March Thirty-First: NaPoWriMo: Cage — Behind the Bars of Time

We’ll be back tomorrow with our first daily featured participant and resource, along with a prompt. But for now, and to help out all of you for whom April 1 comes a bit earlier than it does to Na/GloPoWriMo’s secret headquarters (yes, our lair is built into a volcano), here’s an early-bird prompt: Pick a word from the list below. Then write a poem titled either “A [your word]” or “The [your word]” in which you explore the meaning of the word, or some memory you have of it, as if you were writing an illustrative/alternative definition.

Cage, Ocean, Time, Cedar, Window, Sword, Flute.

I cannot believe I am doing this again this year. After last year's miserable attempt and getting my site removed from the Participants’ Sites due to sheer embarrassment, and then getting it added again this year moments before starting the response for this early-bird prompt for reasons I cannot psychologically concoct right now:

I will probably not post this link in the comments. So, I am choosing the word "Cage." Could it be any more obvious? (I mean, I highlighted it above; that's why...)

In a world where time dances with shadows.
There dwells a bird in a cage of illusion.
Trapped in a cycle of self-doubt's spell within the bars of fate.
Marinated in procrastination's fear,
Its wings, once vibrant with the colors of dawn,
Now wilted, tangled by the ego's sneer.

Each day, the sun rises in a golden blaze.
But for this bird, the dawn is but a distant memory.
It believes it has all the time to spare,
Confident it can step out whenever it dare.
Its cage a prison of perpetual lateness,
A cruel symphony of missed opportunities and regret.

Crispy wind blurries the day into evenings.
Oh, how the bird longs to soar through the skies.
To feel the wind beneath its weary wings,
To embrace the freedom that beckons from beyond.
As it finally moves to take flight,
Reality's wind slaps with all its might.

The world outside moves with purpose and grace.
For time waits for no feathered friend,
While the bird languishes in the sauce of its own making.
Its cage, a silent witness to the passage of time,
a reminder of all that could have been, but never was.
And the moment of freedom finds its end.

The world spins on without it.
Late to emerge from its self-made prison,
The bird learns the hard lesson of time's precision.
As it mourns what could have been fair,
A symphony of regret fills the air.
Soaring dreams now shattered on the ground.

Forever late to the dance of life,
In the cage of hindsight, the bird is bound.

- Oizys.

April 8th, UPDATE: After marinating this piece with self-doubt, procrastination and ego of having all the time in the world, I am posting the link to my response to this early (but, actually, super late..) prompt hoping no one will discover this humiliating chronicle of tardiness.

January 2nd - March 25th — Demon of Regret

From January 2nd till March 25th.

As I reflect upon these past few months, it feels like nothing has changed, yet everything has unfolded in such a way that it's hard to believe. So many unfortunate events have occurred, each one seemingly worse than the last, pushing me to what feels like rolling down the rock bottom. These past months have been filled with rollercoasters and somersaults that have made me question my existence in ways I never imagined. It's as if life has thrown me into a whirlwind of chaos, leaving me disoriented and unsure of how to navigate through it all. Despite it all, I find myself here, still standing, though perhaps a bit shaken. So confused. Why am I still here? Why is everything still continuing? How is this still working? How has everything not crashed into non-existence yet? I've been struggling to find the words to express this throat-churning turmoil within me. It's as if my thoughts have become tangled in a web of confusion, making it difficult to articulate even the simplest of emotions. Writing used to be my refuge, my solace in times of trouble, but now, even the act of putting pen to paper feels foreign and unfamiliar. I had to physically force myself to sit down and write. Just like that, the desire to read, to escape into the world of literature, still lingers within me. Yet, it's as if I've forgotten the language of my own mother tongue, stumbling over words that once flowed effortlessly from my lips.

