Writing to you from the dark

From Helena

I was walking home from work listening to music looking at people around the streets and wondering how I could write the next story where I’m bleeding through my eyes and mouth. I really like a girl and I did confess it to her.

I reached home in the evening at around 6:30. I have been listening to this song called, “Fall For You” by Secondhand Serenade. The poetry in it is immensely strong and I can’t comprehend how genius the writer - John Vesely must’ve been. I don’t see myself writing that kind of poetry ever. Maybe, I have to get into that situation. You always write what you’re facing or going through. You cannot write what you got yourself purposefully into.

Recently, days have been pretty harsh from every stand point and according to how the nature wants it. I don’t know if anyone can relate, but I am stuck in these virtues in my mind where I am getting beaten by a few guards with steel batons on the edge of a cliff while I’m hung loose up on a noose. They won’t kill me with the steel batons, nor let me hang to freedom and neither push me from the cliff.

There are moments of utter happiness where I’m smiling to the fullest that people look at my smile and say, “I’m seeing your smile!”. It’s hard to explain the way the Kyle inside me questions to the other Kyle in my mind. There’s one Kyle inside, one Kyle outside and one more Kyle in the heart. The Kyle from Heart’s province rarely gets to speak. Kyle from the mind often asks a lot of questions. There are moments when I feel that I am standing out as a person. Kyle from the mind will interrupt and ask, “Why me?”. There are moments where I’m struggling at work or some problem. The Kyle from the other side comes and asks the same question, “Why Me?”. This keeps on happening, happening and continues forever.

I let songs play in my ears the whole time. I often play songs which are directing me somewhere, as if they are chantings of a certain person, emotion or energy which I will never be able to achieve. “Fall for you” is particularly about sad feelings because he keeps on chanting, “Don’t change my mind, because I won’t live to see another day”.

I reached home while I was thinking of all of these things, unlocked the door. Found my sluggish flat mate lying on his bed looking outside the window. I said, “Hey, what is up?”. He nodded saying, “Nothing much!”.

I went inside, opened the fridge, took a chilled beer out and went inside my room. I drank half the beer.

I have gotten into this habit of putting the AC on 16°C and lie down on the floor half naked. I don’t know what I feel. I think, scientifically this is called earthing wherein you get calmed down physically and your heart stops beating faster if it is.

The perfect way to make the room super cold faster is to also Turn the ceiling fan on and at its max speed. I did the same, indeed. I was waiting for the words to crawl in my mind.

I kept staring at the ceiling fan and saw myself in the reflection. I said, “how tiny do I look in the reflection. I might be looking so-so similarly tiny when my voice is out there in the world. All weak and with zero impact”.

The music was playing and the moment I said the word “Impact” in my mind, the chorus started playing. The snare, kick drums and everything in sync. I was excited and started thumping my feet on the floor.

The excitement made me say some words to myself. I said to the Kyle inside, “Writing from the Dark”. I quickly woke up and rushed towards my sling bag. I took out my diary and my Kaco mechanical pencil. “Click-Click” and the graphite lead was out. I rustled through pages and found one corner just waiting for me to cry on it.

I wrote the title, “Writing from the Dark”.

I rested my back on the bed side, folded my legs and brought them closer to my body. Because, now I was starting to feel cold. I saw out of the window for a while. I stared at how people were putting their evening lights on. It was 7 PM on the clock.

I said, “Maybe, it’s not a story which has to bleed. It’s a poem.”

I placed the diary beside me and started writing.

“Back from the office every day, I reach home, and keep all the lights turned off, lie down on the floor in darkness.”

I was all impulsive, my whole body was jittery. I did have a few drops of water in my eyes. Because, for me this is a rare moment when my instinct is pulling me towards itself and is going to give me a very-very warm hug.

I have been listening to this song called, “Burn Bright” which deals with identity crisis and pumps up some confidence into who you are.

I said in my mind, “How beautiful does a girl get to live if she really knows how to wake up and smile every single day. She gets to smile differently. Her smile is the only one which exists that way. I believe, every girl should always smile whatsoever happens in the day. It reminded me of a few words from a beautiful poem I had written around women/girls deserving to smile every day. Leaving aside all the agony and sadness”.

By now, I could say that the music was controlling how I’m writing. I could easily shout to the world that, “The keys and strings make me do what I do!”.

I wrote the next stanza.

