Refuge

Years it has been

how many I don't know,

I stopped counting

the day you decided to go.

At first it was hard

to mute your name mid-conversation,

but today I master the art

of loving you minus the declaration.

Just the conviction in your voice

of the love you never put to words,

makes me stick to the choice

I made back then, even if today you hurt.

Funny thing this is that now it doesn't even pain

to walk alone the paths we traversed together once,

there lies no melancholic wait to see you again and again

I guess today, I do understand your silence.

The only finality

that in my world holds true

is how my fickle self, unfailingly

still wishes to find her refuge in you.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Go Extinct!

Lo and behold
This anecdote needs to be told
How the stories that say 'happily ever after' really roll
Read on and see marvels of time unfold.

Life sailed on calm waters, days ran by fine
Drama struck as thunder, I wish I could define
A flash of smile in the blink of an eye
took away the heart, for years which was mine.

Embers of love were set ablaze
with that captivating, mesmerizing gaze
Exaggerating I am not, for me he was such a craze
Just to catch a glimpse of him, Everyday I stood under the sun's harmful UV rays.

In today's world, feelings are played with, hearts juggled here and there
Loving someone in such environment is oh-such-a-dare.
I fought with all the possible constraints and together we were, just making you aware
My mistake I didn't kill the competition yelling at some crazy snake 'Kill the spare.'

There she came along, that pea-head with her pancaked face
Such girls, I tell you, put the homo sapiens to disgrace
Toothpick thin, zombie eyes, hair that were more of a shoelace maze
But then again, what should I say, she was in and I stood replaced.

Heartbreaks are cruel, Tears are an acid leak
Fiercer than lightning she struck and took my life, that murderous super-freak.
But she isn't really the one to blame, no matter how much ill I may speak
Despite the fact that I loved him to bits, he fell for plastic that squeaks.

Anyway, Life goes on with memories but some experiences I let vapor
'Cause sometimes you're trash to that person for who you declare love from skyscraper.
Today as I sat to declutter my drawer
I found a picture of that dinosaur whom I confessed 'Rawr'
For a long time I was too blind to find him distinct
But if I see him now or ever, from deep inside my heart I'm wishing: "GO EXTINCT!"


© 2011 Neha Choudhry

P.S. Rawr is 'I love you' in dinosaur language :D

Through the eyes of Sawyer...

Introduction:
A storm of emotions
A swarm of words buzzing through and through
It'll take a while to pen this down
because feeling it this real, putting down each line
breaks me, shatters me
the way it broke you!



I wrote this piece on behalf of James 'Sawyer' Ford from the LOST Series.
Sawyer writes for Kate.


(The END is altered)



Memories lay scattered around
Shattering the broken self I put to grave and tried forgetting about
One look at your face, resurrected the love
the pain, the wait, the last kiss, the hug.

It seemed like centuries since you were away
After all this time, why today
you packed your bags and hopped onto the flight
the one that crashed here, like the previous, and brought back everything that can never be mine.

There are feelings I will never confess
I lived the days trying hard not to picture your face
As I whispered your name and kissed you
The next moment, I jumped from the chopper only to see you getting rescued.

A man like me can only go for the kill
Loving someone isn't my thing
Love conned the con man me as every night, since you left
Clutching your smile close to my heart, I slept.

Calming the hurricanes of hurt that ran inside
I watched you look at him with that conviction in your eyes
The one I always wished to see every time I kissed your tears
when he hurt you so bad that you ran to my arms, clutching self-doubts and fears.

I could live with the fact that you ain't coming back
I made peace with my heart and shut doors that backtrack
But to see him holding your hand, standing where I could be
A to-be-destroyed heart asks you, Why not me?


Was the question too hard on time
What followed it was a blinding flash of light
Head ready to burst with searing pain
And much to my surprise, when I opened my eyes, I was sitting in a plane.


!(THE ISLAND TRAVELLED THROUGH TIME)!


Was I dreaming, Was I in a trance
I put it aside, why bother giving it another investigative glance.
I got up to stretch a bit and get myself a beer
In the passage, I saw her, why was she familiar?

Was it the cling of handcuffs that she tried to hide
Or the chime of that guilty smile
Why did I recognize the scene of my eyes in hers
As she smiled, why an echo ran inside me that I have shared a life with her before.

I stood there long enough, wordless, staring deep in her eyes
Trying to figure out where this fugitive in my memories resides
She came up to me, touched my hand
And flashes of recognition in me did ignite.

"Freckles, you're here...", I fumbled and broke
She hugged me and breathing slowly she spoke
"I... I thought I lost you..."
"I'm sorry for all I put you through..."
"I have waited all my life to say this,
Sawyer, I love you too..."


© 2011 Neha Choudhry

I love you ♥

I sit here misty-eyed
Seems like all of me is shattered, smashed inside
There isn't a second I haven't cried
Since the moment you unknowingly meowed a goodbye.

With every tiny sound you made
my worries, laments you put to fade
The way you clutched me close in embrace
Will shine the brightest memory of you, for always.