It is a frustrating sensation, feeling disconnected from something that was once so integral to my being. The only question that lingers in my head is, for how long? What will it finally take to just stop? It is a question, one that echoes through the depths of uncertainty. For how long will this feeling of disconnection persist? What will it take for it to finally come to an end? I feel as if I do not know anything anymore. I feel anciently... new. Like, when a person from a faraway past steps into the present, everything seems both familiar and foreign. There's a sense of recognition, a whisper of memory, yet it's juxtaposed with the overwhelming strangeness of the world around me. Each day blends into the next, a seamless tapestry of moments that blur together in a haze of uncertainty. Time stretches and contracts, twisting and turning in unpredictable ways, leaving me feeling untethered from the rhythms of life that once grounded me. I feel like life is the shepherd and I am just a sheep moving blindly in the herd.

I have gotten used to such levels of discomfort that they have become almost familiar, like old friends that I reluctantly tolerate. The weight of uncertainty, the burden of expectations, the echoes of doubt—they linger like unwelcome guests in the corners of my mind, their presence a constant reminder of the fragility of my existence. This repulsive survival mechanism is honed through years of weathering life's storms that just keep on going against my will. I sit and watch my instinctual desire to survive and persevere push my rising bile of disdain down. No matter what I try, how many times I try to undo everything to put a stop to everything, it just does not stop. So desperately, I have latched onto austere indifference in a hope that will probably erase my existence. I have built this steel sheet that separates me and the world around me. I cocoon myself in a cloak of detachment, somehow convinced, that it's better to feel nothing at all than to risk the pain of living. Yet, even as I wrap myself in the comfort of indifference, there is one feeling that never stops piercing into me.

I am lying on my bed, squirming in prolonged agony. There is a small demon that has pinned my frail body. Regret is the relentless intruder that refuses to be silenced. It pokes me and passes through the steel sheets of indifference.  It whispers in the quiet moments, reminding me of the chances I didn't seize, the words left unspoken, the paths left unexplored. I try to make it succumb to my hefty layers of wool-gathering yet it pierces into them and entangles the echo of missed opportunities and roads not taken into the very fabric of my being. It's as though each thread of remorse weaves itself into the fibres of my existence, creating a tapestry of what-ifs and should-haves that I cannot escape. As I lie here, wrestling with the weight of regret, as though I am locked in a battle with this insidious demon, struggling to break free from its suffocating grip. But no matter how hard I fight, it persists, its whispers growing louder with each passing moment. I try to drown out the echoes of the past with distractions and diversions, seeking solace in the superficial busyness of daily life or building castles in Spain. Yet, in the quiet moments when the noise fades away, regret rears its head once more, reminding me of all that could have been. It's a torment that knows no bounds, a relentless onslaught that leaves me feeling battered and bruised.

- Oizys.

January 2, 2024 - The Taboo Tango of Veiled Realities

The second day of the new year is when the new year turns into another year. The second day of the new year feels like flipping the calendar only to find the same chapter as if the fresh start is just a rewind button to the familiar pages of yesteryear. The 31st midnight is a trip outside to look at the sun with a glimmer of hope that maybe it has turned Pentagon or is diminishing, but the rays of light chomp on the glimmer of change. And the first day is just the hangover from the light's voracious appetite. The second day—back to square one!

The second day's dawn mirrors the unvaried routine of the days before, each tick of the clock underscoring the stubborn persistence of the status quo. It's as if time itself has chosen not to partake in the newness promised by the calendar. The resolutions made just 48 hours ago seem like distant echoes, drowned out by the monotony that has crept back in. On this day, aspirations collide with the reality that change is an elusive quarry. The second sunrise of the year casts a stark light on the challenges ahead, with the shadows of yesterday refusing to dissipate. It's a peculiar dance between anticipation and disillusionment as if the universe has conspired to test the resolve declared amidst the cheers and confetti of New Year's Eve.

