Epiphany

As you eye her careful stance, envying her balance, her hold on life, you assume things, one over the other about the perfection of her life, herself. You never once guess at the fact that this very girl once pressed a smarting cigarette between her delicate lips, trying to ease the pressure that threatened to strangle her. You don’t assume that she relied on the blissful numbing effects of nicotine to escape the intensity of those failures.

As she walks through, smiling at one and all you assume her as a celebrity, happy and frank with all. Yet, you don’t ever see the never ceasing creases on her forehead, even as she laughs. You don’t notice how she always smiles briefly and is so often lost in thoughts. And you certainly don’t see the slight pain in her eyes that gives you a peek into the hardships of her life.

As she goes around telling people to hold on, to not let go, you don’t see how she reminisces those days when her own hold on reality was so brief that she was almost about to let go. She floats like a free bird yet her reality is a cage in itself, unable to break free.

You don’t observe the tiny tattoo of an anchor she looks to every now and then, drawing and redrawing over it, in an attempt to hold back. She hides the scars and the carcass of those hidden thoughts behind her attire and yet with each passing eternity it threatens to jump back to life and cut away her anchors. 

***

In the confines of her home, with her perfect hair wrapped in an untidy bun atop her head, lose wisps of hair framing her face she closes her eyes against the stinging smoke. There are three cigarette studs in the ash tray and sill half the box to be puffed away, while she waits for the spreading fire to swallow her completely.

-Momina.

Until then.

The sky… The sky is a perfect blue. The kind that compels you to hold your gaze there and stare at it until minutes pass .There is a dull golden moon, not half and not entirely a crescent, decorating the royal blue; partially lighting it up. The sky is still a little rusty at the edges; where the ends mingle with the lands and disappear behind buildings, all around. 

And between the tall buildings that surround the area, between the long shadows she stands silently staring above at the reality she shares with a million others. A thousand of who could be stranded alone gazing at this mutual reality, thinking this very thing. She’s holding on to that single thought or else she could sink under the weight that pushes her down. She could drown and she’s willing to but not yet. Not until that thread breaks off. Not until she really knows that there is nobody out there not going through the same troubles.

-Momina.

White Noise.

You can't escape it, the noise. You can't flee from it. It penetrates through the thick walls, through closed doors. It travels to the quilt you are curled under in a desperate attempt to evade it. But it passes through, and it continues past the pillow covering your head inside the quilt. It snakes in between the vaccum in the middle of your ear and the headphones that blast music to drown out that noise. It grows over the beat of the music bellowing into your ear like a formidable, daunting whisper.

It's the background hum that never recedes. Instead, it continues to built up in intensity against all odds. It rocks your threshold. Slowly breaking your hold on tranquility. It throws you into a cyclone of commotion. Clamour. Racket. Uproar. It tears away the shred of peace you hold on to.

You scream. You scream so loudly in the depths of the night and in broad daylight. It's like a shadow that haunts and stalks you, no matter what time of the day it is, no matter what your surrroundings are. It pinches your fears, fueling them into a burning rage. Bubbling hot inside you while you are in a desperate attempt to cool off.

No one understands as you stand on the threshold of insanity; breaking down brick by brick, unable to hold still. All your attempts seem frutile. Nobody sees the fear behind your glassy eyes. No one notices sweat that breaks on your face. No one realizes what pain you are in. And nobody hears your silence screaming.




-Momina.

Like Ink Unto My Soul

I am happy. I am infinitely happy. If it weren't for the first post this very day, two yeas back I wouldn't have been this happy and this proud. I wouldn't have known so many wonderful people. I would have missed the chance to interact with them and to read them.

Being a writer was never an aim as a child, it was never a dream. And yet today with every word that I write I live a dream to become a published novelist, to never abandon this romance with words.This journey is still young right now but this journey is special. And it wouldn't have been possible you all reading me and appreciating me. 

Today my blog has turn two and for once I have no words to express my happiness and gratitude. So, I summarize it into these four words from one of my pieces that you guys appreciated the most. This is for each of you:

"Your Insistence Is Adorable."

Thank you special ones and love to all. All aboard. 

-Momina. 

Look Back, Won't You?

I can hear them; it’s only at a mild stage right now, barely out of the door but in hearing distance. I am supposed to be studying this lesson. Instead… I peek over my book, first towards the closed door and then towards my sister. I look at her somewhat disdainfully, yet in a way I envy her and her indifference. She never looks up from the cell phone in her hand, furiously typing away. It’s either that or the phone pressed to her ear. How can one be so absent minded?

Even as I make my way to the closed door, I know that this is a mistake. It’s not a mundane issue any more. It was, but only at the beginning.

*******

They are at it again; the screaming and shouting. Yes, it starts from an ordinary issue but now it never ends there. They don’t even bother closing the door now. It turns into some sort of competition of firing blames and opening your Pandora of regrets. They string other problems into it so efficiently; accusations, lies, regrets, they pile them all high. The speeches increasing in tempo, the voices rising high. You can feel the hatred, the aggression; you can smell it, touch it.

I don’t want to be a part of their fights. I don’t. Yet, I am dragged in too. Always. You don’t get a choice. A choice is a mere illusion, in the end you are meant to be torn inside. The torture, however, is obviously unseen to them. Illusions.

******

It’s all because of me. I know. Every little step that I take towards resolving the fight turns into a giant step fueling it.

‘They don’t need your bloody little amendments, you freak,’ she said to me today ‘You are the cause of the problems. The root.’

Am I? Is it really because of me? The other night all I did was bring them water and they started quarrelling. Do they do this on purpose? Of course not! Perhaps I am the cause.

I asked her this while she was engaged in another one of her endless calls.

‘Would you stop it? Stop being a pain to everyone? Would you ever just stop and mind your own business!? I am so sick of this place, of them, of you! I need out but guess what, I don’t get out. It’s all because of you, all because of you’

And then she pinched me; a mere twisting movement of the hand that sent burning sensations down my arm. Weird how it was oddly comforting. As if for a moment the pressure on my brain leaked out a bit.

She hates me. But she can’t do that without reasons. I am her sister. What if…

*******

I have been thinking, perhaps if I just give it a try I’d know. For now I cannot even think straight. Their fights echo in my ears even if I sit as far as the boundaries of this house allow. They ring terror bells in my ears twenty four hours a day.

