Aathira Jim's Blog, page 10

The Memory Box

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Outside, it is raining. The dense fog mists the locked windows. Like from a faraway world, the rumble of a thunder is heard. The house is covered in pitch black darkness as the electricity goes off. She makes her way to the kitchen and finds a candle by the window sill. Power cuts during the monsoon was common, yet she hovers around the kitchen shelves uncertainly searching for a box of matches. Finding it finally, she lights the candle. In the lick of the golden flame, an unknown feeling grips her heart. A feeling that's as new as the flame she lit and that's as old as the rain pouring outside. She wishes to turn back time and go back to where things were not so complicated; days that would merge into beautiful nights with ease. Nights that were free of guilt and filled with longing. 
With the candle in hand, she makes her way to the attic, climbing the stairs carefully, not losing her grip. The attic lies bathed in a thin film of dust, years of disuse lying around unmasked. There are a child's toys, once loved and now discarded like many other things here. The rocking horse grins maniacally in a corner, the wooden cradle next to it. But her eyes goes to the small cardboard carton that has been sealed and left there for some years now. She had made up her mind long back not to open it, but neither did she have the heart to throw it away. 
Placing the candle on the dusty floor, she sits down next to the box, the memory box, as she likes to call it and unseals the tape after a moment's hesitation. She takes a deep breath as the memories tumble out, one by one, and then flooding her all at once. Smothering, threatening to drown her in its depths. It rises, holding her in its clutches. 
The letters, tied together with a piece of string, the few books that had grown yellow with age. She picks one up. The Mill on the Floss. A book that was a part of her syllabus then. All these years and one would have thought that the memories would have faded with age. Certain memories have a strange quality to them, the harder you try to forget, the sharper it gets, like the pixels of a picture coming together to form a clear focus.

The details of the day comes rushing back to her, pricking her like icy needles. The bright red rose that she had laid down to press in between the pages. 
Would it still be there? Or would it have crumpled to dust like many feelings? The incessant thoughts continue to linger. Well, only one way to find out. 
She opens the book, holding it tenderly, like a new born child. And there it is, the red rose, but no longer red. In muted shades of yellow and a color that was almost black. The petals delicate like a fluttering moth's wings. A smile tugs at the corner of her mouth seeing the rose still there. How often we wish to hold on to those things that we know we should let go. Yet, like a stubborn stain that refuses to leave, it stays, lingering in the deep most caverns of your memory. Guarded like a fierce secret. 
Bottles of dried up ink, old notebooks covered in her handwriting, secret messages scribbled hastily on the back, random notes that she had penned whenever something got her fancy, greeting cards... 
Her hand trembles before picking up the tied bunch of letters. Somethings are better left where it is, in the past. No harm in looking, a stubborn voice inside her head nudges her. She unties the string before having second thoughts. Her eyes blur as it roams hungrily on the pages, taking in the beautiful curved writing in ink that has filled it. She takes it along with the candle and sits near the window, holding it close to her so that the occasional raindrops that breezed in through the open window would not smudge those precious words of long ago and begins to read...
... To be continued.   

Monsoon

Image Source: TumblrWords: My own 

Irrevocable Love

                         Image Source: Tumblr                               Words: My own

Chaos and Confusion

Image Source: Magpie Tales


They call me an artistI create masterpieces after all But what they don't know Is that my art is my life 
That the sketches on canvas Are chaos and confusion Reflected from my thoughts It keeps me sane, these ragged lines
They interpret my art in different waysWhile I want to laugh in their facesThat feeling fleets as soon as it comesThey have made me who I am 
But the only person I'm doing it for Is myself, that's who I am, a selfish creatorI shy away from colorsI prefer my art like my life, in grays and blacks
A brush stroke here, a smudge there I search for answers in betweenThey continue to delude me howeverStill I take a deep breath and continue...
Linking this post to Magpie Tales - Mag 290. 

Cold

There was once a girl who was born with a void inside her. As she grew up, she tried to fill it with people, things and places. But the harder she tried, the bigger it grew. Until she gave up and tried to build her life around it. It wasn't easy, but on some days she could pretend that it didn't exist and get on with her life. And that was when he entered her life. He filled up the void with an emotion she hadn't experienced before. For the first time in her life, she felt she was finally going to be all right. But when he decided that she was too much baggage for him to handle, he left, taking with him all that he gave her and then some more. When he left, he took a part of her with him too. The void grew, a gaping hole in the centre of her being. A hole where her heart was supposed to be. A numbness in her soul. They called her cold after that. Emotionless. A cold blooded bitch. But she knew that anything, anything was better than being labeled a fool of love. 

Sylvia

So, the other day I watching the movie 'Sylvia' which is based on the real life story of Sylvia Plath. Plath has been portrayed onscreen by Gwyneth Paltrow. It's a beautiful albeit tragic movie. It shows the love/hate relationship that she shared with her husband, the poet Ted Hughes. This is not a movie review, but I would recommend you to give it a watch as it is one that made me think A LOT. It shows the emotional turmoil that a writer undergoes; how frustrating it can be waiting for the muse to strike and once she does, the words certainly flow and how! Now, I must confess that I haven't read any Plath except for the few poems here and there. But this movie certainly had me intrigued and I'm hoping to lay my hands on Plath's semi-autobiographical novel The Bell Jar real soon in addition to reading more of her works.


