By Swetha Manivanna
15 Things I've Learnt About Myself
1. My body is a biochemical machine.
Filled with neurotransmitters.
Neurotransmitters.
A pretty big word for something you cannot see.
I guess I can be friends with them.
Ask if they'll twine around my desires like my DNA.
If they'll caress it and promise never to strangle them.
2. I have lived over two decades believing that I do not know how to love.
That I was born with a few missing hormones.
A manufacturing defect.
You see, it's easier to deny my heart the feeling than spending years to find a cure.
3. I can step into the shoes of inanimate objects easier than I can wear my own heart on my sleeve.
A glue bottle that celebrated the bonds it created,
A pen that is proud of its skin colour,
My eighth grade diary which never hit a creative block.
These are things without tongues that can hurt you, and so—
4. Every morning when the koyal sings,
I sense she's trying to tell me something.
I try to decode her message because it seems more natural
To understand her than the tornado thoughts that are permanent residents.
5. When I say my name out loud—Swetha—
I listen a little more intently,
Hoping to discover the hidden sides I have been too afraid to explore.
6. I could write a poem about me every day.
Show my mind that I care.
Pretend to listen to my heart only
To criticise her after a while.
7. I've been trying to write a good poem,
Fishing for metaphors in my afternoon naps,
Similes as evenly spaced as the grains on my wooden desk.
Looking for words in the creases on my favourite clothes,
In the wrinkles of my skin, soaked in a hot shower.
I've been on a treasure hunt seeking redemption,
Like I'm a trampled ant that got up and started walking.
Except—I have no map nor a compass.
I'm hoping that direction is not what someone chooses but is led to, because—
8. I hoard tickets in my wallet, in the pages of books, in tiny pockets and in my phone cover.
You see, the tickets are a reminder—
That there is somewhere to go to,
And soon, it'll feel like a destination.
That I have finally reached.
9. I wonder. A lot.
I wonder about baking and humans sifting their minds through a sieve.
I look at trees and wonder who kisses their roots.
I wonder how much they are hiding.
Why they feel the need to.
I wonder if I should do the same.
10. I lend 64% of my mind space to worry about lost keys,
The sock that never found its pair,
The files on a pen drive that got corrupted,
The thought that dissipated before it hit the paper.
That is 64% of my time that I spend thinking of all the things I do not know.
It's a series of question papers, and I'm always underreported.
11. I keep thinking of all the things I do not know.
I do not know how to unclog my brain,
Find the right words on days that my mind
Is playing hide and seek.
I do not know how to drive or ride my values because
I keep second-guessing every gear I have to shift.
12. I haven't found the right amount of time I can give myself.
It's always an hour too long or a week too less,
And I never understand the difference, and so—
13. On most days, I breathe outside my lungs.
Scared I'm taking up too much space.
Careful not to take advantage of my organs.
Assessing what parts of me I can exercise my right on,
What parts of me I really own.
14. I have a mother. We own each other.
My mother makes dosas the size of world maps.
She hands me the world on a platter
Without knowing that she is my pole star.
She tells me, "I will not catch you when you fall."
She tells me, "I will simply never let you fall."
15. I smile a tight-lipped, risk-fearing, calculated smile.
But I have a sister who laughs like a baby thrown into the air for the first time. Every day.
She weaves her laughs into blankets of love and never ever runs out of them.
I call her a butterfly.
I've seen her grow and transform, and be just as beautiful at every stage.
My sister tells me—"Swetha, write shorter poems."
But my body is a biochemical machine filled with thoughts that are looking for a destination.
I'm still trying to buy tickets for all of them.