Writer's own thoughts!

Those who find comfort in fancy food and attire are perhaps the happiest-  A warm plate of rice with two or three side dishes, And a table full of closest people having a shared meal together.  Those who find comfort in a luxurious house are still happy, A house filled with white artifacts, marble like tiles so glossy- neat and intact, Gardens full of quiet serenity, And, marvellous decor screaming elegance. A dim light is still burning in the hallway to keep the house awake- As if it is waiting for somebody to enter. Perhaps, happiness is still this simple-   To own house, cars and people. Perhaps, happiness is this ordinary to belong and exhibit ownership. We feel happy to show others what we have- perhaps, that's the life trajectory of most people. But, some of us cannot simply lead an ordinary life. We tend to seek meaning in every ordinary thing. We eat a spoonful of rice and begin thinking about hunger, How hungry might be the people out there? We enter a room ...

 You want to leave home early, pal... But, do you know, once you leave home,  You can never enter as a homebody there twice. You'll just attend. Attend your home on vacations, on occassions but never to stay. And, do you even realize, how many homes you will have to create away from home? You will now fall into a mission of building a home - to carry a part of yourself everywhere you go, It will be an oddly strenuous lifelong process.  You will crave home inside a home you live in. You will build a home in distant lands full of strangers. By then, you learn to trust the strangers. You will get to know that you were all alone from the very beginning. Everyone saw your rise and fall and then ascension, and now you recognize the pattern. Gradually, you are waiting for another fall in seasons. Perhaps, not all seasons bring hopes of spring, Perhaps, that's the diversity of nature. Like seasons, our mood changes quickly from autumn to summer, Summer to monsoon and spring to wi...

 Ambition killed both of us. You were too ambitious to bind me, I was too ambitious to leave you. The "Different staged people can never match their life phases." The place where I am coming from- you have seen it already, And, what I want to experience is unnecessary to you now. The different phases in life take people to walk different roads at a time, The road that I have undertaken is different than yours. And, the road you are on- I could not understand it back then. The binding thread was weak. Differences in experiences can lead to devastating formations. We were made of glass, and we were meant to break. The differences subdue the attraction. Other than necessities, people wouldn't bond anyway. What necessity could bring two different people together? Obviously, materialistic needs! But, for soul-ties, one needs to uncover one's soul first, Understand the inner person hidden beneath the exterior, And,  differences in perspectives and lack of depth can strip yo...

Yes, I know how it goes around. I had been there before. The stages we go through are always different from those of people at different stages of life. I know how it goes, Hey, you are a kiddo.... You don't know anything, Let me show you around. You think you are exploring the world and the perpetrator is exploring you. To take a stab at you, to learn exactly when to attack you at your lowest. I know I have been there too. I know people at different stages of life will try to comfort you, Understand your struggling point of view, But, what they can't do is replace their feeling of 'looking down' on you. So, what do you do? Rationally, you don't indulge yourself  in the comfort of a "different staged person." The differences speak volumes to you at the earliest. You have seen this kind before. It's only you for you, You can only take yourself to heights that they thought you could never reach, You can take yourself to places where they thought you woul...

What seems exotic doesn’t mean it will always suit you, Some berries look delicious from a distance,  But, not all of them tastes good.  You might not like the flavor of a berry though it's appearance is appealing to you.  Some flowers may look beautiful from distance until they are decorated in the vase and loses their glow.  You may find the unfamiliar attractive,  But, you may never know what effects it can bring when you get closer to it.  You may fall in love with the accent of a foreign river never knowing whether you can float into it,  You don't know if you can reach to the shore swimming in it.  Probably, one day you are going to realize that's the real danger,  We mistake unfamiliarity for destination, Fill the distance with imagination,  And, fathom difference as destiny, We struggle in the endless mutiny of trying to uncover the unknown, As if knowing everything would solve our all problems.  But, the real problem begins...