What if this helps? It’s only a tiny needle.

I hold the needle in my left hand which quivers violently. I watch it for a few long seconds but of course I can’t. Like always. Like I can’t stop the fights, like I can’t stop the all from hating me. I am the glitch, the fault.

I clench my teeth shut and watch as the needle moves forward and pierces the skin of my forefinger. For a split second there is pain and then relief. It washes over me like a wave of cool wind in suffocating heat. As if a block has been moved away from over my nerves.

I’ll do it again.

*******

A shard of glass is more powerful. The greater the pain it’ll inflict, the better. The longer I feel secured. The longer I feel enveloped in the embrace of physical pain, it helps ton done the constant drill that continues in my head.

They stand outside my door. They scream for me to stop, they shout for me to throw away the pin, or the jagged piece of glass or to stop banging my head against the wall. They look at my bruises and cry and blame. And then… and then they fight again. It starts all over. The blames, accusations. Guilt.

This time, I won’t be stopping them. This is their torture, for all the suffering. I’ll follow the light, any light, any path that brings me the peace.

*******

She came and she cried. I saw her after years. We were so close, always. Her tears were genuine. She ried for the state I am in. And apologized. I wanted to tell her not to, for she was the only person who was not at fault. Or was she?

They look at me like a creature in a zoo. All of them. The kids poke me, the elders try to make small talk which is plainly awkward for both of us. I do not talk. The time for talking is over.

They’ll be gone. She’ll be gone.

******

They have taken away all and any sharp objects they could find. They don’t realize that my peace doesn’t require pointy things. They would have bound me if not for her. She screamed at them for hours, for once there was silence between them. She advised them strictly about me, about pressurizing me. For once, she was the parent and they were the children. She came in before she left; apologized, cried and talked, she tried to make me talk. I cried. I cried after what seemed like year but I couldn’t say a word. I tried, yes. But I couldn’t. Maybe I am past that stage.

******

She called me today. It was not the first time yet there was an odd sensation. She talked, she spoke only to me refusing to put the phone down until I tried to talk back. I couldn’t. She cried. She begged me to come back, to try a little something. For her sake.

Okay.

******

She told me to try and read; to recite one name of Allah, only ten times a day. I tried.

She told me to read the surah. To not torture myself for a single day, a single hour. She calls every day, for an hour she continues to take me through the rituals, the actions I have long abandoned. She recalls the words and helps me learn. She’s there and she tells me He is too.

*****

I did. I’ve never felt serenity as such. Never. I never thought I’d find peace in something so close. But maybe that is where the fault lies. Maybe that’s what we always forget. We look for peace in places where we only find hints of it. And yet we abandon the pool that never dries and walks wherever we go. Why do we rely on every worldly rescue but deny the right path that resides before us. Why is God the last source that we turn to?

Oh Lord! Help these people, help us all. Guide us toward the right.



-Momina Latif.

Seeping To A Stop, At My Fingertips...

There is a creek in my blood stream,

Where the ink flows and my words float.

They rush through my body, melded with the blood

Drop by drop, intoxicating my being.

As my body hums, as it goes numb.

With blood it gushes through the empty vessels,

Containing them, fulfilling.

It turns back from the edge of my lips,

Seeping to a stop, at my fingertips.

From there it flows out, pouring on the paper

Draining from my body, the infinite supply.

The ink blemishes, never running out

Spilling onto the white,

Marring the pure blankness.

-Momina.

The Days Before Yesterday

In the dreary cold,

When nothing bore fruit

A single rose,

All by itself grew

'It wouldnt live', they said

'In the dull winters

that were so cold'.

But the little bud grew,

On and on. And

The petals turned

Velvety and strong.

And before they knew it,

It was a full blown rose.

That even on it's own

Had beared the harsh cold.




-Momina.

Drown With Your Anchors

The window opened with a faint screech of metal against metal that slowly died in the whir of the ceiling fan. She looked behind her one last time and then climbed on the window ledge, rather carelessly; a cigarette glowing at one end held between two fingers and a tea cup balanced on the palm of the other hand. She let her legs hang down the ledge, swaying.

From the ground the figure propped on the window sill of the twelfth floor looked like nothing but an irregular play of the shadows under the dark sky. Closer and you could make out the silhouette of a person, the orange glow at one end of the cigarette, nothing more than a tiny flaming speck moving back and forth in midair.

Her hand moves rhythmically between her lips and the saucer underneath the slender tea cup that doubles as an ash tray. Each puff of smoke that escapes gently from between her lips is like a mere illusion in the dark night, conjured up from thin air.

However she is too occupied to pay any heed to either the magic the smoke presents or the faint moonlight that keeps casting interesting shadows around her. Tears swim before her reddened eyes, almost brimming over but not quite yet. Whether they were due to the sting of the cigarette smoke that she has not yet been accustomed to or the great lump blocking her airway, she didn’t knew. But her throat was blocked; the air wheezing in and out rather painfully. She clenched her teeth against an overwhelming sensation of tears threatening to flow.

In an attempt to distract her own self she looks back into the dark room packed with boxes and shuts the window; her ears ringing at the faint screech. Nothing is visible through the dirty window and the voice that she would soon be hearing is now blocked out.

She lets the tears flow, letting her unwelcome sorrows to mingle with the stuffy air. The air presses down, heavy with the depression that leaks from her. It’s like extreme humidity; it makes breathing and moving difficult as if walking through water or something thicker that fills the earth like a swimming pool. It draws out her energy and will, weighing her down and pushing her away, slowly letting her drown with the anchor that held her.
                                                                   

             ***

From the fifth floor of the opposite building a girl has come out for fresh air; the phone pressed to her ear and a smile tickling her lips. She smiles tenderly at what she hears through the phone but midway through it she suddenly looks up at the sound of a half scream. She forgets to smile or to reply, she doesn’t hears a thing as her eyes follow a shadowy figure falling from the sky.

-Momina.

O' Dear, Lover Of Time.

You know who I’m talking about,

Don’t you?

Yes you do,

Because I say she loved you.

And I see,

How your lips,

Slowly curl into a subtle smile.

So sad, yet glad

To have made her acquaintance

All that while,

Ago.

