Varinka Poetry

My dear,

We had promised to keep writing to each other even of we fall apart but the irony is when I write, you don't respond and when you do I am at my lows. And since there is very little medium left for us to communicate, I am trying to pass along from here, for I know, you would find this (podcast) somehow.

I just wanted to say that I have always seen the reflection of endless horizons and the weights of endless battles fought, in your eyes. Not just those battles fought with guns but the war we often wage with silence, at the heart level.

I have seen those eyes filled with tears, and the lips that once whimpered ‘Do I even deserve your love?’ And yes, you did deserve it, you do, for forever, for the afterlife, and until another lifetime. You will be loved, by this heart. My love, You are someone whom I always look for, everywhere and in everyone I meet.

I look for you, in every sunset that paints the sky amber, in the rustling leaves of autumn, at the touch of chills in the winter and in the first bloom of spring. I just look for you. Yearn for you, I guess. And as you stand far away, amid the ocean tides, know that my heart stands with you. My every beat is a prayer for your safety, and every breath is a wish for your return. Maybe, return to this heart.

There might be silence here and there, in between the chaos, and sudden loneliness in the crowd while they sing with whiskey in their hands~ I yearn for you.

And My beloved, you are born every day, in my heart, and in my memories. Know that each time when my words fail and when stillness persists, I whisper my love to the stars, knowing that somewhere, beneath the same sky, you exist, and you would hear me through the breeze or the ocean tides singing a birthday song for you.

Yours forever.

Dear Love,

There are moments when I just want to be left alone, with a dim light, with you.

Where I would just run my fingers to your spine and connect all the scars of what you said you got at wars. I would spend time as though I am gazing at the constellations and marking the north star. I would press the right part of your cervical and say

'This is the Polaris' only to assure that if you are ever lost in life, just find the Polaris and you will find me there in the North (eastern part of the country) waiting for you.

Sometimes I wish to write you a long letter explaining how much you mean to me and that the growing silence between us was only a sheer misunderstanding, but you wouldn't have so much time to go through long letters word by word, and you wouldn't have time to reply to it word by word. This very fear stops me from writing to you.

I wish to tell you that I have stopped drinking alcohol just to abstain from writing to you because every time I drink to forget you,

I would find myself drunk in your memory more, and I would look for every medium that could lead me to you.

I wish I could explain that getting to hear from you on the most unexpected days would leave me nervous and I would just stand outside on the balcony reading and rereading the same thing without paying attention to the world for hours… and I would finally get back to my work much calmer.

I wish you could understand the words that were left unsaid. The love that was left unexpressed, and the heartache that was left unaddressed. Above all, I only wish you could understand that my love was innocent, and it meant no harm, for it only demanded your presence and nothing more.

There was a time when the glooms of loss draped my days like a heavy curtain of bygones pulling me back to the memories of a love that no longer served. I know, each morning was a hesitant awakening, and April’s cold was more like a reminder of absence. Absence of somebody, absence of love.

But the heart, like the seasons, it knows how to heal.

Slowly, the sun began to rise differently, it started throwing new light through the windows of my soul and it illuminated the corners I had once forgotten that it even existed.

I started to see the beauty in the mundane more mindfully,

the way the wind creased the leaves, or the hushed ballet of dust flicking in a sunbeam… it only warms my heart now. And these little moments, once left unnoticed, became small celebrations of my life.

I rediscovered laughter, a sound that had once appeared unfamiliar, it now bubbles up unexpectedly in the company of my friends. Their voices are warm and inviting and fill the spaces left empty by GOODBYES.

With time, I learned to cherish the lessons of lost love. I embraced the wisdom it had to teach me. The pain, which once was a steady companion, became a faraway echo, and it only reminds me of my resilience. I stood taller and kept taking deeper breaths knowing that I was capable of moving forward…of building something new…Of building something more beautiful.

The past is a story I tell with gentle reverence, but it no longer defines my present. I am here, in the now, with a heart open to possibilities. I am not embarrassed to say that.

The world is vast and it is filled with promises, it only awaits my exploration. I step into it with a lightness I had forgotten it could feel, I am ready to write the next chapter of my life: maybe we can call it

SEASON 4: EPISODE 1- of joy, love, and laughter.

