The Day I Met Myself

The day I met myself
I found myself kicking and biting off 
My knotted pink shoelaces
Torn kites and glue strewn across the floor
Sitting on a 7 feet high ledge.

I looked at her
Furrowing my brows
Like mud bordering ditches
I said "Hey love, why don't you step aside
Or you'll certainly fall down—
—break your knees"

So she closed her eyes
And smiled
Smiled with her canines out
like she came to dine,
Pulling out the dead skin from her lips
Fiddling with her collar bone
Like she'll take it out any moment and behead someone

So she pulled me closer to the ledge
Put my hands on her chest
She said
"Listen"

Now I want to become an Ajanta painting
Paint me red,
Uproot the house of my neighbour
Put it on our roof
So I can climb higher

Origami the skin on my back
Fold it into wings,
I will fly to the sun
Put the same cream on it
That I put on my mother's burns

Take me to the galaxy
Let me skim around it
And we'll put that cosmic butter on our toast
And split it in half

And I wondered how I could think that
"If the spring doesn't kill me
the autumn will"
Wondered why I thought
That happiness is only just left like 
The peach stuck inside
the grooves of its pit

Then I finally understood
How drinking my own saliva all these years
Has made me absolutely mad
How my heart is a tight fit for my love
There are stretchmarks on my ribs.

And to the people I send my poems to
To the ones who say I'm sweet
Don't you see?
I've still not learnt to love myself
So I pull out my bandages,
Tie it around you
I'm saying
Don't let me fuck myself over
Don't let me fuck myself over.

I'm absolutely petrified
Vibrating like stars
Still afraid of those sensor doors in metroes
Afraid they'll leave me behind,
Alone.

I carry around my calm in a paper bag
I think I'll drop it these days
Trigger a nuclear explosion 
Like I did 61 years before I was born

Then I think how I was scared
That my teeth will break the day
They put these braces on
How they pierced in till the day
I heard a stranger 
Sing something about love and
Giving us away

How I was afraid to tie my shoelaces again
Till my friend made me climb
On the highest rod
Of those monkey bars,
Placed my shoes with her shoes
Took a picture and put it on instagram

And maybe we pray
So we can hold our hands
Maybe we dream
To wake up in a sweat.

An average person spends six months of their life
Waiting for the red lights to turn green
It takes time,
To clear the traffic in our heads

So let a stranger sing you to sleep
Count all your fingers again
Put vaseline on those chapped lips
Search for when the next meteor shower is
Again,

I am saying
I'm trying not to fuck myself over
I am saying
That if I were a stranger to myself
I would swing on the tail of an aeroplane
To look for myself
I would hollow the earth
Till I could find myself
Because I could fathom losing myself
If I could fathom losing you.

Celebrating 100 followers! (Completion of the challenge)

Okay folks, here it goes; HAPPY PRIDEE! BE GAY DO CRIME! Wait that’s not what this post is about? Oh right the challenge, okay. So I got four responses and this challenge has very much maddened me. Firstly, kudos to me for making up a challenge I had no idea what it meant. That was a major bummer. Then, I got stuck in writer’s block and now here we are, me finally responding to the challenge: send me a poem/rap/poetic song and I’ll write a response to it! Please take all of this with a grain of bullshit. Let’s get this party started! (Drinks and snacks are in your kitchen)

1. The raddest rap ever 
Firstly, we have our fantastic StarNinja with his rap. So the rap went like this:
I’m a F*#$&%*ing Riddle.
I lay it on thick like Tom Hiddles playing the motherhumpin’ fiddle.
I dance and I chance an encounter with a counter doing math on a submarine.
I keep it cool, bend the rules, do my moves and I keep it clean.
I’m going out like a cactus that needs a haircut,
Filling every prescription for mean like an air hub.
Prickly nature? Yeah, I prickle for fun, yo.
But on the inside I’m soft and gooey like Play-Doh.
Am I sweet? Meet and greet, sugar feet, cuz I got these rhymes on fleek.
I’m an ordinary, singulary everyday thing.
I’m a wondrous universal song that you sing.
I’m big and small, short and tall
Round, flat, curved and straight, like a ball.
What am I?

After belting out this with my sister a hundred times including one time with a very bad Sheffield accent, I wrote a response and honestly go take the trophy for the hardest of the challenges. I tried iambic pentameter and if you squint hard enough any faliure's a success. 
Response:
Entangled dance amidst the violin strings
Held tightly by some absurd actor's hand
The logic dives discovering countered springs
You keep it clean yet not ever bland

A cool entity yet like a cactus 
Dichotomic words that hold such chaos
The kind sing the mean's chorus
The fragrant clay is floating through the cosmos.