You see her now,

Passing by,

Through the lanes of time,

Once more.

There, I see.

In your eyes,

Tears that glisten for that golden time,

Now lost behind,

All that while,

Ago.

Sigh once again

Dear lover of time.

Because you know,

You miss that

One and only girl

Who hit home.

-Momina.

As Long As Infinity

http://instagram.com/p/dlbcIcHoa8/

The sun has set and the remaining light is slowly receding into the approaching darkness. She stands under the cold shower, shivering and gasping for breath as the icy water hits her. She has been standing under the water spray for so long, all the hot water has run out and she has to make do with the cold water. Her unknotted muscles now contract under the cold water.

She twists the knob to turn of the spray and slips into a towel robe, knotting the sash tightly. Just as she steps out of the bathroom, the lights go out. She clenches her eyes shut and stands there, hugging herself tightly in defense against the demons that might lurk in the dark. They really just reside in the crannies of her grey matter, the demons. Her fear lurks as she stands there motionless. The light returns and she sighs in relief.

This has been happening for quite a few days. It’s probably just some electrical shortage that occurs in the whole area, because the darkness isn’t restricted to her house alone. She has been meaning to get it checked. It started with a few minutes a day and the dark intervals grew rapidly over the days.

The dark lapses are way more frequent today. It such a dark night. She blindly makes her way to the window and pulls away the curtain in search of stars only to see a night so black you couldn't even see the faint shadows hovering. Just pitch black and sometimes a faint spark of light so unreal that it could only be an illusion.

These periods of darkness grow longer, momentarily still and longer and she wasted time flipping the light switches in each room. The world just plunged into darkness for seconds that lasted for an infinity. This certain one was lasting way longer than the rest. She had a weird feeling that this problem was deeper than she perceived. There is an odd feeling gnawing at her mind; a sense of cold seeping into her bones, giving her a warning, maybe.

The bell rings and she hears as the faint thud of footsteps near.

“Whose there?” she calls out.

“It’s me, Ruth!” She sighs in relief, hearing her neighbor’s name.

“Oh, hi! Come over, why are the lights all out? I mean it’s been ages and not even a speck of light is in sight.”

“What? No honey, they lights aren't out. Actually I came to ask you why all your lights are on in the middle of the night. Is everything okay?” She could hear a worry in her neighbor’s voice but her words made the world stand still for her.

“No, Ruth. No. There are no lights. I can’t see a thing. I can’t see a thing.”

The air left her throat and she stood in her dark world, hand flailing in the still air around her. She felt someone clutch her tight, whisper something incoherent, reassuringly but the sound of her own screams were the only thing she could here. It filled the entire house, echoing back at her deafeningly, sounding louder in the darkness of her mind. The darkness that was not just restricted to her house, it had spread to her entire world.

-Momina.

Suspended

She’s melting away in the white room,

Turning to stone while the quiet grooms.

A sole hammock hangs in a white painted room. Stark white and devoid of everything with the exception of the white hammock and a thick white carpet that covers the floor corner to corner. The carpet and the white walls are so perfectly match that at first sight you are unable to decipher as to where the floor ends and the walls start. There are no windows and only a single door. The room is efficiently illuminated by light bulbs such that there is little shadow play to hinder the dream like reality.

A pale hand hangs down the edge of the white hammock that seems to be floating in the air. The frail motionless figure whose weight presses down on the hammock is not asleep, rather absent from reality and dream altogether. She stands at the mutual edge of the both; confused as to where the reality ends and imagination begins much like the story of the carpet and the walls of the white room she lays in. There is no hurry though; she’ll stay until a state pulls her either way.

For now, everything is peaceful. Somehow right even though incomprehensible. Carelessness assaults her mind. She hasn't moved from her place on the white hammock in the white room. She has been there for a long while and she’s there to stay for a little while more. 

It gives her a feel of floating, her state and the hammock. Of drifting without moving, of defying gravity with logic. Or logic with insanity. Time lapses away; seconds, minutes, hours. A crazy energy drives her, fueling her with the strength to stay. To hold on; to her peace, to this incoherent mix of reality and dream that she is enjoying right now. To not be happy or sad but peacefully satisfied. This is her middle ground.

In the depth of her mind wild blooms,

There is red on the floor of the white room.

-Momina.

The Middle Ground

She was senseless; her consciousness was welded deeply into her subliminal mind. She was not asleep yet the slumber had not abandoned her, it hung around her creating a shell that did not let her wander towards either. She was bemused about what was real and what was just a figment of her imagination portrayed as real. It wasn’t such deep a night, she knew that, so then why was her mind playing tricks on her? She knew that the constant drip from the bathroom tap was real, it was there every night, and so was the faint whistling sound. She heard footsteps, and listened hard, staying still as a statue she realized it was her heart beat growing louder by each minute. She saw the shadows playing around and then almost a shadowy figure, which was gone with a blink of an eye. Sometimes the darkness would seem to prevail forever and at other times it drew in light, little fading circles of white and cream. The line between reality and imagination had gone hazy; she awaited the reality desperately as she hung by loose threads at the edge of her dreams. She hummed to herself; a sole sound in the death of the night, as the night became her, and her the night.

-Momina.

Obscured

And I waited till the questions evolved into answers, 

Question marks straightened into exclamations. 

Encrypted were the messages

Lost were the hints,

Scribbled and hidden scraps, paper thin.

Dipped in symbols,

To form, incoherent answers.

Master of such creations

Losing while deciphering.

-Momina.

As The White Broke Through

Chris Carter Abstract

She was sprawled on the slightly damp grass in the wee hours of the morning; the time between dawn and sunrise, when the sky is a dull blue with white peeking from behind. Everything was silent, there was no chirping of the birds, no rush of vehicles or any sound of life. Sometimes in the back ground there was faint groan of an air conditioner or an occasional hum of a generator.



She lay there staring at the few stars that still twinkled in the sky. Her bare feet resting on the tingling grass, her knees bent. One of her hands ran through her hair that spread out like a coal black fire with blades of grass poking through it. The other hand stretched out to the grass, plucking out wisps of it. The world was just a blur of color through her partially closed eyes, like a water-color painting with one color merging into the other without a specified border.