It's a new day, a new day as in a new season. and I am whole again, not because I have forgotten, but because I have learned to cherish the strength within. Moving on is not erasing what we experienced in the past but it is an evolution, more like a testament to the enduring spirit of the heart. And as I walk forward, I carry with me the best parts of the lessons and wisdom I learnt from my past.

I am just myself again. I am still learning to laugh and learning to love.

Phyl Kay said ‘if you repeat something over and over again it loses its meaning,

You watch the sunset too often it just becomes 6 pm, you make the same mistake over and over again, you stop calling it a mistake.’

Then,

I tried reading your messages repeatedly until their meaning was lost between the words left unwritten.

I started walking the trails of Orange Village every morning, and now it is just another trail that leads to somebody’s destination.

I, time and again, listened to the songs you sent earlier that once reminded me of our love, and now it is just another song by an amazing artist.

I scribbled poems about you over and over again, until it meant it was just a great composition to my readers.

I revisited the memories we made over and over, but now I don't even remember your face accurately.

I re-imagined us as belonging to each other so many times and see, it's nothing. It means nothin… it meant nothing.

I whispered ‘I love you’ a great deal of times, without you being on the receiving end, for a month and more, and see, nothing. it is valueless.

Phyl Kay said ‘if you repeat something over and over again it loses its meaning.’

But

I only wish you said ‘If you do something over and over again, it will only renew every essence of living and loving all over again.’

. No, I am not into backpacking.

At least, I am not into exploring the world with a half-lover-half-friend-half-something-half-nothing.

I mean, who are you?

I am not into travelling to the interior of confusion.

I just terminate the journey that isn't worth taking.

Season 3 of Varinka Poetry is here! Get ready for an unusual blend of prose snippets and storytelling, a departure from Varinka's usual poetry. Love, V.

You look like Kapil

It was a Sunday afternoon in a coffee shop

I was flipping a poetry book by Robert Herrick,

sipping americano

Reading and reminiscing my yesterlove,

and dwelling in the memories of yore.

A man in a powder blue cotton shirt sat across me with a coffee and a book probably compiled by some Russian author.

I briefly gazed at him because his fragrance seemed familiar

His hair,

His hair was shining like a moonlight,

mostly black with a hint of silver

just like Kapil’s.

And his complexion was a shade deeper than tan.

I gazed at his face, his eyebrows curved, perhaps he was trying to understand the literature

And there was a faint mole at the centre of his forehead,

I was stunned by the resemblance,

He caught me staring at him.

I smiled and whispered ‘You look like Kapil.’

I know I shouldn't have said that to a stranger

When it could just mean that I look for Kapil or just a part of him, in everyone I come across.

And it's not my fault.

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Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/nisha-v-chettri/message

Maybe I told you I love you by leaving the notebook by your office space

And maybe you told me that you love me by whispering sweet nothings in my ear.

Maybe, I told you I love you in the silence we both have created

And maybe you told me that you love me by making calls and speaking endlessly.

Maybe I told you I love you with tears when you were departing to a different place.

And maybe you told me that you love me by making a brief visit just to take a glimpse of me.

Maybe I told you I love you when I was angry at you for not understanding what I meant.

And maybe you told me that you love me when you kept asking me if I was okay when I was not.

We both had a different love language.

I could not understand yours

And you could not be fluent in mine.

Hemingway said, ‘stare at something long enough till you can write exactly what you feel.’

And then there were moments when I stared at you, long enough, till you were uncomfortable. But I was only looking at you so that I learn the arcs and lines of your face that had stories one after another.

Like the mole resting perfectly between your eyebrows slightly tilted to the left. The lone stand of hair on your forehead to which I always say ‘can I pull it off?’

The eyes held an ocean of profoundness along with the pain of longing. I have stared at you enough even in those fleeting moments and I have memorized the texture of your skin and the lines of your emotions. I know how you smile, how you frown. I know how your eyes turn moist when you look at me. I know how busily you blink it to dry the ocean of pain within your eyes careful enough not to let the ebbs of tears flow down. I know it all.

I have stared at you long enough so that I engrave you deeply in the depth of my soul.

I stared at you long enough, because I was not done looking at you.

I stared at you long enough because I knew I couldn't look at you forever.

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