In the beginning, I wore no armor,
Just skin and laughter-
That echoed like light shredding off watersheds,
My questions were poetry,
My thoughts were epiphany,
My eyes, opened windows to the sky not yet clouded by claims,
The mango trees knew my secrets.
So did the swing creaking back and forth with dreams untainted,
And the earth,
Muddy and honest under my feet.
But then came hands
that held no warmth-
Just shadows posing as kindness.
Their words were sugar-laced knives,
Slipping into the garden of my becoming.
I didn’t bleed,
but something died.
Or, maybe, I bled-
Silently- many many a times!
They called it “growing up,”
but I knew better.
It was erosion-
of trust, of magic,
of that inner hymn that once danced
with the smell of rain and crayons.
And, eruption-
Of innocence!
And, reduction-
Of kindness!
Teenage came like a curtain-
Velvet, heavy, and strange.
Boys no longer kicked dust with me,
they stared.
Girls wore masks of blush and malevolence,
And I-
I stitched my silence into my sleeves,
My innocence buried in my chest,
Walked hallways with a borrowed name,
Still, craving for originality,
Seeking truth and convergence,
Every betrayal taught me
How to fold myself smaller-
How to bite my tongue,
How to hide innocence in metaphors.
And, how to wrap myself into small pieces.
But sometimes,
In between broken dreams and patched-up prayers,
A glimpse returns-
Of a child chasing butterflies no one had poisoned yet.
And I whisper to her: Keep running,
Keep playing, Keep swinging,
Let the slider slide away,
Let the wind make your hairs sway,
Let the ocean breath its rhythm to you and you dance with the waves,
And, may you still stay the same- cute but messy,
Charming and alluring, but simple elegance floating in your eyes, shy confidence blushing in your cheeks and innocence in your voice trembling away the fears,
Let you jog around with the jolts of love,
Pure but petrified,
They didn’t kill you,
Only rewrote you in charcoal-
For you to appear like a diamond.
But you, my dear,
Were inked in stardust-
Before they ever touched the page,
Uh, what an insane rampage!
They held you in shelves- dusted and ousted within the cage!
And, once the beginner asked me:
Do you mourn childhood?!
The lost innocence?!
I instantly replied:
Well, yes, I do and who doesn’t?!
And, then, he asked me if you were given a boon to return- would you do that?!
No, I don’t want to feel the betrayal of growing up again!
©® Farheen Bhuiyan Nancy
Time Frame: 1.51 pm, Mirpur Cantonment.