The red of her dress contrasted sharply with the fresh green of the grass in the dull light. The red geraniums bordering the garden made a beautiful border of swaying red flowers. There was a serenity that flowed through the atmosphere. For once no fire burnt in the core of her being, nothing froze her bones till she was a fragile skeleton of ice. Rather, it was the first time she felt humane. There was no tug of war of love and hate but just an aura of joy and contentment that whipped up genuine happiness on its own. Somehow it was touching the light that was the ultimate solace that she had been fighting for.

There was a looming darkness that rang warning bells of doom and despair for her numb senses. And there was the dark past trying to suck her in, intent on creating a vacuum in her present. But then there was this; this happiness, satisfaction, bliss.

This was her final fight. Her mind urged her to stress upon these thoughts, to draw strategies and sense to secure her but the aura of her surrounding (or was it the light within?) It drew her into a slumber of its own. And she floated like a flail bird, resting, drooping lower and lower into an estranged stupor. For one there was no concern of all the deaths suffered already, there was no wake of fear for the future.

She slept in solace as the white broke through the blue, the east swelled with pink and peach hues and the golden shined upon her as people rushed about where she lay in peace.

-Momina.

Drown.

I am not going to hold you back,
I am letting you go.
I know, that when
You want to drown in sadness
It doesn’t help
To stay afloat on hollow hopes.

So drown
Because it’s okay to do so.
To sit among you disappointments
Until you are at peace with them.

And it’s okay
To come up, gasping for air.
For those are
Treasured moments
Of sheer realizations.

So drown,
Because the next time you wither
You’ll know how to bloom,
Again.

You can’t live a life of no sadness
You can’t omit pieces of a puzzle
Because then
There will be no picture.

Drown
And when you look up
At the hazy image
Of what’s beyond that despair
You’ll know that there are people
Standing there,
Waiting for you to come out.
And the people
Who never came.

But that’s okay,
Because you’ll know them all,
Then. Truly.

So drown and call out
When it’s okay
When it’s time.
And I’ll be there
To pull you out.

-Momina.

Her.

She gets up at seven in the morning. She doesn’t have a clock, but her mental clock wakes her up at seven, daily. She still gazes at the empty side table the first thing after she wakes up, where her mother’s watch always rested, but it has long been broken; smashed into tiny pieces that never made their way back to the table or her. She silently walks into the kitchen and helps herself to a drink of water. The water direct from the tap is already too hot. It must be scorching hot already.

She dresses herself carefully and then binds her hair into a braid. There is a broken mirror behind the door but she doesn’t wish to look at herself any more. There is nothing that holds any attraction at all. What would she see anyway? Eyes that speak of hurt? A broken past and a non-existent future? Pain and sadness? There was no innocence left in her weak body, the innocence portrayed on her face was nothing but a lie, it had long been extricated from her in a series of events; every time life had thrown a pebble at her, she shed her innocence and cast a thick layer of stubbornness over herself. In her adolescent years she had barely anytime to think about playgrounds where she ought to be playing or the rain that called to her while she slaved.

She wraps her dupatta sensibly around her head spreading it diligently across her upper body, again without the aid of a mirror, before rushing out, but silently. She has already wasted too much of her time thinking. There is no time to clean the tiny apartment. She’ll have to deal with the consequences later. She was rather used to it. She walks swiftly with her tattered book under one arm. Her books were as tattered as her life, she wondered. What with a drunken and abusing unemployed father and two little siblings to support. There was no mother. There was but she managed to get away from here and gave up her children to a world of abuse and slavery for that. Were they supposed to be like that, the mothers? Maybe her mother was different.

She kept looking for some hope in the absence of her mother. Maybe she would come back and take them away. Maybe she went away to get help. Or for their security, maybe. All consolations were hollow of course but they were solaces at least.

The doorman opens the gate and barely gets to a side. He smirks at her. She holds her dupatta firmly under her chin and quickly passes through the gate, rushing to the kitchen door. She puts her plastic slippers in a corner and enters the kitchen bare foot. She proceeds to wash her hands and then takes a quick peek at clock. Too late. She draws out the bowl of kneaded dough and starts making chapatis: greased in fat. Her tiny hands work fast under the scrutiny of the mistress’s dark eyes. She keeps being bombarded with instructions and comments on her tardiness.

She cleans out the kitchen and then dusts down the rest of the huge house, sweeping out the rooms. If she gets all her work done before time the mistress might teach her the next lesson. She’s worked really hard on the first, as hard as she could in the time she has. There is a still a lot to do though. But if she learns all this she can even tutor the kids around her home. And she might grow up to be a teacher. She would teach lots of kids for free too. But she’d earn too and that will help them getaway, too.

Jewelry glints all around the room, where she sweeps, carelessly thrown around. Her mother stole some gold bangles when she vanished. She knew because she saw them shining under the hem of her dupatta which covered her wrist the day she went away. And her mother had never owned any gold. The wife of a drunken abusing man doesn’t get any gold. And if she has any it goes away and there is no use making futile attempts at fighting for it because they only get you more bruises and a sore body.

A slap on her jaw brings her back to the present. It’s the mistress. The tears sting but don’t leak. She is lecturing her about her daydreaming. And she pulls in her sluggishness in the lecture. She says she might cut her pay short. She stands silently with a clenched jaw, her head drooped.

Her father hit her today when she got home. She hadn’t washed out the only two glasses in the house that he uses for his drinking. He pulled her hair hard and had clumps of it when he let them go. She stood silently with a clenched jaw and head drooped low.

Everyone and everything is silent. Except the fan that whirs above. It makes more noise than it swirls air. The air is suffocating. It doesn’t matter where she goes, she always feels smothered. As if the air molecules around her have vowed to drown and choke her in her own sadness. It’s becoming too much to bear, everything. She is not responsible for her mother running away, of her father being an alcoholic, of the mistress’s house, of the penetrating gazes of the male bodies, of her doomed past.

She huddles inside her blanket and takes off her dupatta and opens the knotted corner. Inside are two rings. They are the mistress’s. Yes she stole them. They glint in the faint light. They are too pretty and intimidating. She’ll run away, she decides. Freedom clouds her vision.