Remember my last entry's ending? The pretentious bollocks of me and my droplet against the ropey fabric of society? And I went to sleep, thinking I would turn my droplet into a rebellious ripple tomorrow morning. It's not just about navigating the same mundane script; it's about injecting defiance into the routine. Each task, no matter how trivial, has to be a subtle act of resistance. The meetings, the chores, the predictable rhythms—you have to consistently and performatively morph into opportunities to defy the gravitational pull of conformity. So, I wake up thirty minutes late to work; my blisters are all gone, and my uterus has gone on a monthly riot. So, yeah. If not a shift from square one to square two, surely an elevation of it. As the day unfolds, the rope frays your edges, testing your collective insistence that you need to do something until your ordinary is no longer synonymous with the predictable. The ordinary is no longer a passive landscape; it's an active battleground, and you have to conquer the change. Every minute becomes a minute. And, even if you are putting on your best fight, it feels as if you are just waiting. Doing nothing. I was just waiting for the minute to pass. Just to pass the elevation from square one to square two, so it at the very least feels palpable. Laden with conformities, and defiance against the mundane becomes a shameful rebellion. You do it secretly. Quietly. Shamefully. You close your door, detach the plugs of reality, separate yourself from the fabric of a collective entity, and try to bring about change. But the change is supposed to be etched into the fabric. Fought and inked with the reds of shameful floundering and blues of under one's own steam.

I took a few hours to entirely detach myself and, most humanely, pluck the tendrils of conformity one by one. In the privacy of my sanctuary, I unravel the threads of conformity. The shame is not born from the act itself but from the realization that this defiance is deemed subversive. It's an acknowledgement that society frowns upon those who dare to question the predictable and who choose to colour outside the lines of conformity. And the constant fear of taking your secret colours outside sets a nest in the back of your mind. I come here, and I think about what to write. And, whenever the door creaks open and reality's plugs are reattached, I drop the act somewhere in the corners of the web, but the shame lingers. It grows out of you as if it were your own motherly creation, not chopped out and laid bare open by the hands of a morality sheepdog. The rebellion may be quiet, but its impact is loud, and it sometimes drops down your cheeks or climbs up your throat. And you either let the shame do its job while you continue your silent defiance or you give in and etch the fabric with the bile of atavistic instincts.

Either way, you never know what additional features of the struggling game get released and added to your character every morning, so don't make categorical statements a couple of hours before to the public (not that anybody actually witnesses this gory act of textually-induced logorrhea) that you are on the verge of changing the mattress of your long pedigree.

- Oizys. 

January 1, 2024 - Stale Resolutions, Fresh Trauma

Welcome to 2024, where nothing has changed. The world is still the same. Bullets are still being fired. Kids are still starving. I am still in the same clothes as last year. I spent the whole day in the same cot I was rotting the entirety of last year, wondering what my resolution for this year should be. I know it sounds like a joke, but it is not. It is probably an age-old habit that has set in inertia, and no matter how much we fail to keep up with the resolutions, we always fence off December and January with a hopeful view, thinking that whatever happened, has happened; let's try and get better starting this year. Nothing changes. You might start a new diary page with some fresh ideas, but society's script is still the (stale-)same. We go for therapy and try to heal ourselves, but the newspaper guy every morning slaps us with freshly baked trauma. We tend our garden in the winter so we can see the flowers bloom when spring comes, and we peek up to the streets to see the epoch enthusiasts chopping off our ability for personal transformation.

You say it's the quiet decisions, the daily choices that accumulate like droplets forming a mighty river. Then why are our hard-earned droplets licked and sucked by the royal pond of stagnation sentinels? You say, after all, change begins within the confines of our hearts. Then why are the custodians hell-bent on stomping on our resilience to try something new with their boots of conformity? You say it's not about grand gestures or sweeping transformations but about embracing the power of incremental change. Then why are the routine rulers throttling our personal evolution with the coded habits entrenched deep in our amalgam that wallop any kind of deviation? For how long do you think you will attribute individual drawbacks and wellness pieces of advice to the problems that require a grotesque transmogrification of intricately woven unequal threads of the conglomerate tapestry, where somewhere some are stretched thin to their ancestral cores and others suffocate under the weight of uniformity, casting shadows over the once "vibrant diversity"?

