Devyani Saini's Blog, page 4
September 19, 2017
Matter | Poetry
perhaps poets write
of abuse, heartbreak, and loss
because the happiness
does not have to be dealt with
September 18, 2017
Naked | Poetry
true intimacy is
not standing naked together
but standing honest together
Undressing Me | Poetry
undressing me
is not what you do
with your hands
or your eyes
but what I do
to myself
when I speak without veneer.
– when he asks me to strip
September 11, 2017
there’s something beautiful about a new perception
Stunning, uplifting
September 4th, 8:25PM
It seems that our bodies were made for war, that someday someone, armed with an axe, will come to tear down the trees that you spent years nurturing.
Someday something will start a fire that eats away at the soles of your feet and only thrives with each step.
You’ll feel the disintegration of your heart, with the laceration of each tissue and the abrasion of each ligament. You’ll feel how something once tangible will turn to dust. Your hands will burn as your stomach liquefies through the gaps between your fingers. Your ashen lungs will dry up and no matter how much you breathe, nothing happens. Your corroded mouth will yearn to bathe in a lake of fresh, clean water. Your brain will swell and press against the insides of your skull, making you consider the possibility that something, is in fact, very wrong. Your eyes…
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August 30, 2017
Empty Notebooks
I love notebooks. Just the way they feel between palm and finger, the way a pen glides over and makes a mark, the way it fits into your bag with such ease.
The first notebooks I used were for school work – those were easy to fill. The daily ritual of writing down notes, math sums, definitions, Q&A, test answers, diagrams. The real difficulty arose afterwards, when I bought some blank notebooks, leather bound with a ribbon marker, little pockets on the inside cover, rounded corners. A proper moleskin. Afraid to make a mistake, I left it blank.
I have maybe 6 notebooks at the moment. One is from London – the cover a bright glittering purple. It says “Make Today Awesome” in light blue letters. Another is from Harry Potter World – a Slytherin one, green leather covers and rough brown pages. A smaller one, a gift from a friend. It says ‘Colourful Days’, and below that ‘Draw All Your Dreams’. Another I got recently – another gift. A blue, perhaps damask, cloth cover. The pages feel handmade. One from a Hong Kong street market, brown pages and a Chinese saying burned into the leather cover. My designated travel journal.
An old green moleskin, a gift as well, has a few pages with Korean sentences and song lyrics. I’ve put that one aside for my Korean. But once again – it’s a study notebook. It will be simple to fill.
But the others. How to fill the others… I’m still wondering.
One for accounts during college. Contacts? My phone would probably work better.
I could never maintain a daily journal, so that’s out. Maybe an art journal? It’s a lot of work though.
In wondering what to fill in all these notebooks enough time would have passed for me to have filled them – whether with my To-Do list, reminders, questions, information, notes, or whatever else in the world.
It’s a little amusing, to say the least.
August 4, 2017
Forgetting
The sight of forgetting is the city lights at night, stars against a black ocean of silent roads and shadows.
The sound of forgetting is music blaring through speakers, so loud you have to open your mouth to let the sounds escape, lest your head explodes.
The shape of forgetting is a shot glass filled with clear liquid, salt shining around its rim. Somewhere close by there is a lime, or maybe there isn’t.
The smell of forgetting is the choking but heady toxicity in the glass. It’s the same smell as my nail polish remover.
The taste of forgetting is a scarlet flame. I imagine the blood, rich and thick, will begin running down my throat, but there is nothing – only a faint remnant of the poison.
Everything is fine now.
I have forgotten it already.
June 20, 2017
The Torrent of Words
The word mistake is not one that appears in the typewriter’s dictionary.
There are only letters and spaces.
A trembling excitement dances across fingertips as they settle over the keys. To make a mistake is to betray the machine. It does not recognize mistakes. The fingers expect to find a backspace key, but there is none. Every smear of ink on the page is permanent.
The excitement turns to trepidation, then fear. Fear of marring the pages with an unworthy word because the capricious mind cannot make itself up, fear of overthinking each letter, each punctuation mark, before pressing a key.
Why am I afraid, when all the power rests with me?
You are afraid of yourself, the typewriter replies.
The apprehensive hands finally settle on the keys. The blank paper is inviting in its innocuousness. Each sonorous keystroke is a staccato of insecurity. After an eternity the line is finally filled and the carriage is pushed back.
A pause.
Go on, the typewriter says.
Suddenly a wave of calm washes over the trembling hands, and the quivering lip stills.
The keystrokes begin, slow and still unsure, but continuous. The clicking becomes a fragment of a melody, growing faster and more decisive after every passing second.
The typewriter inspires a delicate freedom. It does not judge, nor command, but merely serves. To the typewriter every word is the right word. As they spill out like a torrent washing away silt, there are no red lines that underline the mistakes, no markings to indicate the miscommunication between the fingers and the mind.
The typewriter does not recognize mistakes.
The machine whirs and clicks, and a hand reaches out to slide the carriage back. A blank line, ready to be filled. There is comfort in the sound of the keys being pressed – bringing forth a familiar memory of the past we were never a part of.
Thoughts flow, seamless and unbroken, manifesting themselves as lines and curves of black ink, which sear themselves into the hearts that understand them.