She didn’t sleep. She held the rings in her clenched fists and waited for dawn. Once the light started to break through the sky, she got up silently. She goes through her usual routine of getting ready but it’s three hours early. Once she’s done with wrapping her scarf about her, she looks around the room. Her eyes meet the innocent sleepy ones of her younger sister. Innocence still prevails there. She whimpers and comes to hug her. Don’t go, she says, don’t leave us like mother. Don’t be her.

Don’t be her.
Is she not responsible for her siblings, she thinks, about her deeds, about the purity of her soul, about becoming like her mother? And how could she be something that wasn’t her. She wasn’t their mother. She wasn’t a hollow hope. Did she have to make her life more morbid and dark than it already was?

She thought while she sang her sister back to sleep. She went to the mistress’s house at seven. She silently put the glinting rings back. They seemed dull, now. All there sheen lost. She burned under the doorman’s gaze. She was degraded by the mistress. She violated her body by doing twice the amount of work. But when she proceeded for home, she felt more hopeful and fresh than she had in days. It wasn’t everyone’s imagination. The girl who had a solemn expression on her face for the past two years was indeed smiling today when she walked home with a jump in her step.

-Momina.

Maybe We Need To Stop Living Among Metaphors.

A single puff of dust swoops up from the ground as if conjured by a magic spell. Between the dust that now settles back onto the dry ground, the droplet that has caused this tiny hazard is long gone; already soaked into the depths of the thirsty earth. Gradually the whole space starts being bombarded with such tiny dust bombs, and the burning plane drinks it up as quick. The heat rises evidently out of the ground as the water droplets pick up speed; it trickles out of the ground, prompted by the cooling rain. In no time the rain spell grows in intensity drenching the parched land, the thirsting flowerbeds, the burnt grass, the dry soil. It subsides even before it can trickle down towards an unknown path. 

The drowning sun sends golden waves that glint off the raindrops that cling to each surface. There is a general relief that drifts through the air, soaking people along with the rain. The air resonates with cries of happiness and prayers being send heaven wards. Between the beautiful chaos, that is the rain and the mayhem caused by everything around, she’s caught in the moment. Despair and satisfaction run through her, somehow together. 

The light from the setting sun filters through the window, being the only source of illumination in the gradually darkening room. As if it’s trying to show her the light but she was too much of a coward to break through her cage. Or maybe it was just the light slowly seeping out of sight. Maybe she just needed to stop living among metaphors. 

Between the profound desolation and satisfaction other emotions fluctuate, creating an incoherent tangled mass of feelings that looks like a twinkling star, fading and glowing, and fading and glowing. The satisfaction she was feeling, encased by time in that moment was an oddly familiar sensation. Although, how it sustained with the growing feeling of melancholy and despair was awe engaging. Maybe she had found bliss in her sadness. Or maybe sorrow had become home, the place where the heart was. 

Amidst all this, there was never an ounce of emptiness. The despair was not hollow, neither the silence nor the loneliness. Each was a part of her own, entwined so strongly with her backbone, knotted with her nerves and melded with her blood. She was them and they were her. She weaved her anguish in patterns and found happiness smiling in the folds of it. Why did people assume she was unhappy? She was not.

The monotonous despair had shown her so many colors of life and it had taught her well, too. Everything was there and she was the one revolving in the middle, touching despair, sparking happiness, dying a little while she lived each day. Being a part of everything, everything a part of her. 

The grateful exclamations start afresh as the rain comes down in full haste. The light has all but left her now darkened room but she doesn’t flips the light switch, she doesn’t moves from her place for she is content while watching the hues that dance within her; as her realizations take shape.

-Momina

Among Candle Flames

The flames of the candle danced in the darkness. Not one flame but three, although the candle was only one and a single wick inside it burned. The candle was one, the reflections two. And together they were three, brighter and better but from a single source.

She sat very far from the candle, among the shadows that had not been driven away by the brightness. Her eyes, however, were locked on the candle flame, following it’s every movement. The room was enveloped in silence, light and darkness. She moved closer to the candle, out in the light as her shadow grew larger behind her. She raised her hand to cup the flame, enclosing the room into darkness again. The only thing that now glowed was her palm at one side of the flame and her face at the other; intent eyes sparkling mischievously. Moving her hand closer she touched the flame, clenching her hand to a fist capturing it, the light. And then she let go, all too soon as the light scalded her hand.

She slid down her hand, holding it firmly, lighting the room once again. The hot wax that melted close to the flame slipped past the mouth of the candle, sliding down, gathering onto her hand. Stinging and burning. She whipped her hand away in pain, knocking the candle to the floor. She fell back in fear when she looked up from nursing her hand, as fiery arms rose from the burning carpet. Now a new kind of light illuminated the room, the reflections even this time two. Rising spoke, flaming claws; she fainted in the now lit shadows, wasting away in silence and the hissing of the burning room.

-Momina.

Are you looking for beauty or finding faults?

Love is a very simple thing, and we tend to complicate the simplest of things. It’s unnecessary to go in the details of everything, to discover its chemical basis, its origin… the first story. I don’t feel the need to do any such thing. Even though love can be quite vast in its meaning, it’s really not that difficult. We make it difficult though, categorizing it and sizing it up. Why? What’s the point of falling in love with a single person when you can fall in love with so many things, over and over again?

We’ve all heard the about the difference of loving and being in love. Why? Why can’t we fall in love with everything? Why can’t we sincerely like all the things that we want to? We can, but we don’t. We don’t because there is this general hype about falling in love with one beautiful person.

I do not believe it. I fall in love with so many things, people, deeds etcetera. Not love them, but fall in love with them. I fall in love with words; random words scrawled on walls, on paper, on blogs, on social sites, by people I don’t know and I might not ever know and I fall in love with them.

I fall in love with poetry, not necessarily famous poets, like Whitman, Plath, Yeats… no, everybody loves them. I fall in love with poetic verses that bloom out of nowhere in the minds of random people all across the globe. They jot them down and forget, but so many people fall in love with them.

I fall in love with deeds; a tiny gesture, a smile. A stranger smiling at a stranger, a scene I only witness, a scene I am not even a part of and I fall in love with it.

I fall in love when I see two people falling in love. I fall in love with their love. I look at them, once practically strangers and know so close and dear to one another. How can I not fall in love?