You're sweet with the rhythms of wonderous life
You're ballads stitched through the breeze
Big like pinholes, small like this life
Short like fishbowls, tall like a crease.

Who are you?
Well, you're a fucking riddle.

2. A very sexy song

Okay, now that that’s done next up we’ve magicquill17 also known as my sister who has quite acted opposed to her usually kind self by giving me an actual Arctic Monkeys song. Yes, we’re big fans of Arctic Monkeys here. She literally made a portrait of the lead singer. They make wonderful rock songs with deep lyrics. (How deep? As deep as the pacific ocean.)The song was “Science Fiction” from their album “Hotel Tranquility Base and Casino”. Now go open your Spotify and listen to that and their entire discography.

Response: 

Your voice is crocheting flowers around my ears
Burning hot like a machine,
Mutated leeches with spider legs
Scream for lizard tongues in our tears.

I must admit I need you here still,
Reality's mouth is unmuzzled
Fangs full of cavities and clad in latex
Sinking inside my will.

Refractions through the golden glass
Of our societies
Relegious squatting on our present,
Myopic views from rear-view mirrors.

All points about love and peace are simple
Stuck on the inside of dirty mixing jars
Only the sexy way makes it out
While love is wearing ballet shoes in a football match.

The world has got me on a wire
Disguised through our despairs
Held onto through disgust,
Strange fascination.

Break your heart like a fortune cookie
SOS covered in laughter
Innocence doing multifarious activities
Pretence stuck like cumin on teeth.

So I tried to write a poem to say something new
But I've a feeling that the whole thing
May well just end up
Too repetetive for its own good,
The way some science fiction does.

3. A poem from the dark ages

Nice song right? Okay next is my lovely Victorian time-travelling Witch godmother Diya! Awesome book reviews, magical poetry, sweet replies, sparkly blog, she’s got it all! Here is the wonderful little poem she gave me:

THORN GARDEN

The roses bleed,
Tears of pain.
It’s crimson beauty,
A hideous stain.
A heartbreak macabre,
Cold chaos adorns.
Welcoming you,
To garden of thorns.

Response:

I step with care,
In this chaotic lare
Squint my eyes to see,
The sun bleed its glory
And I look at the roses
Standing still in mourning
Their eyes wide open with longing
Wishing upon the sun.
And I understand,
Grief is crimson.

4. A Hiphoppy rap

Okay so finally we have my awesome friend, Naman (say hi to him in the comments!) who assigned me the chorus from the very nice rap “Stan” by Eminem. I just feel so cool saying the title. Stan, yeah, stan, Stan, yo stan I love the rap Stan by Eminem, Eminem, yes, bruh. Okay, I’ll stop.

Here is the chorus:

My tea's gone cold, I'm wondering why I
Got out of bed at all
The morning rain clouds up my window
And I can't see at all
And even if I could it'd all be gray
But your picture on my wall
It reminds me that it's not so bad, it's not so bad

Response:
The rain's knocking your bolted gates
And I'm wondering why, you didn't open up
Your tears are blocking my ears,
And I can't hear at all
And even if I could it'd all be quiet
But you got out of bed afterall
It reminds me that it's not so bad, it's not so bad.

All righty then those were all the four responses! What a party right! Thanks so much for sticking through! This was soo fun and so exhausting gosh! Go on, you can reply to any of the issued challenges too or the responses I gave to them! I’ll see you around then 🙂

Celebrating 100 followers!

What I do is all words but seriously, what the absolute fucking fuck? This is mad. THANK YOU SOOO SOO SO MUCH! Actual, hundred follows, like, two zeroes. This is so so good! Thank you so much for supporting me.

Now I could go on and on with the gratitude (and don’t get me wrong I am very very grateful) but that would be just boring and it’s not a celebration here without a challenge! I love doing and giving challenges. Sooo what are we doing this time around?

It’s simple. Here, at Poems of A Young Girl, we believe that poetry can start conversations. So you send me a poem, and I write a response to it in the form of a poem. It could be yours or someone else’s, it could be someone from WordPress; provided you get their due permission and give them a link to here (what a fun way to promote everyone’s blog!) or some other published popular or underrated poem, just, any poem. Hell, it could even be one of my old poems or that poetic song or rap that you’ve been thinking about! You may also give some feature you would like to see in the response.