We sit in our fields of labour, yearning for a beacon of change. Some days, we succumb to weariness, letting the weight of the world convince us that our small, quiet acts of defiance are insignificant. Staring at this sea of monotony, we awaken our quiescent competence somewhere within us. Because if we don't propel ourselves forward, the suffocating grip of the corporate matrix outsources its job to the relentless assault of hunger and begar. Our pale legs and parched throats reek from waiting for freedom since forever. Can we collect all the droplets into a raging river that sweeps away the barriers to progress? Or is it just everyone for themselves, each with their own droplet, attempting to win the fight?

I begin my new year, hopefully, with a new thought, if not a new life, a clean slate, or a new page. Just me and my droplet.

- Oizys.

New Haircut, Same Rot; New Year, Same Plot

On December 31st, I started writing this at 11 p.m. I have procrastinated writing things for so long that there have been feelings covered with tarps of dust, time, and rust. What's happening? Well, a war. For days, weeks, and months, I have been yearning for the tips of my fingers to rebel and push out these emotions for the world to see (or just this creepy little corner of the worldwideweb). And all it took was a calendar change. A partition of lines between two numbers to make me sit and crap a few words. Let me give you some highlights of this so-called war machinery:

- The Battle of Self-Doubt: The soldiers of my inner child and adult critic march on the streets, declaring war. The trenches of self-doubt ran deep, and the fear of continuing to live became a formidable opponent.

- The Skirmishes with Time: Time, my relentless adversary, seemed to slip away unnoticed. Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and my aspirations to write became casualties of an ever-advancing clock. Procrastination, it seemed, was winning the temporal battles.

- The Confrontation with Limitations: The demand for perfection in every sentence and every paragraph paralyzed my creative spirit. The war cry of "You are not good enough" echoed louder than the call to simply be and create. The battlefield was littered with unfinished drafts and stangant blood of dead dreams, casualties of an unyielding pursuit of flawlessness.

- The Negotiations with Inspiration: The teasing muse, the inspiration, a fickle ally, played hard to get. There were moments when ideas tried to flow effortlessly, and then there were barren stretches where the well of creativity seemed to run dry. Negotiating with this unpredictable force became a constant struggle.

- The Siege of the External World: The onslaught of modern temptations from the external world, with its sirens of social media, the clamor of daily responsibilities, and the allure of mindless entertainment, besieged my creative fortress. Distractions were like invaders breaching the walls, diverting my focus from the writing battleground.

But here I am, at the eleventh hour, facing the final skirmish of the year. The pen is indeed mightier than the procrastination that held me captive. As the clock ticks away, I'm daydreaming of emerging victorious in this personal war. The arsenal of words is my weapon, and the battlefield is the blank page. Perhaps, in this late-night scrawl, there's a ceasefire. A truce between the excuses and the act of creation. The war is not over, but at this moment, I've claimed a small piece of peace. So, here's to the war of words, fought in the quiet hours of the night, and to the hope that the coming year brings more bits and pieces.

In this very moment, we sit and ponder. Try to go as far back as possible, wondering where it all went wrong. Trying to pinpoint the exact moment we could have stopped, the exact action that could have been omitted. The battlefield of retrospection is strewn with the debris of missed opportunities and the echoes of decisions that led us to this late-night confrontation.

The ink on the pages of the past is smeared with the stains of hesitation and indecision. Each missed deadline, every postponed commitment, is a marker on the timeline of this ongoing struggle. The war drums of regret beat in rhythm with the ticking clock, amplifying the urgency of the present moment.

