To Me,
It’s been a while since you’ve heard from me.
Been a decade since you crossed your knees.
Been a little more time since Renee stopped calling,
I wonder if she’s been lost and maybe just wandering.
I came here to tell you: you’ve been doing good, all this while.
You’ve lost a dozen of dimes, indeed some were good times.
10, you were intoxicated with innocence.
You knew less and that was surely better,
that’s what Tame Impala says, something you’ll learn much later.
15, hey! You’ve experienced what it’s like to fall in love.
Till now you don’t understand the existence of rising in love.
It comes with growing, needs a bit of wisdom and ageing.
19, ah! you’re at your prime.
Or that’s what you thought.
You’ve fallen thrice and by thrice maybe a couple more times.
Numbers and people began piling up,
like weights on shoulders you hadn’t built in the gym.
Math you never solved, faces you never needed
all of them pressing down,
all of them shaping you into someone undefeated.
21, you’re a rebel child.
The years that will turn your whole life around.
You start to bloom in different ways,
ways your 25-year version now looks behind.
When it starts to rain, you sit in the balcony.
You read books to mom to distract her
from all the daily noise the pandemic brought.
You tell dad to break a sweat,
and he does. He loses 10 pounds,
maybe more of his worry than his weight.
23, that’s when the wisdom starts to kick in.
Slowly, but the voices start speaking louder.
They tell you: keep your eyes open and your mind wider.
Keep your heart closer and keep dreaming wilder.
I wish I could tell you that the voice was me from 2025.
But no, it’s just the echo of a night,
when dad asks you to resign.
And you do. You resign, take a flight,
and start your new life.
Oceans across, there lies a bed you make,
food you learn to cook,
money you begin to earn,
and new friends you slowly collect like seashells.
You start to like UK vibes, but you’re so desi you make the whites fall behind.
24, you learn shit and crib.
You stumble, you curse, you laugh.
By now it took you twice to fall in love to rise once.
You start to realise the mess is also the masterpiece.
And now, 25.
you have wisdom, you own your craft.
You don’t cry when people shout, you laugh.
You cut ties, you don’t let toxicity intertwine.
Now when it rains, you look out a little less,
but you’re still mesmerised.
You lift heavier, and you’ve come back to India,
where you realise home isn’t a place,
it’s the pulse in your chest when you finally feel aligned.
After all, it’s the butterfly effect. Not so bad like you thought.
So while I write to add one thing each year,
This time I write
Not to warn you or to guide.
Just to tell you:
you’ve been doing good, all this while.
By me.
whatsyourrashi 