The way I've cuddled you to sleep
I myself wasn't aware I loved you so damn deep
Until today when I looked in your eyes for one final time
I could feel myself break, giving away the only one I could call mine.

Stay safe, my love and learn to catch a mouse
Although from the bottom of my sinking heart I am so wishing you create a mess in that house
Just so you can be back to me
And we, together, can hug and sleep.

I've cradled you when you shivered at night
Laughed when you chased torch's light
You made me your home, tore down the walls I've built around my heart
The love we share is forever, we are never apart.

It'll be a task tomorrow morning to not look for you around
To not re-fill your milk bowl, to not answer to your sound.
Just remember one thing, I am always finding a way to get back to you
And no matter what I do, I am always thinking of you.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Lethally Yours.

Do you have the slightest idea
How brutally you tore me apart
To build me up and bring it all crashing down
Dazzled by your smile, I guess I overlooked that you were the master of this art.

How easy it is to say "Let's part ways"
How convenient it is to hold my hand, walk along all day
But as the night falls, as sunlight fades to gray
How chivalrous it is to leave me in traffic, halfway.

Yes I do have a hyper-active imagination
Maybe I mistook, misread everything you never said
But what's your argument for the kisses you planted, for the butterflies you gave
The 'till the end of time' love, you professed.

Headache I am, ninety-nine percent of the time
But at least you can sleep, thanks to the plethora of pills
The heartache you gave has no cure
My breaths are engulfed in tears, the silence kills.

Having survived yet another day, much to your surprise
As a broken me takes off for the dream world behind my closed eyes
I, yet again, erase the hurt, put the tears to a pause
Just Because...

Sometimes you are enchanted by the excruciating pain
Sometimes you are so in love with the cause.


© 2011 Neha Choudhry

. . .

कृपया ध्यान दें: यह मेरा हिन्दी लेख में प्रथम प्रयास है|

आँखों में अब भी
गुज़रे कल का धुंआ है,
दुआ के अल्फाज़ों में
बस नाम तेरा है|

लकीरों का क्या है
आज यहाँ हैं कल कहाँ हैं,
रास्तों का क्या है
जहाँ क़दम चल दिए वही राह है|

ज़िन्दगी वहीँ है
तू जहाँ है,
तेरा साथ हो
तो तनहाई भी कारवाँ है|


© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Let me be YOU.

The photograph attached inspired me to write this one. I just could not NOT WRITE this.

Walking down the trail with your father, I saw you
Early summer it was, I faintly remember it,
Silently, I turned around 'cause as always I expected to be rebuked
But then I heard a sweet voice say 'Hey!' and saw a hand extended.

For someone who is treated as filth, unwanted
that moment was too spellbinding to react,
I stood frozen to my place, daunted
'He's just another reason for me to not bring you back in here', retorted your dad.

I was welcomed with anger and wails
the day I opened my eyes to the world,
My mother succumed to the child-birth pain
My father abandoned me on the road and left crossing a point of no return.

I grew up living on abuses and kicks
from everyone I ever came across,
To earn another sunrise of my life, I loaded bricks
and searched for left-overs in dustbin that people tossed.

My life sounds sure as Hell
but I still loved it for I had a friend, Paige
She lived nearby in a refugee camp, everyday she had a story to tell
But one night she was raped, killed and thrown away.

I was a little shaken, yet I drank in the tears and went to work
Loading bricks, I was distracted, as I couldn't just erase off her face,
I tumbled on something and fell, my employer in rage grabbed me by my shirt
spat in my face, threw me three feet away and yelled 'F*** off, you Disgrace'.

I donated blood to someone in need
they say the needle was contaminated,
the cause of the incurable flu, fever, aches and slight loss of memory
is something called HIV-AIDS.

There is someone from your town here
I narrated this all to him,
'cause I know not how to read or write
And I am sending along with this letter, a tin.

While you walked past me that day on the trail
You dropped something by mistake and forgot,
I am sending back your little bracelet
with memories of a life I got.

Don't write back to me
As I would be long gone by then,
I am glad out of everyone that hated my existence
You cared to ask and extend a hand, my friend.

Such an irony, life is
Although I never lived much of mine,
Still if ever I had a chance
I would want to be YOU for just a moment in time.

To know what care is
To know what a father's clasp feels like
To sit at home and taste the food mother makes
To embrace happiness,
Just for a while.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

'Cause I built a castle on the sands of time.

In the smoke of burning memories
In the cocktail of tears that flow
In the first words that I said to you
In the last of you that I saw
I suffocated myself so as to let you breathe free
I drank in the pain each time 'cause you never cared to see
I stood clutching onto the tiniest pieces of my heart
Only to see you hold her hand
Look me in the eye
And walk away.

In the eerie silence of the night
In the very first phrase of my prayers
In the song that's stuck in my head
In the perfume of the time we had
I whispered your name to the stars as my only wish
I asked happiness for you wherever you might be
I sang the lyrics with life streaming down my cheeks
Only to see you light a match
Set us on fire
And leave.

