, a stranger with a familiar face that you saw while coming home. And all your emotions come flowing out. Like flood waters, uncontrollable, wiping everything out, clearing the slate. Only in this case, they aren't destructive. They are cathartic. And the tears that come out of your eyes finally take the numbness away. It hurts. It really hurts. All the regret, the broken dreams, the hatred toward yourself, wash over you. You cry for a long time, and eventually the heaviness goes away replaced by an emptiness yet lightness that you haven't felt for a long time. 

And though the pain hasn't miraculously gone, you're on your way out of the proverbial tunnel. 

The road seems long, you still can't see the promised light, the end is not in sight. But you're on your way.