The hands lift from the keys, but the machine does not stop. The keys depress of their own accord, whispering, “This story must be finished. Let us write it together.”
June 17, 2017
Peach Apricot Tea | 복숭아 살구 차
Even from far away I can smell it. That peach apricot tea, from Edo. I sit close to the window, the mug warms my hand. Outside the window people are running so fast I can’t see them.
Where are you going? Is there some festival?
Then I hear a gunshot. I’m still sitting here alone, the peach apricot tea is here too. It smells good. I can’t help the living, so I just look. A person just fell. I see blood. My peach apricot tea has a sweet taste. It’s still warm.
It’s totally quiet in the cafe. Nobody is here. I drink slowly and look out the window… the person who fell is standing. Red blood everywhere, like roses. His face seems sad. He reaches his hand out and I laugh.
I can only watch and drink tea.
I know he is already dead, but his eyes resemble those of the living. How interesting.
Finally he disappears. People are still running though… Today seems like it will be busy.
Well, should I wait for everyone to die?
Anyway there is still peach apricot tea in the cup. I can wait.
More gunshots, more screams, more tears. I’m tired.
Even from inside the cafe I can here all the voices. Some people speak in Korean, some in Japanese, but to my ears it sounds the same.
…
Finally it is quiet.
By now the peach apricot tea is finished.
I leave the cafe to find the souls.
멀리서도 내가 그 냄새를 맡을 수 있다. 그 복숭아 살구 차, 에도에서. 창 가까이 앉고, 찻잔은 내 손이 데워졌다.. 그 창 밖에서 사람들이 엄청 빨리 달려서 안 보여.
어디 가? 아무 제전 왔어?
그때 나는 총소리를 들어. 아직도 혼자 앉아 있는데, 복숭아 살구 차도 있고. 냄새 좋았다. 내가 사는 사람에게 도와주면 안돼거든 그냥 봐요. 어떤 사람은 방금 넘어졌다. 피가 보여. 내 복숭아 살구 차는 단맛 있다. 아직 따뜻해요.
완전 조용해 카페에 아무도 없거든. 난 천천히 마시고 창 밖에 보고… 넘어졌는 사람은 서 있다. 빨간 피 어디나, 장미 꽃 처럼. 그 얼굴이 슬펐을 것 같아. 그는 손을 내밀고 내가 웃어.
그냥 볼 수만 있고 차 마실 수 있고.
그 사람 이미 죽은지 알아, 그래도 그 눈빛이 진짜 사는 사람와 닮았다. 신기하네.
드디어 사라진다. 사람들이 아직도 달리는데… 오늘 너무 바쁠 것 같아. 글쎄, 나는 모두가 죽을 때까지 기다릴까?
아무튼 아직 잔에 복숭아 살구 차가 있어. 기다릴 수있다.
더 총소리, 더 비명, 더 피, 더 눈물. 피곤해.
카페 안에 있어도 목소리 다 들였어. 몇 명은 한국어로, 몇 명은 일본어로도 말하지만, 내 귀를 위해 똑 같은 소리야.
…
결국 조용한다.
지금쯤 복숭아 살구 차가 끝났어.
혼들을 찾으려고 카페에서 떠나요.
June 12, 2017
Volume
“Mass isn’t proportional to volume.
A girl as small as a violet, a girl who moves like a flower petal – is pulling me toward her with more force than her mass.
Just then, like Newton’s apple, I rolled toward her without stopping until I fell on her with a thump.
My heart keeps bouncing between the sky and the ground.
It was my first love.”
– Kim Shin (Goblin: The Lonely and Great God)
Mass isn’t proportional to volume.
A book that can be cradled in the arms of a child holds worlds, entire histories of people that existed in another place, another time. The book contains a universe.
In the child that witnesses his mother’s murder, a bubble of revenge grows – hatred that consumes kingdoms, rewrites history in blood on the walls of his enemies.’ castles The boy crushes the world in his tiny fists.
In words, weightless as air, laws are spoken. Love given. In words, empty as air, promises broken. In words, existing as sound, as letters on a page, hearts are carved into little pieces and trampled upon.
In these weightless words, I give away smiles. I give away death. I give away volumes of feeling, of worlds, of history.
Volumes of everything.
Lol idk what I even wrote for this prompt. I just liked the Goblin quote so I thought I’d bullshit a little. The quote doesn’t even have much to do with what I wrote lol. (I’ll probably end up deleting this haha)
Shout-out to anyone who saw the Jorg Ancrath reference in the 3rd paragraph. Hard to catch unless you’re really looking for it…
June 11, 2017
what are girls made of?
Tell me, what are girls made of?
Hmm… sugar and spice and everything nice…?
Okay, no… they’re made of… this and that.
They’re made of wit, grace, and shy smiles. Respect, charm, refined mannerisms. Obedience and pretty eyes and a sing-song voice. Courage and soft skin and little hands.
Beauty.
That’s the word.
Beauty.
Or… maybe they’re made of sin and regret. Greed and desire. There’s that too. What about anger? Hatred and loss. Bitterness, dissatisfaction?
Gluttony and passion, violence and cruelty. There’s so much girls are made of.
But who knows, maybe they’re all really made of skin and flesh and bone, like the rest of us.