I fall in love with the nature; clouds, a sunrise, a glimpse of the dark sky where only a single star gleams, an eclipse, the expanse of water stretching out till the ends whilst I float in the middle of it, the promise of land beyond. I fall in love with them even though I know that they won’t come again as themselves. The next sunrise would be different, the sea will be taken by a tide, and the clouds will change form. Everything will become a new something to fall in love with, only to change again.

I fall in love with art. All sorts; decorating the corners of a notebook, painted on walls, an incoherent mix of color in an adolescent’s sketch-pad. I fall in love with laughter, echoing from the house next door, the table beyond ours; people reveling in their own personal and private jokes with laughter echoing out as one.

I fall in love with so much more, and each time I do, I fall slightly in love with the people associated with it. And you do, too. You are falling in love, too, not just once but over and over again, with people you don’t know, things you don’t understand, stories you haven’t read… you are falling without categorizing, you are falling in love genuinely without thinking about the consequences.

The world, you see, is a beautiful place. And it’s filled with so much love that if we consider it, we can take over the hate. Fall in love with it.

-Momina.

I Have Enclosed Myself In An Infinity Of My Own

It comes down in an even sprinkle, falling straight; gently beating the ground. I watch quietly as each drop falls on my clothes and gets sucked up by their fibers leaving nothing but a tiny dark patch. It would have been nonexistent if it wasn't for the rest of the rain drops slowly soaking me up. My clothes gradually turn a shade or two darker than their original color, my hair dampens and water droplets slip past my face and my half bare arms.

I had dragged a chair to the center of the driveway where there is no overhead shelter, now I sit on it with my feet up, the rain water swishing around the legs of the chair. The heels of my feet rest on the very edge of the chair, my arms around them and my fingers intertwined so my feet won’t slip due to the wet tension. Hugging my legs, my face turned sideways so that I can feel the rain on my face and dousing my carelessly knotted hair.

For a moment I had considered making myself a cup of coffee but I opted against it. So now nestled in the pocket, in the arm of the chair, are several rain-sprayed jasmines that I’ve picked from our garden. Their scent floats all around me, fusing with the smell of the rain. It is so incredibly, crazily beautiful, this moment, sitting enveloped in a self-embrace with nothing but the mingling scent of rain and jasmines and the occasional tweeting of the birds shattering the silence. My far vision blurred for I have long abandoned my spectacles in the wake of this morning rain, hence, I am enclosed in a tiny bubble of my own. It’s so personal, as if the rain falls down for me, only.

It comes down so silently, getting lost amidst the whir of the ceiling fans and the hum of the air conditioners. Nobody wonders how they manage to sleep so soundly when the heat otherwise woke them up every day, every hour. The perks of being an insomniac include experiencing these exquisite early morning rains, whenever they come; earlier than the early risers. You connect with the silence and the beauty because it’s only you.

I've been sitting in the red canvas chair in the center of the driveway, in a sleeping neighborhood with the breeze playing with the hair that has come loose from my bun and the rain drenching me, for the past two hours. I got up only once to encase the sheer ecstasy of these blessed moments in the fold of my words; adding another piece to the plethora of such captured moments.

I am sneezing and slightly cold but it doesn't matter. I've waited for quite long to feel numb like this as I

cherish the rain, silent and lone.

-Momina.

A Conversation With Conscience

“Give yourselves the reasons, if you don’t trust anyone else’, she heard. The sudden interruption caused her to forget about her muttering, look around and then think the situation through.

She rarely ever started a conversation but this was fascinating, and hadn't it been initiated already?

“How so?” she asked.

“You know the rights and the wrongs, a few if not all. You know when it’s okay to ask you, and you know when it’s not. And you know that anger is pointless when it’s something you can do, under your control.”

“But it’s not… destroying my peace, my contemplation. It’s wrong. Of course I am angry. Giving me an illusion of choice is wrong. Deciding my future for me is wrong.”

“Is it? Didn't you have your moments of peace? One cannot live in peace if there is a war going around in the surrounding or inside you. The illusion of choice was wrong, but so is this illusion, that of peace.”

She is speechless. It waits for her to speak; it gives her time to let it all sink in.

“The illusion of choice is given to you, you can however, correct it. Have your say. But this delusion, you have created it yourself; you've made yourself believe in it.

“You built your own shackles, you hold the key; it’s all you.”

“It’s all me”, she said to herself as her mind wrapped about this.

She lifted herself on her feet and looked at it, staring at her with similarly curious eyes, through the mirror.

-Momina.

Your Insistence Is Adorable.

Everything in the vastness of space is in a state of perpetual motion. Every tiny speck and every gigantic object that exists because several such tiny specks came together... everything, is moving. Shaking. Hovering. Vibrating. From the tiniest electron revolving around the nucleus of an atom to a huge star in a galaxy eons away. It is all moving, gently and crazily. Silently. And I am sitting here, still; suspended in all that motion. Waiting to be lifted. Waiting to be moved or removed by an unseen force. I am the glitch in the system, the nut that refuses to rotate while the rest spin in wild, silly circles. I am right in the center of a moving world, stationary. Useless.

I can see you, sense you, reading me, following me around. Trying hard to decipher me and my struggle. Putting such great effort in thinking about my past and my future. And I don’t even know about my present. I see you trying to visualize my story, trying to adapt it, picture yourself in it.

“What happens? What happened?” I hear you ask yourself, incredulously, as you turn another page to my story, as you see me running from the horrors of an unexplained monster. Running in vain. I see you crease your forehead, run your tongue over your dried lips, change your drooping posture, so that you won’t get tired. So that you’ll be able to read a little more without interruption. Your insistence is adorable.

You are tired. You didn't sleep all night, you were so engrossed in reading me, thinking about my story and tweaking your perspective as you moved further, word by word. I was there with you, without you realizing. I was watching you enthralled by a story that wasn't even your own. So I asked myself why you did that? Why did you hurt yourself over someone else’s tale? Cry over another’s pain, laugh at someone else’s joy? Why do you sit here, your eyes following me, your mind wrapped about me, when your own story remains abandoned, unwritten?