Sylvia is a movie that deals with the depression that Plath had been fighting and finally succumbed to. Even today, there is a stigma surrounding all sorts of mental illnesses. Rather than showing empathy and kindness, we live in a world where people are ridiculed and shunned by society. Battling with mental illness is not easy, the least you can do is show your support. I was reminded of another movie that I watched last month called The Hours which is loosely based on the novel Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. 
I couldn't help but compare the two writers from two different periods and the tragic ways in which they chose to end their lives, which reminds me of this dialogue from a brilliant book that I read recently The truth about the Harry Quebert Affair (I'm in love with quotes, in case you haven't noticed already) between Nola and Harry where she asks him as to why writers are such lonely people, perhaps the loneliest in the world. And the reply given by Harry still blows my mind away:
"I don't know whether it's that writers are lonely or whether it's loneliness that makes them write..."
Writers are definitely an unpredictable lot, after all, how can one really know or even begin to understand how the human mind works? 


Sylvia or Woolf, these are writers that I look up to and one can only try and be a better writer by learning from the best. I may have digressed a lot while writing this post but I certainly had fun writing it, which is what I love about writing. I found the above quote while I was spending my time researching (also read as googling) Plath. I couldn't find a better one to conclude as this one resonates with me on all levels. And this, is exactly why I write. 

Colors of Love

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What is the color of love, you ask meIs it the blushing pink on her cheeksWhen she smiles for me Is it the scarlet red on her trembling lips Just before she kisses meOr is it the coffee brown of her eyesAs she locks hers with mine
Sometimes it's the orange in her hairWhen the sun strikes it from behindSometimes it's the color of honey on her skinWhen she holds me close At other times it's the silvery moonlightThat streams in between the window panes
Or the turquoise of the river When I row across it for her Sometimes it's the color of lavenderWhen she embraces me Black, white and all the colors in betweenThat's what she will always be A kaleidoscope of colors, a mirage... 
Linking this post to Theme Thursday - Colors. 

Book Review - Kith and Kin - chronicles of a clan by Sheila Kumar

From the book cover: Wimpy men, whimsical women, people trapped in their own time zones, cuckolding wives... Meet the Melekats. They are an inimitable lot!
Theses are slice-of-life stories about an old Nair family from south Malabar in Kerala. The Melekat mosaic includes Ammini Amma, the matriarch of the family, and her large brood of offspring and descendants. A wannabe journalist in search of the perfect story, a girl in search of a husband, a woman in search of a reason - any reason - to leave her husband...each character arouses curiosity. 
There is love, laughter, betrayal, hurt, anger, meetings, partings, and even a chatty ghost, in this fluid and engaging narrative. 
My thoughts: A wide variety of interesting and intriguing characters is what makes up the gist of Kith and Kin, as the name indicates. When I started reading, I couldn't help but compare the stories to that of Anita Nair and Kamala Das, some of my favorite writers, primarily because of the setting in Kerala, which is home for me. But that was where the resemblance ended. Sheila has brought in her own distinctive voice and narrative to the story while breathing life into her characters. 
Though the book is a novel, the chapters read like short stories on its own, each one dealing with a different theme. There were quite a lot of characters who are all related and once you get a better grasp of who is who, the story progresses along smoothly. I loved the characters of Melekat Ammini Amma, the matriarch, Suvarna, Seema and Sindhu, her granddaughters, Sumant, Suvarna's childhood friend to name a few. 
Reading the book was like taking a trip back home. Yes, it evokes a sense of nostalgia as you go along with the characters in their journey. The book is well written and edited, with impeccable English. I had to pick up my dictionary quite a few times, and this is certainly a good thing if it helps you in learning new words. There are so many topics that the author has tried to cover including infidelity, complex human emotions and its vulnerabilities, marriage and love. I also loved the title of each chapter which gives a thoughtful preview of what is to be expected from the coming story.
At two hundred odd pages, the book is a light read and I finished it over a couple of days, relishing each one of the stories. Read this one not just to get a peek into the Melekat family, but to dwell into some of the darker emotions and stories that we keep hidden, not daring to voice them out aloud. 

The book has been sent to me by the author in exchange of an honest review. All the views expressed here are my own. 

Rock Bottom

Destitute.. Plain. Black. Hollow. A never ending spiral through which I'm falling. Grabbing the bannister, but clutching empty air in my hands. Falling, falling, falling. A rock hard bottom perhaps? I do not know. But what bothers me is that I couldn't care less. A bottomless pit. That's what I crave right now. For now, that is oblivion. A haven. Away from the noises of the world, away from its clutches. A void that refuses to be filled. One that refuses to leave the caverns of my mind. Thoughts, sliding inside my head, deep and dark, slimy like worms. I cringe. Why does it feel like I will never get out from here? Do I really want to? For now this feels dangerously close like home. 

Ecstasy

My vision seems to be cloudedI see things through a pink hazeFor unwavering things I was moulded Yet how beautiful it is in my smoldering gaze 
Love; true, true love, words I scorned And now my world revolves around it The smile you gifted is now adorned Like a million twinkling little lamps lit 
Scribbled lyrics on the last page of an old notebook Your name and mine, hearts and arrows Your favorite dishes I cook Humming around like a song sparrow 
A handful of sunshine yellow daisies I plucked They sit waiting in the water for you Finding you, I still can't believe my luckI'm over the moon, people like you are certainly few