As the night wears on, the shadows of doubt lengthen. The pen, poised and resolute, faces the impending dawn with determination. It knows that tomorrow morning, the war will resume. The battlefield will once again witness the clash between creation and procrastination. We sit in contemplation, we feel time slipping, and we hear the clock ticking. As the night gives way to the approaching light, I gather my thoughts and prepare for the final chapter in this ongoing saga. The war between pen and procrastination will continue tomorrow morning, but for now, in the quietude of the night, I find solace(?) in the knowledge that the battle is not lost (over..?). The ink flows, and with it, the promise of (sigh...) living:

- This is never, ever a do-or-die situation. Always do or sit and wonder why, and be forced to do so by the consequences. I was in the same position when I wrote my last chapter. Nothing changed. Well, from an outsider's perspective, the insides have been rotting. Soft mass, all liquified in a bottled body. I don't talk anymore. I have stopped saying things to people. I wake up, I work, and I go to sleep. I daydream in the background to stop outside stimulation. I have erased all previous memories. Deleted all photographs. I have successfully butchered all the relationships (not that I had many to begin with...). I have not replied to a single person in months, not even the ones who live with me. I have made my life as thin as possible. She is an old, anorexic, malnourished crone. Who exudes fragility. Holding the knife pointed towards her stomach, waiting for someone to accidentally give a push, and she can part reluctantly, the way she was born. Full of wretchedness. Like a disgusting fruit with a rotting smell and dark spots on her skin. Head full of white fungus. Mouth full of blisters. Reduced into nothing but an embodiment of decay and despair. Her seeds cry, carrying the burden of a life that withered away, a lament for the potential that never had the ability to bloom.

- There is a child who lives in a house behind mine. He cries. Alot. I have never seen him. I have only heard him. His cries. Oh, the painful cries. The ones where each wail comes from the depths of the stomach and pierces into the world but hits no one. Today, it felt as if his tears were silent echoes, seeking refuge in my vast silence. But I have no place and no refuge to offer. I wonder about the burdens he carries. His voice, raw and unfiltered, makes me sick. It is almost like the wail is trying to reach my own dormant pain, stirring the echoes of my past. Invading the house of memories. Angry that it finds nothing, enraged that everything is erased. Searching further, all there is is an inner child. They exchanged looks. A look when a failed prodigal daughter sees a forefather from her ancestry. Like a disgusting tale of fractured heritage and unresolved pain that fuels a rage at the erasure of histories, at the silent screams echoing through generations. I stand near my window searching to catch a glimpse of that poor boy at the intersection of two realms, where the child behind me seeks refuge in his cries, and the child within me responds with a silent acknowledgment—a subtle nod to the vulnerability of unresolved pain. The prodigal daughter fails (falls...?) at the feet of history standing infront of her, and the forefather smites her with a suppressing gaze, a poignant narrative unfolds—an intricate tapestry of sadness and anger woven through the threads of forgotten histories.

- There is some talk about building a house. My parents talk. There is another person, I hear. Their creative discussion turns into an argument. I hear my father begin to raise his voice while the other person backs my mother's argument with reason. Soon, the voices stop talking once the father puts an end to the discussion, and there's silence. I wonder. What do we do with more rooms? I have been effectively decreasing myself to take up less and less space. The clash of opinions in the adjacent room mirrors the internal conflict, a tug-of-war between the desire for expansion and the impulse to retreat further into the shadows. What would it mean to occupy more space in the physical realm when the instinct is to shrink into the margins? The dilemma is softly interrupted with a muffled cry. I think it is my mother. I recognize the cry. It is the same cry she cries after every discussion ends. As the cry permeates the silence, it's as if the walls themselves absorb the emotional residue of the unresolved debate. The dilemma deepens, intertwining the practical consideration of additional rooms with the emotional complexity of familial dynamics. The cry becomes a melancholic punctuation mark, underscoring the emotional toll of the ongoing struggle for space, both physical and emotional.

Oh, look, we have crossed the blurry lines of 11:59 p.m. and 12:00 a.m. We have (dis?)successfully stepped into January 1st, 2024. Did something change in the physical world at the stroke of midnight? Nothing. We wrap up our day and go to sleep. Knowing fully well, tomorrow we will wake up the same way, brush the same teeth in the same mouth full of age-old blisters, pick up the same weapons of lowly daydreaming and incapability to unlevel the will to live, and fight the same war. The clock may reset, but the essence of our existence remains tethered to the unyielding grip of the status quo and the cruel leader who always wins.

