Original Writing

18 Things Learnt by 18

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1. The world is your oyster. Travelling will teach you more about yourself than you ever thought possible.
2. You will fall in love too quickly and fall out of love too slowly. If love was easy, everyone would be falling and it wouldn’t be unique, terrifying, horrifying and beautifully life-changing.
3. The only way of knowing who your true friends are is by waiting to see if they stay. If they leave, they weren’t made for you and are an invaluable lesson for the future.
4. Standing in the middle of the street, gazing up at the sky, filled with contented sighs and happiness does not make you weird. In fact, do it more often – it centres you.
5. Reading books is the best way to explore the hidden depths of yourself. I once admired writers and their ability to spill thoughts, tears and fears onto paper and turn it into poetry and/or prose, now I am one of them. I wouldn’t be if it weren’t for my extensive library of prized collections.
6. Read poetry. Even though I’m still young, I opened myself up to poetry and let it consume me. And I couldn’t be more in love with it.
7. Write letters. To friends, family, boyfriends, girlfriends, husbands or wives. Nothing says ‘I love you’ louder than in your own handwriting.
8. Listen to your elders. Their wisdom is so easily overlooked as a result of them getting older, less agile. But their wit and wisdom get progressively stronger and more valuable as we grow older.
9. Dance. Like there’s nobody watching. There’s nothing more liberating than expressing emotions through body movements.
10. The media is not your friend or ally. They will tell you what they want you to hear. They will not always tell you the whole truth. They will most likely be biased. Remain open-minded or else they will subtly and effectively manipulate you.
11. Size 0 does not exist. Underweight is not sexy, so eat your food. Don’t skip meals in order to control your weight as you’ll end up doing more harm than good. Smoothies don’t make you skinny. Chocolate is your friend.
12. Watch every sunset you possibly can. They will most likely either remind you of everything good in your life or remind you of someone.
13. Faith will empower you. Religious or not, having faith in someone or something will give you immense strength.
14. The world does not revolve around your phone. Pay more attention to the people around you than the latest trends.
15. Let people finish their sentences. I’ve noticed that we, including myself, have a habit of interrupting each other before one has even finished what they were saying; slow down and listen!
16. Treat people with the respect they deserve. If they disrespect you, remain civil, but they do not deserve your respect. That is to say, do not disrespect them either.
17. Honesty. Being truthful is invaluable. How can you demand respect if you lack honesty?
18. Positivity. Seeing the good in everything and trying to remain as happy as possible completely changes your life and outlook on it. We can choose happiness or we can choose negativity. But which will we inevitably benefit from?

Remembrance Day: 11.11.2014

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To mark another poignant day of reflecting on the lives tragically lost in World War One, I thought I’d post Wilfred Owen’s 1914. I chose 1914 because it was one of his first poems I read when I first stumbled across poetry in school, and his poetry, graphic, disturbing and heart-rending, has stuck with me throughout the years. It’s also one of his first poems on the war. My thoughts go out to all those who suffered directly and indirectly as a result of such a horrendously tragic war. To those who gave their lives for us, and died in honour, for a greater world. 

War broke: and now the Winter of the world
With perishing great darkness closes in.
The foul tornado, centred at Berlin,
Is over all the width of Europe whirled,
Rending the sails of progress. Rent or furled
Are all Art’s ensigns. Verse wails. Now begin
Famines of thought and feeling. Love’s wine’s thin.
The grain of human Autumn rots, down-hurled.

For after Spring had bloomed in early Greece,
And Summer blazed her glory out with Rome,
An Autumn softly fell, a harvest home,
A slow grand age, and rich with all increase.
But now, for us, wild Winter, and the need
Of sowings for new Spring, and blood for seed

Lover’s Halves

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Half of me wants to smoke Marlboros with you and stain our skin with ash and ink and blood and sweat and kisses – everything that epitomises the lust that hangs in the air when we enter the same room. Half of me wants to devour you wholeheartedly, at once, until there is nothing left but the whisper of your existence. But the other half of me wants to write poems about you because every love song fits, and every great love story reminds me of us. It wants to dress up in a tiny black dress and feel you caress the dip of my spine whilst we slow dance to dulcet tones of our love’s journey. It wants to write you letters every day of the week so you know what my love for you sounds like; what true love really is.

My Favourite Book

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He’s my favourite book; the vintage edition with the slightly worn-out pages, the binding disintegrating with my every touch so that I have to handle with care. He’s the cliffhanger and the happy ending that I desperately crave. He’s not the most popular book in the bookstore; he’s not at the shop-front, catching everyone’s eye in the window with his self-righteous front cover but he is my favourite piece of art. I like that about him. He’s not what people expect. And that is why he is mine.

A Bucket List Wish

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Every sunset will be witnessed with someone’s thumb over the pulse of my right wrist, watching the fiery glow softly caress everything it sets its sight on. I’ll be standing in the middle of a storm as the scent of our youth crashes into the ground, leaving behind a mess of broken ambition and ecstasy. Intoxicated with the idea of mystery and adventure, I’ll follow my happiness. Submerged in my freedom, I will live how life should be lived; with no limits, no expectations and no rules.

Apologies of Love

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I’m sorry that all of my words roll off my tongue in metaphors and my sentences string themselves together like needles and thread but I read too much poetry and over time, I have picked up the tiny habits. I’m sorry that I never stop talking until my letters have formed works of art and I’ve finished describing my thoughts and emotions in a way that nobody understands, but somehow they understand anyway. I’m sorry that it takes so long to get things done when I’m around because I spend half my time staring into the distance, wondering what the clouds would taste like, and how I would put that taste on paper, and you spend all your time snapping your fingers in front of my face as though that will scare the poetry out of my mind to slip onto the street and seep through the gutters where nobody will ever find it. My apologies could go on for miles but I don’t have the space of time to tell you all of them, and for that, I am sorry, too, but sorry will never change the fact that I have let the poetry creep down my throat and claw itself into my bones, take apart my every being and replace my heart with words I have no trouble saying but you have trouble listening to. I know that eventually, you will grow tired of it, but until then, I will hand you love letters when you least expect it and write your name into my lungs so that even when I cannot breathe, I will remember the sound of your voice. I will surprise you with afternoon picnics and concert tickets and movie nights and even though while you are rubbing your thumb on the back of my hand I am writing a poem in my mind about the feel of it, I still have not managed to write a poem that describes you perfectly enough because you are not merely something that can be put into words, and no poetry will ever be worthy of you. My love for you is a sensation that only I will ever get the pleasure of having because although my mind is filled with beautiful words, none of them will ever be beautiful enough for you.