Just remember that this is not a one liner prompt like last time, it’s a reply, to another poem. You can send as many poems (or the poetic songs and raps) as you like if you think I can do justice to writing a response to it. Please send it by 20th May by commenting and linking it here or filling my contact form.

YAYYY I am so excited! Thanks again for the 100 follows! Go on then, send your responses!

Wild eyes! Wild eyes!

My hair were long once,
I burnt them off on New year's eve
To light the tip of my pen
And smoke yellow ink.

The spring inside my heart
Blooms yellow and blue and green
Out of the clay of my sins
They rise, tickling my bones,

I wonder in deep sleepless nights
If the sky would open its blue wings,
Like a butterfly
And drink nectar out of these blooming buds

It's no wonder
The moon revolves around our world
Whispering,
"It's just maddingly huge"
The Universe throwing rocks at it
Cause it blocks the view.

Oh! I'm feeling big like a droplet.
Small like the wind
Full like the seabed
Empty like a book.

Happiness is claustrophopbia
Standing at the edge of the universe,
Healing's that unexpected sapling
You find while pruning for weeds

And inner peace?
Inner peace is just madness high in your car trunk
Cause the world is holy
And we're sinners.





 

We, The Poets

Poets are greedy,
We look at grief
Like a vulture soaring upon the battlefield
Try to find Sacramento
In a falling leaf.

We the poets,
Sing of the ocean
Until the ocean diverts
And our capillaries burst
Of salty water.

We the poets,
Bite of huge pieces of "meaning"
Ruminate upon it day and night
Then spit it out
And put glitter on it.

Ask what is darkness
When everyone else
In the class happily,
Moved on to the refraction of light.

We the poets,
Who mix a drop of poison
In your food
Like Chanakya*

We, the poets
Talk cryptid.
Poet makes the poetry
But poetry does not make the poet
Human is poetry
Poetry is human
Human is poet
Poet is human
Human becomes poet
All?
Most? Many?
Humane, human.

We, the poets
Are the kids who collect bottle caps
For a project they saw on "Art Attack"
Who have a pot filled
With dry, forgotten "compost"
Who still collect the coupons in packets of chips
That when become a hundred
Might fetch you a gift.

We, the poets
Are the seven-year-old elder sibling
Scared
Holding their toddler brother's wrist a little to tightly
Perhaps to comfort themselves.

We, the poets
Open both the iron-wrought gates of our heart
Palms open,
Say "Do what you may"
Let people come and go
Ransack our hearts
Because we fall in love every single day
And each time we do
Perhaps we fall in love a little
With ourselves too.

Perhaps, it is us poets
Who say "I love you"
Again and again and again
Even if they aren't dying.

• *Chanakya was a scholar and advisor in the Mauryan period. He is said to have mixed a drop of poison in King Chandragupta’s food everyday to make him immune against actual poisoning by enemies.

देश निराला

(Psst...the answer to last post's riddle is at the end!)
जो कौये रुदाली बन कर
 मरघट पर जा ही मर गए,
उनकी मृत्यु पर कौन रोये?

उनकी लाशों को सफ़ेद पाषाण पर बिछा 
उजड़े शब्दों से,
खारी नसों से मैं कहानियाँ लिखती हूँ।

मैं उस देश से हूँ जहाँ 
महात्मा का मुखौटा लगा 
खोटा सिक्का चलता है

यहाँ सत्ता "अंधों के राज्य में काना राजा"
के उसूल से चलती है,
लेकिन अगर चटनी मिल जाये 
तो फिर हम दलिया भी खा लेते हैं।

यहाँ हम देश से परेशान हो
"आज तक" चला देते हैं,
फिर भारतीय हैं
४० डिग्री में भी गरम चाय पीते हैं।

यहाँ लव 'जिहाद' है
मगर मुस्लिम साले भी हैं 

यहाँ केसरी रंग 
लहू के रंग से ऊपर है
तो जब मेरी ३ साल की बहन ने कहा
"मेरा मनपसंद रंग केसरी है"
तो मैं डर गयी।

खून का प्याला ले खड़ी देवी को पूजते हैं
लेकिन स्त्री को 'मुश्किल दिनों' में 
मंदिर में प्रवेश निषेध है,
काली को हैं पूजते 
फिर काली से हैं हटते।

आरक्षण तो हैं यहां
लेकिन कौनसी लड़की अछूत है?

