this 30th bday, i'd like to give myself

freedom. from life.
no more heartaches
no more heartbreaks
no more regrets
no more every day tears, no more
everyday comforting others and drowning on the inside
pretending
trying
trying
trying
fighting
pushing
pulling
giving
exhausted laboring on
no
more
enough.

bus.

i miss you A.
screaming this into this void because, well, where else?

wonder if you will hear me.
wonder how i will get through this year without you. stakes are higher. things are worse.
and i miss, i NEED, above all, my friend in you.

all the men in the world, they've sucked the lifesoul out of me.
drained me out in red rivulets, spreadeagled i give birth to my pain
and my anguish; my emotional burden of
carrying unfinished boys on my shoulders and giving shelter
to their excuses, their lies, broken half-finished promises,
disappearances becauses they can't shoulder too many
burdens of their own.
i may be a cowering shipwreck but
there's old treasures buried in me still,
glinting in sunbeams when i smile,
fake or otherwise; i can bring
nations down to their feet when as a mother, as a lover
then can i not
bring you down to your
knees?

or
make you rise
from your own ashes?
do not question my strength
i may be perfectly still but i'm only
quietly gathering strength to

ignite.

collateral damage/ or reasons why I'm upset

At 3 am I am putting back the lamp that toppled over. The glass on the floor that didn't shatter. Wiping the water from the iPad. The suitcase he flung out the room has been put back. The pack of printing paper flung across the room is resting on the laundry bin again, now upright. I've picked up my clothes and the blanket he threw in the ground, and washed the mascara and eyeliner staining my cheeks. My wrist is a little swollen again just like a few days ago where you grabbed it to get my phone out of my hand. My gold chain is broken because it got caught in the tussle, that will take longer to fix.
Don't worry about my heart. It's been broken so far past repair it doesn't even need to be considered anymore.

..........

You get more and more violent.
Today all this because I hid your keys so you wouldn't drive drunk.
We grappled over my phone and then I had to push you out of my way so I can flee the apartment.
A few days ago you punched my cereal box down for...I don't even remember now.
A few days before you grabbed both wrists so hard they were sore for days, because I said to you I wish your mom taught you some manners when you had cursed me out again.

This is all after that time you had dragged me by the feet out of the car a few months ago and begged for forgiveness afterwards because you couldn't believe you had lost control.
..........

I don't even flinch anymore when you call me fucking idiot or fuck you or bitch or chutiya.
I've become so desensitized to it after 6 years of such drunken love talk.

..........

Tomorrow we wear our smiles and go about our day again.
Be a good daughter a good sister before die trying to be a good wife.

Seems we never learn our lesson.
I promised I wouldn't let any man lay a finger on me after what happened to my mom but here we are.

Keep swimming,

E

When I asked him where he was at 4 am on a Sunday night /Monday morning because he wasn't home, he said in talking to my cousin and fuck off.

#whentheytellmeididnttryhardenough

Broken.

Eeda

Where are the men

Where are the men?

The ones who won't hold my wrists tightly in theirs
And ignore my silently agape mouth while
Trying to find their way to my young breast

The ones who won't ask for my mind and my soul and my body
At their disposal, convincing me of soul mates and connections
And then remember, after having me, promises, parents, others
And forsake me in the cold

The ones who won't gather my wrists, despite knowing of my nightmares about them,
And hold me against my will to silence my anger
Punching the wall being my ear and later say
Why are you angry?
I never hurt you. I never raised a hand at you.

The ones who won't make my mother cry
Disrespect her, subjugate her, remind her of her inferiority
And yet tell me, their daughter, I should not take shit from no man.

Where are the men
The ones who won't take anything from me
Where are the men
The ones who won't suck the life and soul out of me
Where are the men
The ones who won't leave me barren and dry
Where are the men
Who are tender, who love, who give, who cause no pain

Perhaps this is why they call this limbo I'm in
The in between places...No man's land
Where lost souls go to roam

Where are the men?!
There is none.
In no man's land.