- Oizys.

Echolocation of the Caged Tongue

A failed writer and a caged bird.
Wings emasculated and legs tied.
Fingers stuck in my ears.
Tapping the voice in my brain shut.
Forcefed ink and forced to puke poetry.
I try to regurgitate meals of ponder.
Thoughts gnaw the metal as a relentless hunger.
They pluck a feather.
Dip it in the inkwell of my mouth.
To make it a quill.
Days become decades.
Bits and pieces of reality evaporate.
Ink congeals at the tip of my tongue.
The inferior umbilicus is trapped.
I close my mouth as I widen my eyes.
I gulp the blob of ink.
I chew the quill.
The mind hopes for a clot of words to release.

No one comes near my bars.
They say, a stench lingers.
No one comes to open the cage.
They say, it is my asylum.
Why?
Is it fear of my wild heart?
Or, is it repulsion of my rotten belly?

~ Oizys.

The Unweaving

Tonight, I sit on the precipice of my own undoing, on the verge of a cataclysmic event I can only describe as "The Unweaving." The world around me has morphed into a grotesque and nightmarish tableau, where the colours have bled into a sickly, bruised palette as if the very essence of life had drained from the world. As if someone has squeezed it to make it devoid of any emotion. Once-vibrant reds, symbolising passion and vitality, have faded to a feeble, pallid pink, a feeble echo of their former fervour. The verdant greens, once representing growth and renewal, now appear jaundiced and tainted, reminiscent of decay rather than life. Once serene and calming, the blues have transformed into a murky, ashen grey, reflecting the weight of a world burdened by sorrow. These desolate hues now intermingle, painting a grim tapestry of a world beset by malaise. It is a place where hope has withered like a dying flower, where the vibrancy of existence has succumbed to the relentless march of despair. In the shadow of this bruised palette, the air is thick with the stench of decay. It clings to every breath, a noxious reminder of a world unravelling at its seams. The once-fresh scent of earth and nature has given way to a putrid miasma as if the very essence of life itself had curdled. The aroma of decay is a relentless spectre, seeping into every corner, every crevice, and every memory. It haunts the alleys where laughter once echoed and lingers in the halls that once resonated with joy. Now, it pervades every nook and cranny, an inescapable presence, a testament to the relentless passage of time and the erosion of all things vibrant.

The morning sun, once a symbol of hope, now casts long, gnarled shadows that writhe and contort like serpents. My footsteps echo through the barren chambers of my soul, empty rooms in my broken mind, reverberating with a mournful, discordant symphony of despair. Each step feels like a rusty blade carving into my fractured psyche. Each leaf, once young and soft, is getting crunched and crushed underneath my feet and getting stuffed in the cuts and bruises, their tender innocence sacrificed to the brutal landscape of my existence, each bruise and cut now holding the remnants of a world that once held promise but has since crumbled into desolation.

The mundane rituals of existence have become rituals of self-flagellation. I scrub and scrape my skin until it's raw and red, hoping to wash away the stains of regret that cling to me like a malevolent parasite. Each moment etched in my skin feels like an open wound, a relentless reminder of choices made and opportunities lost as if the past were a relentless predator gnawing at the edges of my body. The mirror reflects a visage distorted by torment, a visage I can scarcely recognize as my own. The eyes that once held a glimmer of hope now stare back, haunted and hollow, as if they have witnessed the darkest depths of the human soul. It's a reflection of a self fractured by the weight of regrets, a face worn and weathered by the storms of anguish, a portrait of a soul adrift in a sea of remorse.

My thoughts are a swarm of locusts, devouring every vestige of serenity within me. Doubts, regrets, and self-loathing spiral into an abyss that threatens to consume my very essence. It is a descent into madness, a grotesque carnival of self-destruction. I see the voices in my head as they deplume me of my vision, like someone pinching the wick to snuff out a candle in the cavern. Each whispered thought is a deathly squeeze, extinguishing the fragile flame of clarity that once flickered within. In this cavernous silence, I'm left in the inky blackness of my thoughts, groping through the labyrinthine passages of my mind, searching for a glimmer of understanding that has been cruelly slaughtered with forced subservience and indoctrination.