 If I look into the past I get bitter,  If I look into present I become steadfast,  And, if I look forward to future I become hopeful. The past has shown me how to be resilient.  The future holds possibilities,  If I use my potentials,  The present speaks of the credentials  that I have earned from the labor I have done-  in the backdrop when nobody sees, I rise early when everyone is asleep,  And, I have been awake from ever since. Everybody sees the champion rebuilding,  Nobody sees the silent sacrifices they give.  I have sacrificed myself to sacred time,  Only to find vast time ahead after finishing all jobs, I have nothing. I have been in a continuous loop of work, Hustling into one thing to another without a break, And, when everything gets quiet,  I realize I have none and nothing to do anymore.  I am whole and alone at the same time.  I have sacrificed and sacrament myself,  Cremated myself into the ...

  Again I sit alone with myself,  Me and my shadows beneath the dim light- face to face,  The terror of being alone begins again.  But, when was the last time I wasn’t?!  These empty rooms speak volume of that!  Perhaps, I took association too seriously too close to my heart,  But, the hearts of people- they are always closed as if enclosed envelops they hand over until the messages are delivered- the letters read over.  But, individuals always take companionship for convenience, but never for permanence. Is it too hard to find your tribe?! Is it too hard to belong?! To belong to a person?! To a commune?! The empty chair is still speaking volume.  I sit here under the dim light, Me alone with my unreconciled shadows.  I refute them to reckon the unravelled....!  My shadows speak loudly, All these crowds and people in shrouds imitating kindness.... But, at the end of the day they are full of themselves thinking only about themselves....

 I am manifesting a sweet guy who'll understand how much it took from me to walk the high roads of Texas , how exhausted my body is from walking miles and how much heat I have absorbed from the Texas Sun above my head. I want someone to walk beside me  on the bridges of the new cities- hand in hand, side by side along the trails and watch the sunsets while sipping our starbucks coffee. I want to swim in the Miami beach, see the Florida lakes, wake up in the Colorado red brick sunrays on a Saturday morning, And, wake up to the sweet dreams in the arms of a sweetheart who can be with me in all trials and trails. I want someone to notice me behind my smile and fathom how tired I am after all the battles I have fought alone, and listen to me when I am vulnerable, as if he can see my soul piercing through his loving eyes. I don't want the gaze of a wanderer anymore, I want someone deep who can heal with his words, calm demeanor, quiet understanding and win a globe within me. I want...

My father had a dream,  Not the grandeur one but a dream stitched with humility, audacity and simplicity.  My father was courageous,  He wanted to build a state with his family and kids.  Not the ones that would glitter from the chandeliers but from stars,  From constellations above! He chased the unreal for a long period and made every impossible into a possibility, into a potentiality with chivalry.  His dreams smelled of novelty. Of concrete cement that gathered beneath his fragile fingernails.  My father's breath smelled like paint, dust and cloves.  Because, once he was an young boy with empty pockets, sleeping in the unknown shades, looking for living in the foreign lands,  Those alienated soils gave him identity,  A reason to work harder to build his generation's pathway, their gripping identities.  The social destiny that he curved for us was nothing less magical.  Unbelievable was his journey-  Starting from a hum...

The sadness in my eyes has numbed the empathy towards the pain of the collective.  I no longer read the unspoken words of the kid lying beside the highway beneath the foot over bridge, I don't translate the language of hunger and try to reach them.  I have become numb. I don't understand the silence of homeless people who are always looking for a meaning in their rootless lives,  I don't recall their cries for help.  Who are counting stars with an empty stare.  I no longer feel deep for them.  I think my grief and loneliness has made me shallow.  I have grown into a stoic carefree person.  But, did I ever want to be like this?! A stern mountain with a calm demeanour?!  My heart has become an alter of only one echo. I remember the day when my heart was broken.  When it was pierced fiercely with no swords but shields....What was meant to protect attacked me. A shield if wielded to wrong hands can rip apart. It frightens me- this digression...

