19/24
Friendship is so much harder than love. With love there are no questions. It’s just sheer acceptance of everything you are. But friendship – it strips you. Layer after layer. It scoffs at your nervous inhibitions Laughs out loudly at your flaws Rolls it’s eyes at your trophies. When it’s done peeling you all the way to your core It’ll gather you up … Continue reading 19/24
18/24
You thought you had killed me. You waited till the vultures came. I watched your shoulders disappear into the heat haze. I once thought those shoulders would protect me from anything. It took me a long time to crawl out of where you had left me. My chest, arms, belly, thighs, knees scraped raw. Occasionally one of the deeper wounds on my belly … Continue reading 18/24
17/24
I smile into your minty lips Breathe in your shampooed hair And wonder what if we had met in a time when there were no toothbrushes? Look at us perched on plastic stools Little plates of fusion food costing more than my weekly grocery bill strewed in-between us Scrolling our gadgets setting meetings for week after. I wonder where would we have met then … Continue reading 17/24
16/24
You in your Free Palestine t-shirt with your blue profile picture on Instagram If I gave you an airplane ticket to Sudan would you get on? You with your sealed lips and woke opinion comments on Facebook shares If I asked you to gather people to get on a boat would you find 20 to sail in solidarity to West Papua? … Continue reading 16/24
15/24
I am so sorry that your mother didn’t tell you that a wife could be the road untravelled. That that adventure you’re seeking across the seas, in unknown cities could be a woman. I am so sorry that your mother couldn’t make you see that a wife could be more than pure milk. That she could just be the frothiest milkshake you’d … Continue reading 15/24
14/24
Your tribe isn’t always the brotherhood, fun times and safe spaces. Sometimes you are entwined to your tribe in a web of lies, buried secrets and dried blood. Sometimes the very people you are repelled by, the ones you pray you never become like, want nothing to do with, are the only ones you have faith in. To protect who you really … Continue reading 14/24
13/24
You know you’re healing when the thought of spending a cool Saturday afternoon alone at your local tapas cafe over a jug of chilled Sangria dreaming of crossing icy borders again fills you with such warmth that your stiff toes curl out in abrupt laughter. whereisshyamni@gmail.com Connect: Facebook, Twitter & Instagram Continue reading 13/24
12/24
I cannot remember the number of times I would arrive at my mother’s house and leave from the gate. Extra pairs of shoes at the front door always gave away her visitors. I could not bear the love in my mother’s eyes when she would hold my hand and pull me close to sit with her while I answered the same questions again & … Continue reading 12/24
11/24
“Madam, now vhat does a lion have to do with books?” asked my taxi driver for the evening. “uuuhh…..” “Exactly. Nahhthing.” I watched the young novel-wala outside my window disappear into the evening Dili traffic. He couldn’t have been more than 14 years old. Maybe the cab driver is right. There is no point in contemplating our accesses. His to … Continue reading 11/24
10/24
On the southern tip of India sits a temple with a blue door on it’s eastern wall always locked. Green murky waters of the 3 seas crashing ferociously outside; as if trying to touch the feet of Devi Kanyakumari. Years ago I sat outside that door at the end of an exhausting journey thinking how unjust. Shouldn’t doors of temples always be open? … Continue reading 10/24