As I scrawl these words with ink as dark as my cavernous eyes, I am both the executioner and the sacrificial lamb. This unweaving feels like a gruesome dance with the demons that reside within, a waltz of self-annihilation and freedom. With each stroke of the pen, I unravel a piece of my own tapestry, shedding the weight of the past like tattered rags, and in this act of self-deconstruction, I discover an odd liberation, as if dismantling the old self paves the way for something rawer, unburdened, and authentically broken.

Tomorrow, I may wake to a world no less distorted, but I will be reborn from this same wreckage. This same chasm. This unweaving is not an end but a metamorphosis, a baptism in the blood of my own suffering, and a testament to the yield of the human spirit. It is the relentless yet foolish resilience to rise from the ashes, to unearth some worth in the fragments, and to precariously juggle the duality of existence—the darkness and the blindsight, the broken and the each scattered pieces—as the raw, undeniable core part of being. It is in this ongoing battle that the haunting truth of my humanity reveals itself—a truth woven from the threads of vulnerability and resignation, despair and exhaustion, and the ceaseless floundering between the fragments of my soul and the sad, stubborn life that still manages to find its way in.

- Oizys.

"My Liberation Notes" - Yeom Mi-jeong

I vividly remember the day when I first stumbled upon this drama, My Liberation Notes, on Netflix. I was instantly drawn to its raw and unfiltered portrayal of human emotions and mundane life. I shared it with my circle of friends back then, hoping they would share my enthusiasm. To my dismay, they found it strangely off-putting. They could be right, you know? But...

I sought solace in the words of Mi Jung, the complex protagonist of the drama. I remember writing the dialouges in my diary, transcribing her monologues with an almost desperate urgency. Little did I know that within a year, my world would drastically change but not so much. The friends I once held dear drifted away. I managed to graduate, albeit with great difficulty, and landed a remote job that offered little fulfillment. But, I am isolated and alone. Despite my dreams of escape, I found myself trapped in the confines of my room, where hours blurred into days and monotony reigned supreme. Back then, I used to sit in my room and study all day, desiring and thinking, "One day, I will get a job and leave this place and everyone here." And, now it seems like a distant echo lost in the abyss of my reality. I am still sitting in room. Stuck in my room.

 

In the midst of this suffocating existence, I decided to revisit that drama, hoping to recapture the reassuring emotions it once evoked within me. Night after night, I completed my work, eagerly immersing myself in the familiar scenes, only to find tears streaming down my face as Mi Jung's words struck a chord deep within my soul. It became a ritual, an emotional release that accompanied me into the lonely nights, where I surrendered myself to the overwhelming sadness and emptiness that enveloped me.

 

There has always been an ache in my heart, an unfulfilled longing for freedom and liberation that has haunted me since the beginning. It's a feeling I've tried to suppress, burying it beneath the weight of responsibilities and unspoken dreams. Desperate to find an outlet, I turned to writing, pouring my thoughts into a blog that remains unseen and untouched by others. Its existence, like a hidden secret, offers me a sliver of solace—a place where I can lay my soul bare open without fear of judgment.

 

This drama might not resonate with everyone, and it may not possess the power to break the chains of my mundane reality, but it is undeniably real. It has become my anchor, a source of validation for the strange and unsettling experiences that have colored my life. It doesn't necessarily make everything better or worse; rather, it justifies the complexity of my emotions, offering a source of understanding and assurance in a world that often feels indifferent.

 

Every time Mi Jung's monologues resonate in my ears, I can feel a slow burn in my throat, a tightening in my chest as tears well up in my eyes. It's a visceral reaction that etches itself into my memory, a reminder of the profound impact this drama has had on me. I know deep down that this connection will linger, that I will find myself drawn back to it time and time again.