I've chosen to be the glitch. To stop, to drag on so that you’d become agitated. So that you’d put me you aside for a moment and look around and see what your own world has come to. The ignorance of your own reality so that you can indulge in mine is flattering. But I realize I've been doing the same. Trying to indulge in your story, figure you out while you try to decode mine. I've been trying to stop you from interpreting me, all the while looking forward to your reactions when you finally unveil my end. All the while we've been simultaneously reading one another, embracing tales not our own. We are linked this way, you see.

So, when I see you handling me with such care, adoring the curve of each word, cherishing the way every scene of my story falls into the other, melding beautifully and unlocking a mystery, I melt. I see your eyes shining at my happiness, you cheeks wet at my sorrow, I never realized I became so much to you. And I never grasped how focused a part you became of mine. After all, without you I am just a dying script, drying ink that will eventually fade to nothing. But you never let that happen. You've treasured me, spending so much time with me and thoughts about me when I wasn't even there with you. You became the lips that spoke my story, the syllables were written but you sought people and shared them. And I have come to realize now that I fell in love with you every time you opened my story, over and over again just to share my repetitive joys and tears one more time. And each time when you held me carefully before giving the story to a friend and whispering a loving, ‘Take care of it’.

And I have fallen for you each time I heard your sigh of relief when you once again held me in your hands.

-Momina.

*This piece has been written keeping this in mind: 

Buoyant Flames

With slow steps she descended into the cold pool; each step measured and pondered on the slippery floor of the pool as she had never learned how to swim. She gently walked further with even steps. Arms held outwards by her side, the back of her hands resting lightly on the slick water surface, she submerged herself up to her chin. Tendrils of dark hair, gleaming in the harsh sunlight, spread out halfway around her head like roots of an ancient tree, bobbing gently on the water. 

There was a fire burning deep within her, a mix of vapid anger and disappointments welling up from the core of her being, shattering any wall of peace and reassurance to tiny crystal like jagged pieces that burned and reflected the fire. The sweltering heat did not seep out from all her pores, outwards to the water, as she had imagined it would. The cold water around her did nothing to cool her down. While the sun was another story, showing no mercy, trying to melt her exterior unaware that she was already deteriorating inside. 

With closed eyes, so that they wouldn’t burn in this eternal battle of interior and exterior fire, she began a slow tread forward. Deeper she walked, in the colder water that wrapped around her in a desperate attempt for a little calmness. She ventured into greater depths, the water rising; quivering at the tip of her nose, the bridge between her eyes, feet gradually losing ground. Deeper and deeper she crawled, trying to avenge the blazing fire, to shut down this insane play of incoherent flames, losing herself to the water; trying hard to float in tranquility whilst she drowned in the depths of the pool.

-Momina.

Crazy Rambling #10

Lately I’ve been finding extreme fascination in withering flowers, roses, to be specific. I pluck them off from our garden a little before they are about to shed their petals, and arrange them into an oasis. Eventually they become limp and flaccid and dry out in their dropped posture. They are incredibly fascinating if you take your time to look at them, to really see them, not just a glance. They are untold stories, incomplete, yet they hold a charm far more precious than all the finished stories, all the happy endings. Even though they dry out, they are pretty, worth saving. 

I've never understood why people press roses between the pages of a book; there is little beauty in something you are forcing to die. And personally, I find nothing interesting in looking at a rose flower that is pressed until it’s flimsy and lean. It’s a full blown rose that darkens in color, that closes upon itself as it dies and dries that holds my attention. It’s beautiful, still intact. Somehow still living and fragrant. It’s the incomplete story of those roses that fascinates me, and I've always been a sucker for unfinished stories.

-Momina.

Reflections In The Paper

She sat down dejectedly in front of the mirror with her sketch pad turned to a blank sheet, the pencil dangling from her fingers. What had life become? 

Swallowing back the lump in her throat and clenching her eyes shut to will he tears back into them, she picked up the pencil, holding it just above the blank expanse. Composing herself she began to sketch. Her pencil dragged on the clear paper leaving a grey trail behind as her eyes moved to and fro between the mirror and the paper, sketching herself. She did not have to worry about expressions; she pretty much wore a single expression now. She watched her own reflection and her hands as they held the pencil that scrawled on the paper, bringing to life there a pair of hollow eyes. 

After an hour of the tenuous job, she was done. The sketch had a hint of a forced smile; an awkward curl of one corner of the mouth. The person in the sketch was so familiar yet a complete stranger. She gazed at it for a while, altering her observation again between the sketch and her own reflection while her mind wandered off into a completely different alcove. After a while she picked up the abandoned pencil again and began to shade. 

She shaded half of the face into the darkness of the gray lead. She then looked once again at the sketch, this time in satisfaction, at the dark and bright side of the sketch, the truth of the human face.

-Momina.

Twist A Zero To Convert It to Infinity.

Arno Rafael Minkkinen

Sometimes I stay awake all night. Writing and trying to fill in the blank spaces inside of me. As I add word after word, they become tinier and tinier but louder than screams. They do not consume the blankness that resides within me, they fill every other space, cramping into nooks and crannies, become tiny in themselves but they leave the empty space as it is, undying; never growing any less or more. The mayhem of the words is so calming, just as unsettling the nothingness is. The shouts of them so chaotic yet so distinct, each word, a sea of thought. Together they become an ocean that flows over the galaxies. But the empty void is still there, the disturbance; the iceberg that wouldn't melt away. It floats along, as outstanding as the words, as silent as their screams. 

It sometimes intrudes with my thoughts so much, I go blind. But then I realized, it’s the blankness that is the root to those nourishing words. It is the one holding onto them so they do not go astray. The blankness is where they birth from. The nothingness is the seed. And it’s there so that the words would never die. As long as the empty void is there, there are words forming, for me to write, for you to read.

 I am the sheets of paper that I fill with my words day and night, but I am the blank pages, too.

-Momina.

Illusions on the loose.

Holding onto my tea cup with both hands, I sit in the garden, staring as if sitting in alien surroundings. I do not drink the tea, I hold on to the mug only for warmth. So, I imagine that it gives of warmth forever, and that it doesn't goes cold, and that I don’t let it spill onto the grass, deliberately.

I watch the jasmine hedge for several minutes; it’s just up to the boundary wall now. I envision it growing and growing, until it sways violently in the wind, its top amongst the clouds. Ignoring the reality where upon it was cut down each time it grew to the level of the wall.

