#the quote in between is from a poem written by a hindi poem mahadevi varma

[six-white-venus]

in my dreams, i carry my school bag and go to my hindi class. she is waiting for me. she always is.

her name means dream. and she stays true to it. she comes to me in flashes and in never-ending sagas painted behind my eyelids. she loved coffee. i learnt how to make tea from her, even though she never really taught me (let it simmer- the longer you let it brew, the more the flavour seeps in). she has the voice of a nightingale. the only way i remember her voice now is like this: the name of her daughters, yelled on top of her lungs because oh god, your little sister has spilled her milk all over the floor, you haven’t done your braids well, you’re late for school, did you tell your dad to buy dinner? can you make me coffee? i’m so sorry that you had to be my mother, my dear. i’m so sorry you couldn’t be a kid.

she kissed their cheeks and told them she loved them every day. she calls her students her children and means it. i called her aunty even though we were no kin, even though she was more like my mother. honey. her eyes and words are honey sweet. coffee sharp. chocolate dark. she loved me. she loved me. she loved me.

oh. oh look. i can’t stop switching to present tense, like she is still with me. like she isn’t six feet under. my head hurts. she used to have terrible headaches that made her awfully cross, but not at me. never at me. she loved me so much. i wish she didn’t.

“parichay itna, itihaas yahi; umidi kal thi, mit aaj chali.”

this is how i love her:

 i hate coffee but its scent is what home is made of. sea salt stained cheeks wiped away patiently by feather-soft hands. red, brown, yellow. the sun and the moon and everything celestial. like free ice cream and memories that feel false and wrong wrong wrong and yet so right and and and it hurts. hurts so much. don’t make it stop. we were supposed to go on a trip. to somewhere. anywhere. we didn’t. honey is thicker than blood. she drips into my dreams and i wish my hands were bloody and not drenched with honey. i wish the ants weren’t eating away at my hands. i wish i took a picture of her.

i love like her laugh: loud and true. i love like the epics she carved in my brain with her quill of crimson ink- like warriors that were doomed before the story was even thought of, like poets that were hailed when they were no longer and spat at when they were breathing, like kabir and tulsi das and rahim and their countless dohas. like the meanings of the words that i forgot but not really- they remain in the back of my throat and stick there. they stick there and it hurts to swallow. i love like this: i wake up and don’t die. i wake up and try. i wake up and open my books. i wake up. i wake up. i wake up. i wake up because she can’t. i wake up because she would want me to. i wake up because i can’t let another person forget her name. i wake up because my name on her tongue will live with me for years and years and i refuse to let it fade before i’m ripped away from the land of living.

her name is kalpana. she is the sweetest dream i’ve ever had.

Can you describe someone you love? (Please do.)