 

In a bittersweet way, it's both comforting and disheartening. Comforting because it reminds me that I'm not alone in my struggles, that someone out there understands the depths of my emotions. Disheartening because it serves as a constant reminder of my longing for something more, something beyond the confines of this suffocating room.

 

- Oizys.

That English Family

Tea, Dreams, and Bittersweet Realities: An Envy-Fueled Odyssey Of That English Family

While doing my research on the postgraduate college I wanted to attend, I stumbled upon a piece written by one person with a sketch drawn by his brother. When I read a bit more about them, I came across a blog by their mother. Her blog, her words, and her pictures of her sons, grandchildren, and relatives became a soothing balm for wounds I didn't know I had. Her little stories of faith, her memories of her mother, her entries about her elder son getting into university, her videos of playing with her younger son's kids She had lived a difficult life yet managed to make the most of it. She and her family look very, very happy. Not the Instagram happy where they morph their differences into lies to get coins and likes. Genuinely happy. Smiles. Guitar. No lies. Their eyes sparkle. Their moments attest to genuineness. The comment section is a giant,  soft quilt of compliments showered by her friends and extended family. I do not know how they are related to each other or what kind of relationship they maintain. But she seems like a genuinely good person. Just humans and goodness mixed like sugar and butter. She reads and writes beautifully, and her words have turned me into some sort of "fan".

I recently saw her update about visiting her elder son, who is studying in a different country, in a beautiful city in Europe. He glowed. He exhibited luminosity. His face just sparkles. He makes music in his free time. He had multiple bands. He uploads them on YouTube and sells them as well. He is studying hard to build a career as well. I watched some of his music. There's freedom. There's passion. There's love. There's acceptance. I imagine them to be a family of love, freedom, and acceptance. Living in a home filled with warmth and good tea I imagine them meeting on holidays and celebrating with their friends and family, exchanging gifts. I imagine them saying goodbye before the elder son leaves for university and sharing tears. I imagine them having video calls where they try to match their timezones. I imagine her elder son taking her mother around the city, showing her the museums, parks, and famous eateries. She is writing another book, and I have yet to buy her first one. I am saving money for that. I imagine her meeting her son's friends as they show her around. I imagine her going back home and reminiscing about her time with her son, which is reflected in her blog.

After glancing a bit more at the photographs she had uploaded with tiny notes about each of them tucked underneath, a train of reality hit me. It is the same university that rejected me. I looked at her son, standing outside the university. Reality—my grusomely bland reality—pulls me back to my cold room, to my cold cot. And I think about my interview with the professor from that university, which was flailing and embarrassing. I think about the non-existent photographs of me with my family. I think about the screams and angry silences around my house. I think about the last time I spoke to my sister, who is from a completely different country. I think about the last time I spoke to my father, who had just moved in downstairs. I think about my friends who have left to pursue their dreams in different cities. I think about my mother, who is sleeping next to me. I think about last evening, when we all made our teas separately and drank them separately.

I check flights for cities in Europe. One leaves tonight. Should I go? Should I pack my bags and just leave? Should I visit the university, talk to the students and professors there, and talk to her elder son about his experience there and his music? Should I visit her as well? Tell her I am saving money to buy her book. That would be ridiculous. I don't even have the money to buy her book, and yet I am visiting her from a shabby little town in a shabby little country. She doesn't even know who I am. I decide against it and go to sleep. Try to sleep. With fantasy and reality fighting over my head. I lie there while they both rip me into pieces. I think about tomorrow morning and how I have to pick up these pieces and face life in this room. I imagine what she must be telling her son about how much she enjoyed her trip to visit him. And I imagine her son reading her mother's happiness while walking to the university while passing a park where she shared a cup of tea with her while telling her all about his studies. I think about the last time I took a trip and shared it with anyone and glance over my empty gallery. I close her blog and try to forget her URL so as to match my fantasy with my empty reality. So, it can be a fair fight.

- Oizys.