Thoughts of a War Child

If I could write to anyone outside this cavern of hopelessness, oh how much I’d tell him.

I would tell him about the gravel beneath my feet, crunching under my weight. The long, never-ending road ahead. The horizon only clouded by dust and sand. My shoulders burnt red as the sun beat down on me, on us, relentlessly. Mercilessly. The heat concentrated on my skull that only tries to create an umbrella of shadow for the body below. My lips that peel off each other like Velcro-strips, the walls of my throat that scratch against each other like dragging high-heels on uneven pavement.

My mama always told me, “Life is unfair.” Our lives were decent, we lived on alright. We had at least 2 meals a day and my neighbour taught me Mathematics and Science. I didn’t quite understand my mother, until there came a day. Two weeks before I was to turn 8. When buildings shook, and my drawings fell from the wall. When cement became dartboards for lead bullets. When my neighbour was never to be seen again.

Life is unfair. We see it everyday. Able-bodied, stronger men who entitle their kill for only theirs to devour, snatching flattened plastic bottles or “sandals” made of rubber. While our white-haired, wrinkled, hunched-over fathers bleed through their soles, treading on glass.

We see it though we would rather not. Watching your five year-old sister snatched away by the cursed waves, as hands reached out to grab you from the sinking orange deathboat. Her screams I still hear in my sleep, her screams I want to force into a glass jar and leave in the city where we once lived, where ruin is kept.

We see it now. The sand path that disappears into mirages, the destination we seek but seems to be another myth. It mocks our sanity, and it mocks our faith. The cruel, stone-cold Sun that whips us with glowing red rays. It dares torture us from worlds away. Revenge cannot be taken; even if we reached it we could not touch it.

I would ask him about what it is like where he is. I would ask whether the youthful gave to their elders, whether meat was shared. I would ask whether mothers held their babies every night as if so close to death. I would ask if they see flowers more often than we, whether they ever stopped to peer and caress them amidst the chaos and debris. Whether Life is still unfair.

Thoughts of a War Child // CLL 

When You Are.

When you are so happy,
Sounds of laughter cease to be heard.
When you are so in love,
Weaknesses can no longer be seen.
When you are so cold,
You can no longer feel your feet.
When you become so tired,
Your body can no longer feel fatigue.
When you are in so much pain,
It all becomes numb.
When you cry so much,
Your reservoirs have run dry.

Heart, Settle.

Today,

I managed to describe how my heart feels when it is nervous.

It becomes encapsulated in a bubble,

A vacuum,

Sound-proof.

It feels like it is submerged in water,

Like how you let go of a rock

Slowly,

At the surface,

But it drops to the bottom faster than you'd like it to.

As it reaches the depths,

Feeling subsides,

Like a paintbrush going up your arm,

Like eyes tracing your face,

Chin to forehead.

That happens for a second,

Till it is numb for yet another.

But then you feel a sliver of silver,

Skin on cold metal,

It almost makes your bubble quiver.

Then it settles,

The moment of fear and anxiety washes over you,

You force yourself to think about something else.

These episodes will come again and again,

But they will never feel old.

1/7/16 

I find myself believing in things that don't want to come true.

22-6-16

Needed Wanted

It's been a while, hasn't it?

Blogging seems like such an unfamiliar concept now, but I've come back for it in hope that I'll retrieve something I once had. Right now, it almost feels like I'm just living because I need to live, and for particular reasons. Fixed, definite, tangible, visual, describable reasons.

I stopped writing for a long, long period of time because a pragmatic side of me was saying that writing is not at the top of your list for things to do. Writing is a hobby you enjoy doing, but you have math homework and a biology test and a chinese exam. You can put it aside. Maybe one day, you'll find the time. 

The difference between "Need" and "Want" has been distinctly established for my whole life. Spend on what you need, less on what you want. Do you need that?

And yes, at first glance, writing is a want. I had a longing to write. I loved to write. I don't know when or where I learned that what I love is wrong, what I love is a guilty pleasure, what I love calls for regret. Why didn't I realise sooner that writing was a need too? 

What you love, is what you need.

What you love keeps you alive. What you love keeps you sane, it keeps you kickin and runnin.

I'm constantly making lists of things that are more important or things that I have to do more than other things I have to do either way. I guess they call it prioritising. Most of the time, this ultimately leaves the things that are not 'needed' in the conventional way, stuck in that corner of your room, the only corner that is neat because you barely go there.

There's a part of me that still has passion for this, for writing. But I am also so aware of the lack of it.

I have dismissed it far too many times, decided it was not important enough and was acceptable to leave on the backburner. 

The things seemingly unimportant at the present time, may actually be a piece of your thousand piece puzzle, without it, your picture is not complete, without it, your building is not stable, without it you are not fully you. Perhaps, another piece would emerge, like lava between the cracks, but some things cannot be replaced, without changing the overall person to be ahead.

Even If It Is Known.

In between sobs, I asked why it had to be this way.

I asked how could anyone survive this,

Reach the end... sane.

I asked why all the solutions to this problem, seems to be only found in death.

I thought: how sadistic.

I didn't understand why I could not escape.

It scares me to think that I'd have to wait for the lion's passing.

I don't want that.

I don't want Death.

I am not about all of that.

But desperation drives me to extents my values forbid.

In selfishness and for gain.

I don't want to think about the future anymore.

Let me fly free, even if it is known that I will never reach the sky.

x

11/3/16

Blurred.

There are too many things I do not understand.

And too many of those things I probably cannot.

It is torturous, being confused.

It is like seeing, but only seeing blur figures.

Only making out rough shapes,

Only relying on what we know,

Only falling back on assumptions and more confusion.

Blobs of sheer mocking.

It could be or it could not.

Picking at the the flaws of your brain,

Pulling at the loose threads of your heart.

x

4/3/16