लोकतंत्र में है राजवंश
इस महफ़िल में इरशाद कहो तो
सर काट जाते हैं
पुलाओ और बिरयानी पर 
हम यूं ही बट जाते हैं।

कोयल ने पूछा काक से
की क्यों बेसुर, कर्कश है तान तुम्हारा?
काक ने पुछा कोयल से 
क्यों बेसुध, विवश है गान तुम्हारा?

The answer to last post’s riddle was: Eyes. We have two winners! Magicquill17 who had guessed Eyes and StarNinja who had guessed “Red Onion”. Now that wasn’t the answer I had intended but it did make sense after I read his explanation and the poem again. (Like who knew red onions and eyes have so much in common) So there, we have two answers and two winners! YAYY! Congratulations both of you! (For both the answers’ explanation go to the comments of the last post)

Riddle

Snuggled in deep dark pits,
Beneath thin leafy branches,
Drinking reflection in bits
The brown post of their cot arches.

White marble floor
Coloured spiraling well- staircase,
Going forward into anyone's core
Some say it's the most beautiful maze.

Shoot an arrow into the red sea
And it'll foam white here,
For many looking to be free,
The moon will draw up tides in there.

They say Cupid strolls here first
Muddies up the heart's carpet,
This place is holy
This place is sin,
It may bring darkness,
Or it may bring light.

But whether this place is present,
Or out of order
It always introduces water.

Author’s note: Here’s another riddle for you to rack your brains. Not gonna lie, this one can be tricky, but that’s the point of it! Keep guessing in the comments, the answer will be revealed in the next post!

The History Of Scissors

After popular demand (I'm in denial!) from the previous poem on History Of Spray Bottles, here's one on the History of Scissors:

Snip, snip, snip
The barber goes
Your enemy's shoes 
The scissor does it all!
The oxygen of the arts and crafts
I will not delete this draft
(much to my sister's disappointment).
Snip, snip, snip
Let's cut to the historic mania
It was first found in Mesopotamia!
(Seriously those guys beat us to first at everything, sorry Da Vinci, tough break.)
Now these scissors had springs
(Wish Mesopotamia had them too instead of the violent floods of Tigris and Euphrates, burnnn)
The one with pivots that we use today
Was manufactured in Rome back in the good ol' days
Snip snip snip
The story ain't finished yet
There's still our favourite France left!
(I mean, where do you think the word scissors originated?)
Made in 14th century,
The place name that you'll forget is Nogent-en Bassigny
Snip, snip, snip
Let's jump to a Samurai story!
Now in Seki, Japan
The citizens could no longer carry the katan(a)
Why so? You may ask,
Well explaining that is my task!
Snip snip snip
The time is the late 15th century
Narcissistic lords are in fury!
Turns to a good ol' civil war
Widely known as the Ōnin War.
With people being all sword-y
The Samurai wanted to be all lord-y
Carrying the Katana was a symbol of power
And the common folks can't climb that social tower.
The blacksmiths need money
What do they do except worry?
Well, they turn to the protagonist of our story
All hail the mighty scissors!
Snip snip snip,
Italy and Spain enter the race in 16th century
And England in 18th century
Now add Capitalism to the mix
And there you have it!
The modern day scissor,
All competitive and ready!
You have all kinds of shears
Hell there's even cigar cutters
And Mayo Scissors 
(Not used for cutting packets of Mayonnaise actually, it's a medical scissor, boring!)
Give it to a wealthy white guy
And it's ceremonial scissors,
Give it to a psychopath
and it's a murder weapon!
Now make sure you heed the warnings of Art Attack
Handle with care, keep your fingers intact!
Snip snip snip,
That's the end of it
Please do not unfollow me for this shit.

Comet Books

Holy child,
Do not weep
I will sing,
A lullaby
So when you fall,
Like a shooting star
And the world will stare,
And clap its hands
You can close your eyes.

अप्रत्याशित अन्वेषण

अज्ञात है अविश्वास मेरा,
जो अश्रुओं के अश्वों पर सवार
अश्को को संग अपने बहा रहा है,
कि शायद यह अश्रु
जिज्ञासा के सुमन सूंघ कर
किसी छींक के सहारे निकल गए 
और शिव के रूद्र के भांति
बीज बन, 
आशा से तृप्त हो,
प्रेम से फूले
और फिर फट गया सुख का अंकुर
जो लम्बी लताओं से चढ़ता वहाँ
जहाँ श्वेत शान्ति का मुखौटा लगा, 
विचरण करता है शाश्वत जीवन।