“I burn so bright that the moon, he is afraid to set low and miss the light I’m emitting”

The metaphors were really weaving the way I wanted them to. There was no light in the room, but I was confident about what I was writing in the dark. I feel brave in the darkness around myself. I feel alive. I feel like I can love her to every ounce of my strength. I will cry and only I will know that I’m crying.

The bridge on the song was just doing it’s job. I deleted the whole queue and set “Fall For You” on the loop. I said to myself, “I can’t miss this moment. I misunderstood it. It wasn’t supposed to be a story, it was a poem. I should’ve thought about the poem from the beginning”.

I confessed my love for her. But, the age gap turned out to be a lot more than I could think of. I fell in love with a woman and not a girl. I always thought she was a girl and not a woman. I got carried on the emotional train and ended up doing the wrong thing. She never asked for it, but I ended up giving something unnecessary".

The next set of words quickly started hitting the shore of my mind,

“I’ve been wanting to, talk with you, look into your eyes, and gain confidence.”

This stanza contains my shyness and awkward-ness to look her eye-to-eye and talk normal. I am fighting against the norm. I am fighting against everything and trying to save our friendly relationship. There have been 0 relationships in this world where the girl and the boy were friends but one of them fell in love, ended up getting rejected and still the relationship has stayed healthy.

For me, I don’t have any hope but I’m trying a lot, a lot and a lot more every single day. I have always struggled with keeping my relationships in a stable state. I can’t look into the eyes of my friends when I’m struggling with myself. I can’t talk with my parents well and neither my sister. In those moments, to me everything feels like a castle of glass which will break just when I’ll say something. I often want to keep my book closed and mouth shut.

I looked outside the window and enjoyed the song while it was coming to an end.

It started again and this time the piano evoked the frisson. I have always been sensitive to emotional music growing up. I really wanted to write about what surrounding I was in. I held the pencil in my hand once again and wrote,

“It’s easy to write from the dark, because I can’t see, whatever I’m scribbling on the sheet. Hence, I’m writing this to you from the dark.”

I whispered, “Serenades. What’s the worst that could happen if I stayed this way.”

I was full of feelings by now and I started to weep while I was staring out of the window. I have never been a writer who would take a break during the process and then get back to it. I bleed in the process and my impulses take me to whatever hell or heaven I deserve.

I felt miserable about how I misunderstood both of our ages while I had some clue that she was older to me. I got carried away really bad and I started feeling bad for it.

Kyle from heart wanted to speak something and I took the mechanical pencil in my hand for him to speak his words. He said,

I am not a rock-star, I’m just a kid, I’m not a hero, I’m just a boy. Who had to write this poem

For her and the age gap we have, I am almost near to a kid for her. I am a 24-year tender graduate starting out new in this job.

The poem felt heavier and heavier after I had written this stanza. The room got colder than I could imagine and I started shivering.

She stays very quiet and I really wonder if she’s in some kind of trouble. I don’t feel like I’m the part of trouble or I’ll get to be a helper in that part ever. I have tried talking about this with her and even offered my help to her. I felt miserable every moment I talked to her.

John vesely sang, “Don’t make me change my mind. I won’t live to see another day”. Tears made their way through my heart once again. Kyle from the heart took control over my body and I threw the pencil. It hit the wall and I could realize from the sound that it had broken.

I rested my head on the bed and kept telling myself, “I am not allowed to be the part of her dark room. I shouldn’t write about it. I shouldn’t write about it. I shouldn’t write about it. I should absolutely not because I don’t precisely know if she’s really in dark or not. I don’t know anything, I’ve never been accepted as a part of it, only given an essence of how dark it could be in there. I don’t know anything precisely.”

I had the last stanza in my mind. I wanted to complete this poem, so, I rushed towards my desk. Took out one more pencil from drawing pencil set. It was a “Lyra 8B” pencil which I had between my fingers. I sat on the floor, got the book on my lap.

While looking out of the window, I wrote,

“I sometimes feel, you’re in dark too, but I don’t know precisely, because, we don’t talk.”

We don’t talk about things which matter. We were never going to.

I realized, I was sounding like a self-indulgent person in the last stanza. But what am I supposed to write when everything is there in my mind and everything is around me. I am brave in the dark.

I was not allowed to be a part of her darkness. John Vesely talked with Kyle from heart and said, “Because tonight will be the night that I’ll fall for you, over again”.

I have pianos playing their part in my life and mind for me. Piano’s are going to drive me. I am crying over the question, “What about the people who cannot convert their melancholy into Art ?”.