 Now you know,  The permanent damage that you've done. They call it survival,  But, I named it silence.  A disease called- incapable of love.  No physician can give prescription on it, No laboratory can discover the reason beneath it. The diagnosis report arrives late after the predator leaves the marks,  Only after the heart forgets the weather of warmth.  Not because love doesn’t knock on the door,  But, because the door is permanently locked.  All callings go in vain,  Doorbell keeps ringing, but no one answers.  Until the hands of lover bleeds.  But, is there anyone who is ready to wait and bleed?!  The symptoms are quite subtle: Eyes that avoids affection and mistakes softness as danger,  Hands that retract from gentleness as if infatuation is a burning fire. Pulses intensifies only at the footsteps of departure.  Then?! A quiet grief spirals back from head to toe,  A relief follows.  I dodged a bu...

The cockroach did not know that evolution never taught humans to befriend it, And, It didn’t learn to hide. It approached towards me not with an intention of hurting me,  But it approached swiftly not with venom but six hesitant feet, and two trembling antennae, That shook its head with an unspeakable greeting.  Perhaps, it thought proximity was the beginning of a new friendship.  It came near to me, close to my ears as if it wanted to whisper some tea, and spill some secrets. But, I turned away in disgust. It ran into my feet, with its polished shell and  offered me a glittery smile. The smile of a being who has never been loved, Yet arrives with a fading hope that someday someone will love and accept it as it is!! I did not ask, why it was here! Neither did I bother to wonder- if my fear was valid to kill a being, a living creature?! And, me as a human,  I only remembered parts of everything I ever inherited-  The fear, The disgust,  The pollution, A...

There was an ocean within me once, It was deep,blue,wide. In that deep blue ocean- Tides shone so bright, Faith precipitated as salt- it tasted sweet until all flavours faded away, Beneath the ebbs and tides- a love formed on the aisles!  Between a mermaid and a whale! As if fated union. A canon of fire blew right in front of the invisible castles of doubts, as if something lingering is yet to happen, Just then the missiles of hope were thrown away in despair and desperation! As if a parade of mockery will show on the day!  A love formed so immeasurable that was one of a kind! Then an imposter came in a disguise of a storm in my calm ocean to stir waves! Without any noise, without any declaration of warfare, He attacked my sails. In the deepest blue of the sea, He devoured every ounce of love alive in me. Just like a giant blue whale, he ended me. In his big stomach lie my vows, My vanity- my erroneous sanctity! The big appetite of his left me scouring for any insanity! In the...

In knowing you, little by little, I cannot deny,  That the flaw was not in your nature but in the culture in making of you- that shaped you, how you act, how you behave.  It couldn’t be unseen. Only after all this accumulating time, did I understand the depth of the cultural decay horrendously affecting you.  A spectacle so repellent,  So, unattractive that stirs only revulsion.  Problem upon problem,  One issue after another,  As if an endless trope of shortcomings- a legacy of neglect, a culture that repulses the beloved.  And, since you have come across my path,  Standing on the crossroads, I can feel a fierce disdain within me for you.  Contempt for the cultural atmosphere that made you a tyrant- a shallow scallop.   I strongly detest it with all my might,  I feel the abhorrence not only for you but the culture that shaped you.  ©® Farheen Akter Bhuian Timespan: 15th july, 2026, Mirpur Cantonment. 

I wish I was not this ambitious for every direction I have gone demanded me of a bereavement for everything I leave behind.  In teaching my arms how not to tremble while carrying them.  In hiding my tears,  My voice not shaking while saying goodbyes.  And, my soul not escaping the ribcage while tightly grabbing them. I don't want to let go of them - those who are my people.  Who have ever known my grief,  Who have understood me beyond my cold  exterior, tears pushed back behind my smiley face. Those who have read between the lines.  I don't want to lose them at all.  I wish I had wanted less. Perhaps, then the people I love would have remained within arm's length, Their laughter echo in my ears, Their faces not blurred for poor net connection,  And, timezones not differed that would make seeing them difficult.  I wish I could always touch them, feel their presence.  Cuddle them tightly and keep them in front of my eyes.  B...