I used to wonder what it would feel to be in the headspace of someone who committed suicide. But I know now. If it wasn't for religion making it prohibited I might have done it myself.
The resources people give you are terrible. You call help lines and counselors and they ask for your personal safety. If you tell them yes you get a cop and really with current climate, are they any sympathetic to a female of color?! Or you get an ambulance to take you to the most depressing place in the world...a hospital.
If you say no you'll get a generic counselor saying Im sorry that must be hard, how did that make you feel? Over and over again over thirty and if you're lucky, sixty minutes, with a follow up email suggesting you reach out and call an appointment with a counselor or psychiatrist and a promise to follow up.
You're asking a person whose hysterically crying and telling you they have no desire to even get out of bed and eat to scan a list of counselors and try making an appointment?
Have YOU tried making an appointment?
Over two hours of calling later one lady picks up who said S would never be able to leave his problem and his mom died due to her own fault.
Great counseling.
If by chance you are lucky someone returns your call, 9/10 times they won't accept insurance.
Wait they accept insurance? They can only see you in the middle of the workday five weeks from now.

Forget the medical system. When things got really rough for me I reached out to who I thought were my good friends who promptly started ignoring me. Most people will keep you at arms length and why shouldn't they?! Compassion is time consuming and time is money. And people are too strapped with mortgages and car loans and credit car debt to care for you.
Those that don't have that don't have compassion..
Either way. In short. You're fucked.
Even your best of friends will check in occasionally until life consumes them. Life consumes everyone. So what if it consumes you too?
No one truly cares at least on an ongoing basis until you're truly gone and then the I didn't see it Coming and not her starts.

Really?
Didn't see it coming?!

I've been fighting with myself and reaching out to numerous people openly saying I'm in a bad place I need help and. You get a short time band-aid and that's it.
I've been masking and masking and masking for so long I've truly become dysfunctional. A walking zombie going through the motions of my day waiting for it to be over, 1 more day closer to death or relief.

Kia dua karun?! Ay Allah swt enough? Tried that. This is more than I can bear. I'm broken and I have nothing left to give. I'm losing my mind. Relief? Tried that.

There's nothing but darkness and I'm lost in it. I get maybe a day or two of light and then it'd back in this hole where I literally can't manage to stand up. I.
Did I ever mean anything to anyone enough that my life was worth saving?
For how long would it destroy parents and siblings, my loss? Is that a lesser time than what I currently have the energy and courage to endure?
At times the answer is yes. Those are the times when you pull the trigger or tighten the noose.

Spinning in ashes.

E

feel like writing but not sure of what.

maybe I need to focus on the article I read yesterday about self-forgiveness. Find all the excuses for the mistakes I made, write them out, air them out, face them square, stop grovelling with myself for their acceptance, let my rationality stare them down until they hide in the shadows, and then maybe then... i can embrace the quivering little girl for making the huge mistakes she made.
maybe that's the first step out of this sticky spider web.

i can't help this girl crying in the mud right now because i too, am judging her, am mad at her, disappointed with her choices... i can't self-love if i'm so busy being so very very angry with my self.

self-love when it comes to crepes, sleep, netflix, reading books, swinging on a swing, retail therapy, beach, water, air, sun, is all just bandaids. self-love is when you help the struggling you stand up on her feet, wipe the tears and the grime, and nudge her back towards to her path.

stumbling but at least moving. harkat mein barkat.

this for the newnew. this for the 444. this for. holdingonandlettinggo.

eeda

middle

Sometimes we wish to sleep so we can forget.

Sometimes we wish to forget so we can sleep.



I can't sleep

and I can't forget

 