In the silent seconds passing between us
In the butterfly kisses
In the raindrops that sparkled your face
In the unheard words of the hidden letters I never gave
I wished to hear your voice, I wanted you to speak
I waited, bated breath, only to know if you loved me
I drenched all these years in the rain of love
Only to see you close your eyes
Shut the door
And whisper Goodbye.


© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Dear You, with Love.

So, it started somewhat like this
Thanks to the perfect love stories I saw and read
I had a perfect wish
To find that one guy or let him find me
The one whose one gaze would sweep me off my feet.

Call it an obsession or whatever you may
the list went on and on with each passing day.
Polite, friendly, caring ones I did meet
But none held that spark,
the one that could make me skip a heartbeat.

Movies, by now, seemed cliché
the same old happy endings that flagged off waterfalls in my eyes,
Reality narrated a different story altogether,
here did exist the concept of Goodbyes.

Hope, I still held on to
in my heart's core
the search, I abandoned
I couldn't stand being disappointed all the more.

He usually sat on the back benches in class
Eventhough I wasn't being talked to, on his jokes, I suppressed a crazy laugh.
Some magnetic pull he surely possessed
His presence around was all I silently wished.

I was all smiles on a mere mention of his name
Life surfed on happy waters, I wasn't the same.
He was the diametric opposite of everything I ever thought I wanted
Yet, the day he appeared, the silly lists disappeared.

It was his birthday, mine was the most casual wish
But when he shook my extended hand
Something out-of-the-world dramatic
his touch did.

The glint in his eyes
had set embers of love ablaze.
He walked off, smiling, with my heart
While I stood there for what seemed an eternity, in daze.

The world had either stopped
or time had slowed down,
He was all I thought of
all the time, there on.

In the most impossible places
Among unknown faces
That one smile made life magical
In reality, he gave me my fairytale.

Together, it has been a while
Looking back on that day, still gives me butterflies.
For no one in the world, I can be this sure
He is everything Love is about and so much more.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Disclaimer: This photo has been taken from http://bit.ly/rSb9r1

She

Here's to all my girls!


Stuck in reverse
to her life seems,
She cries an ocean
when she sits back, reminiscing.
A jar full of laughter
she carries along,
Her voice will make you forget
your favorite song.
The sparkle in her eyes
could put the night sky to shame,
The way she looks at you
would want you to let her win every silly game.
She looks tempting soft
but to the inside is solid steel,
One flash of that dazzling smile
And you might even forget you had to breathe.
She loves with the passion
you can never match,
Sometimes speaks so fast, so random
there might not be a single word that you catch.
But one thing is for sure
and you know that too,
When those kohled eyes stare you in face
the love in them will set free a million fireflies in you.
A sniff or sight of belgian chocolate ice cream
sets the ninja in her free,
she won't even let you touch it
yet those puppy eyes will make you
hug her to sleep.
Once you let her be a part of your life
the perfume of her presence
will linger on
for a million lifetimes.
If you are wondering
who that might be
She is you,
She is me.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

Rain on me now!

It stayed up there and watched it all
day by day dirt drenched my soul.
I heard things I never wanted to
I saw things my eyes can never forget.

I walked the trek all by myself
taking tiny steps, tiny breaths.
Darkness was growing inside me
and the smile I carried wasn't just helping brighten it.

And even before the first teardrop could touch my cheek
It came rushing down to rescue me.
Wearing the cloak of the breeze
Hugged me tender, put me to ease.

The downpour washed away the vices, the pain
I stand drenched in happiness, in love
With the silver drops beating on my head
I dance, I sing, I celebrate the rain.

As night starts to draw in
it kissed me good night,
silently singing
my favorite lullaby.

At times the world's walls close in on us
Eyes brim with tears, smile turns a frown.
Look up and just call out its name
Nature showers diamonds on you
each time it Rains!

© 2011 Neha Choudhry

I see a Winner.

Staring walls for answers
to the questions I ask myself
every living second of my existence.
Hiding in these eyes
lay acidic tears
that seep inside, every now & then
Burning my hope, burning my soul.

Life has had a re-run
Only hurt ran in concentric circles,
I faced the stabs of time in face
Only to see the blows grow more fierce.
The last thing I saw before I closed my eyes
Were pieces of a life I dearly love.

Much to destiny's surprise,
I crawled back on my feet.
Crying out those piercing tears is better than dying slowly, keeping them inside.
Here, I stand, with eyes wide open
Fearless, in my cloak of charm,
And I am looking for something that time washed away
I'm snatching back My Smile.

In the worst of times, I breathed in calm.
In moments when I was on verge of breaking, I held on to my faith.
Today, I break-free from the stale inhibitions,
And walk on with my head held high.
I've lived a long time for everyone else
Guess, this time this love and care is Mine.

Arms stretched, I embrace the sky
and with that I blow heavens a million kisses,
For making me this strong that I don't melt easy again.
Standing before the mirrors in everyone's eyes today,
I see a Winner.

© 2011 Neha Choudhry