On Knives, Pages, and Patience. Writing as Survival.

https://www.tumblr.com/fragmentsof-mysoul/796220482780315648/do-you-know-what-scares-me

Sometimes the page is a room that knows your name before you say it. Sometimes it’s a corridor where every door is ajar and none of them open. I’m not here to fix that architecture. I’m just placing a palm on the wall, listening for pipes, heartbeats, echoes, the soft hydraulics of being. Sometimes a post feels like someone cracked your ribcage just enough to let the page breathe. This one does. I’m not here to diagnose the ache or dress it up. I just want to witness it: how a paragraph can be a pulse, how a sentence can hold the shaking. If you’ve ever wondered whether you’re writing to live or living to write, park here with me for a minute.

kabhi likhne ka matlab sirf itna hota hai:
apni saans ko satr ka waqfa dena.
kabhi matlab hota hai:
ek lafz ko kursi par bithana aur kehna: “ruk jaa, main bhi yahin hoon.”

There are days I want craft, not confession; form, not fever. And then the sentence tilts, and the fever learns meter. What a strange mercy: the way disorder borrows rhythm and the body believes it for a while. No grand thesis. Just a chair pulled up to the edge of the feeling, a light left on.

main apne aap se vaada nahin karti, aakhri taareekhain dhokha deti hain.
main bas itna kehti hoon:
aaj ke liye ek pankti, kal ke liye ek saans.
baaki sab: hawaashi.

kayi baar lagta hai lafz bhi dhadakte hain... jaise kalam ki nok par chhota sa dil.
kabhi woh zinda rehne ka tareeqa ban jata hai, kabhi naqaab.
main sach bolun?
likhna aur jeena mere liye do alag sadken nahin... ek hi raasta hai jahan dhool uthti rehti hai.
kabhi main raakh udate dekh kar sochti hoon, yeh meri hai ya kisi aur ki.
phir bhi, main panna palatti hoon... kyonki kabhi kabhi bachna ka matlab sirf itna hota hai:
ek aur saza, saans ki tarah.

aur jab lafz thak jate hain, hum unhe paani pilate hain:
ek pyali khamoshi, do ghont roshni, aur thodi si meherbani khud par.

If you see stitches showing, good. It means the skin is learning where to hold. If you see gaps, don’t fill them yet. Let the air do what air does.

kayi baar dard ko roshni ki zarurat nahi parti...
sirf aaine ki.
agar tum aaine ban sakte ho, do.
agar nahi, to khamoshi se baithe raho, yeh bhi meherbani hai.

I’m not trying to be brave. I’m trying to be continuous. Continuity doesn’t look heroic; it looks like dishes in the sink and a cursor that refuses to blink off. It looks like coming back to the table even when the chair wobbles.

aur jab lafz toot jate hain, unhe chipkane ki koshish mat karo:
tootna bhi qawa’id-e-zubaan ka hissa hai.
hum sirf itna kar sakte hain:
veeram ki tarah thoda rukna, phir aage badhna.

If you’re reading this at 2 a.m., I’m not going to tell you to sleep. I’m going to tell you to put the kettle on. Warm water is a kind of punctuation. It teaches you that pauses can be warm.

aur haan, agar tumne kabhi apni roznamcha ko maafi maangi ho...
main bhi.
kabhi kabhi lafz hamara bojh utha lete hain,
aur hum unhe “shukriya” likhna bhool jate hain.

I don’t have a map, just a habit: show up, breathe, line-break. Show up, breathe, line-break. Some days that’s a prayer. Some days it’s payroll. Either way, the ledger tallies differently when you count what kept you.

~ Oizys.

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