E

what it feels like/losing my mind

anxiety feels like having too many tabs open in your mind with jammed scripts
it feels like giving the dials to radio transistors to a child, multiple frequencies and voices blaring in your mind at different volumes at once
it feels like a tightness in your chest like having an invisible rubber band around your upper ribcage
it feels like a 30lb stone sitting in the middle of your lungs
it feels like breathing deeper and still feeling like you're drowning because you don't have enough oxygen
it feels like a migraine
it feels like a taut smile
it feels like forgetting a 10:00am call is actually at 10:30am
it feels like waking up after a night full of rushed worried stressful dreams only to realize that reality is no relief either
it feels like running a marathon in your sleep and running one while you're awake
it feels like rolling up a boulder with both shoulders up a steep incline, only to have it roll down again when you stop to take a breather
it feels like inadequacy
it feels like disorder
it feels like things being out of array
it feels like lack of control
it feels like wanting to crawl into a blanket and not coming out because of sheer muscle exhaustion
mental and emotional and physical
it feels like wanting to smile but not having the energy to
it feels like wanting to cry but not having the energy to
it feels like today
right now. this minute.
it feels like isolation. it feels like loneliness
it feels like being in the middle of a desert without a map at night

it feels right now,

like me.

-eeda

garbage

There are butterflies circling my head

Yellow and blue like
Termites from my dreams. There is
Blackness by my ears the
Ringing inside the curtains inside
My head. Echoes are like
Looking through seaglass. Muffled my memories
I am living, loving in darkness again.
In shadows and secret no one
Will embrace me no one
Is proud to wear me on their sleeves the way
I wear everyone on my heart, yellow blue
Termite jewels in the blackness.
.....

Ode in pieces

You, honey words enough
To balm my aching heart spewing
Tar. lets hold off one night I don't
Have to dream of my clinging to your arm threading
Myself nimbly tenderly into your fragile
Fingers you push me roughly away from yourself
Glaring, honeyblack eyes I
Just need you to see to see to see me.
Just need to be seen.
.......

Pretty smart girls are seen but not heard.

.......

This hole I have been in before. Welcome back friend.

Haunted eyes I am the haunted and the haunting
Nightmare in my sleep nightmare
Awake.
.......

Choking

Letting go of summer sticky sweetness, take

My fingers out of the poison pot, green
Lurid like vomit I have been licking
Like heaven food killing
Myself inside but convinced I am
Breathing here just fine.
......

Hollow madness this

Is what that looks like.

.....

I will always have more love to give than I get and that

Is my life's biggest tragedy and my
Ultimate undoing.

....

-eeda                    

firsts

Aaj bhi khud se lardh leye

Aaj bhi tum ko yaad kiya
Na chah ker bhi is dil ne
Bhool jane se inkar kiya

Na subh tulu hona rukti hai

Na waqt kabhi tham jata hai
Mujh se bade ziddi aur bhi hain
Azma ke yeh jaan leya

Na Tum kabhi yeh samjho gay

Is zid mein kaise haar gaye
Aj phir tum hi jee gaye
Humne phir khud ko maar leya

Kia yaad karogay, yeh jeet bhi lo

Apne mein magun, khush raho
Tum jahan ishq ke jhande gardh gaye
Hum ne waheen dafn hone per israr keya

-eeda

29

I have a tradition. Every year I write down the number of things I learnt over the last year I want to remember the year ahead. Better late than never, here's 29 at 29.

1. Going through the loss of a loved one, planned or unplanned, is the most traumatic thing you will ever experience. Death is a part of life but loss doesn't get easier the more you lose.

2. I will never get used to sing goodbyes or walking away. It is the most profoundly disturbing thing I have or will ever deal with.

3. You can fall in love again, but be careful who you fall in love with.

4. There is no limit to how many times you think your heart can break. Break it will.

5. Everyone you love will disappoint you at some point. You have to learn to minimize expectations.

6. On that note, expectations are premeditated disappointments.

7. For better or worse, life will continue to surprise you.

8. My hardest battle is fear, and of that, fear of abondonment followed by fear of entrapment (in closed small spaces or held against my will) followed by fear of failure.

9. Success does not guarantee contentment. Success does not guarantee contentment.

10. Be careful of what things suck the soul of you. Because everything you give yourself to, takes a bit out of you. Be careful of the price you pay.

11. Don't ignore the red flags. Don't ignore your gut feeling.

12. No matter what the world says, taking off your rosy sunglasses that make it easier to cope, won't make things better.

13. Loneliness is the worst thing in the world (see fear of abondonment)

14. Learning to selfsoothe is a very very very important survival skill.

15. Self care does not equal selfishness. It does not come naturally but you absolutely need it to survive.

16. To Love does not mean to have.

17. Yes there will be others who will have it all. Have ask the love. All the family. All the success. All the friends. Kids. Houses. Wealth. Deen. IT.DOES.NOT.MATTER. You are not behind. You are not late. Be grateful.

18. Cherish your parents. No one will ever love you like they do. No one will ever support you like they do. No one will ever forgive you like they do.

19. That battle inside yourself? Stop fighting it. Forgive yourself. Perfection is unattainable.

20. There is no knight in shining armor.

21. Learn to set clear boundaries around yourself. Do not tolerate everything because of your fear of confrontation.

22. Stop letting fear rule your life.

23. It is not your job to fix everyone you love.

24. True happiness is in being loved without doubt.

25. No matter how dark or gets, always find a reason to live. To keep going.

26. Things worth holding onto : your sanity, sense of humor, generosity of spirit, softness of heart, kindness, honesty, Imaan, optimism, ability to love unconditionally.

27. Things to let go off: fear, anger, betrayel, lying, impatience, holding onto stress, inability to let go

28. You are more than the sum of all your problems

29. Your life isn't over yet. It is just beginning. Chin up.

-eeda

 

E

lately

We accept the love we think we deserve

Love is not supposed to hurt.

I have spent my life seeking love that hurt or making love hurt me because that was the only way I knew for it to be real. Is it really love if it doesn't hurt?

Is there anything in this world that doesn't hurt?  Everything hurts. When it doesn't hurt it terrifies me. I wait with bated breath for it to break because.

Well because.

Revelations

…………………

Wad duha. There is darkness but you are not foresaken.

Two people today said to me today I exaggerate things. Worry too much. Care too much about everything. Too much "in" everything.
I don't take criticism well but I need to hear it because I'm so off balance. I need a break to literally find myself again.
I've been hear before when I lost myself. It took forever to come back to myself. It took getting down to the deepest part of the black abyss to realize I needed help coming back up, and that is when I had sought professional help.
I'm almost at the bottom again. I can see the depth through the black water reflecting my fear back at me.
I know I need help. Badly.

Which is why I'm latching onto every temporary band aid I find. People. Things. Food. Music. Sleep. But regardless into that blackness I must go to come out the other side. No point dragging hands and feet trying to climb out of it pleadingly.

Lets see where this goes. Spirals, skinned shins, sinking, senseless.

Facts. Let's stick to facts.

…………………….

It's easier to be numb.

I'm doing all the things I do when I get into this mood.
Push everyone away. Stop talking much. Stop eating.
Take sleeping pills and sleep alot. Started smoking again (0 nicotine ecig) and the relief was a amazing.
Listened to tiesto blaring. I remember when this happened in college and I went to that underground club and had danced all night.
Want to go dancing again. Want to close my eyes and lose myself and not think for a change. This is what this is. I want to put my life away on a nice little shelf and take a second to just breaaaatheeee. Process everything and everyone.

Self destruct? I don't know what this is.

Liberation or destruction.
I don't know. I'm just dancing with my eyes closed. Spinning until something stops me.
Clouds and cliffs and smoke.

Chan kithan?

………………………..

It is not easy this

Breaking apart of things, relationships, people.

………………………….

Maybe the reason for this turmoil is just that. I need to find my way back. From the ram to the doe.

……………………..

Aise berehem hogaye ke afsos-e-alvida na raha.

Eeda

disconnected

Something is really really off with me. I think this time I've pushed myself way past my limits.My sleep is off. My head hurts. Migraine. Nausea. My brain will not shut off no matter what I do or how tired I am. I'm anxious. Restless. Ears ringing. Head on fire. Scared something bad will happen any day now because I haven't had such a long peaceful stretch in a while. Vivid dreams that are leaving me confused. Feeling out of it. Disinterested. Unhappy. Crying alot more than usual. Don't want to continue living because don't see any reason for it. Don't want sex. Don't want to be touched. Don't care if anyone cares about me. Don't want to care about anyone either. Void. Limbo.

this time really feeling like crossed a new dimension.

-Eeda