And there are several unseen rainbows in the sky, the ones that only I can see. And those people in the stationary cars that weren't there. The Kite that flies, cutting through the trees, yet moving only in that particular square that is bounded by those barbed wires. For these are those moments that I experience now, the ones where imagination becomes reality, and there is truth in the moments that were not even happening. But they were, and only you knew.

I look on as something falls from the nest in the tree. It falls down fast, blurry and off white. An egg. It runs down rapidly, landing somewhere in the green, that cushions its fall, maybe. Hopefully the mother will find it there, whole. And I’ll pretend that later on I did not see the carcass of a tiny featherless bird with thousands of ants moving to and fro over its lifeless body.

-Momina.

As The World Went On Without Them...

A hundred followers. Thank you, all! I am grateful to you all for reading and appreciating! 

For my sisters. 

There is something increasingly tranquil about sitting inconspicuously in a corner, from where you can view everyone, but draw little attention to yourself. Notice people, approaching or going their own ways, watching people, noting their ways. And just like that they sat there, two, who couldn't be more different, peacefully looking out to the world as it went on around them, without them.

There is something extremely joyous about walking bare foot on the wet grass, as you feel the green tingling your feet, under the night sky as you roam aimlessly, wandering off before turning to face the world again. You are so close to nature, so earthy, so content. And just like that, they walked those slightly damp lawns. Three pair of feet, wandering away but together, three pairs of shoes hooked on each one’s hand, as the world went on behind them, without them.

There is something awfully hilarious about being cross with the world, how one shuts himself, secluding, feigning ignorance to all those around. But actually they stare, inwardly they laugh, and how beautiful if you can share! And just like that, they lay there, four faces so dissimilar, lost in a world of their own that they share. They curse the darkness that has come with the hurricane yet connected them all in a way they haven’t been in a while. And so they share, four perspectives so unlike as they make a vision identical as the world goes on, outside, without them.

There is something exceptionally beautiful about sitting together sharing a personal joke and taunting one another. It’s about being so close, knowing the other well enough, that jokes don’t hurt and funnier they seem with every minute, no matter how pointless they are. And just like that they laughed, a chorus of five distinct giggles, making the most of these shared moments, the late night forgotten. They chuckle and chortle as the world sleeps about them, without them.

-Momina.

Slipping Away

Little by little as all subsides, I hold onto the familiar space, 

Walking on a similar pace, Letting everything go. 

Little by little.

Second by second it slips away, blurring into an abyss, 

So dark it becomes, unknown to eyes, disappearing into a void. 

Second by second. 

Page by page, as the memories flood, meaningless, 

Don’t they become? Fading are the words that adorned the sheets. 

Page by page. 

Color by color, they wash away, losing charm as they become, 
Nothing other than hidden grays. Pale and dreary, as if they decay. 

Color by color. 

Skin by skin, bone by bone, the muscles chew off as nothing I form. 

A carcass of naught that now rests, only in deeds, only in minds. 

Thought by thought. 

-Momina.

This Was I, Today.

Today I burn. 

I burn with intensity of love and what not. 

I evaporate in the silence, 

I am written in words. 

Then I become the very hands 

That tears apart the pages filled. 

I die as I cry, I love as I die.

I scroll down, I read, I cry and I love. 

I sit in the early morning silence, when most have left for work and the remaining have yet to stir. So, here I make the most of the tranquil surrounding that hardly come by. Revelation after revelation dawns upon me, as the words echo in the stillness, shattering and sustaining the peace. It’s brilliant how two opposites can exist in harmony. But that’s not for now to ponder about. This is how I feel. Thoughts are bombarded at me; explosions take place in the quiet aura around me. There is too much to ponder over, flipping, one after the other in a sort of comfortable misery. They die down, they rise. They exist and they perish. They flicker like a candle, varying in intensity. Yet they all make sense somehow even in the chaos that is them. 

It’s been almost five hours since I’ve been sitting here. I only got up once to see if there were any clouds in the sky. There were none. However, that did not cause me any disappointment today. So I sat back down in the company of silence, chocolate, thoughts and poetry. 

Poetry, I always just wrote it. I started writing only because my younger sister used to write. Somewhere in the middle it became who I am. And I had never really read much apart from mine and her. I used to skip the poetry session in the magazines to read the stories. Somehow, somewhere, I found poetry, I found solace. I read it in papers, I read it on blogs, I read it in books. And then there were people who introduced me to some beautiful poetry by some incredible writers (Thank you). I read. I loved. And today as I sat before my laptop, nibbling on the chocolate I bought yesterday and reading these amazing works of poetry I somehow knew how to appreciate it, cherish it and find the hidden meanings in their folds. I related. I saved them and I quoted them and formed verses of my own and wrote them. 

It was me, today; sitting in between and unseen mess, my mind incoherent to most, my chaotic thoughts invisible to all, typing and clicking, with an idiotic grin, sometimes a half smile regardless of how shattered some of the poetry left me. This was I, today, realizing and learning and loving. 

-Momina.

Visual Satisfaction

She puts the glass to her lips and leans her head back, letting the last few drops slip inside her mouth. She places the glass back and leans against the sofa back, landing her feet on the table. She hits the remote, and music begins to flow through the stereo at the corner; beautiful wordless music. She taps her foot and nods her head slightly, with her eyes closed as the melody strikes in high and low notes.

It is a fact that the peace of the moments never lasts as long as you want it to, and as the phone rings, it jostles her awake, she hits her foot on the glass at the table, as she gets up. She hears it crash, a reverberating sound, and looks at it in disbelieve. It looks whole from her angle. She forgets about the phone and settles into the sofa, looking at the glass that rolls from side to side on the glass top of the coffee table, slowing down. The glass is broken. Quarter of its length, one third of its width has broken off, and it rests a little further away, whole.

How queer, two things so whole, yet together they are broken. She doesn’t register the phone as it clicks off. She puts the glass upright, leaving the chipped off piece further away. She leans forward, and runs her finger on the smooth edge of the cut glass. Smooth until it cut through her flesh, stinging and drawing blood. She sits still at the alien sight. She watches as the red drops drip, staining the glass and the coffee table. She snatches a couple of tissues and wipes off the blood. Pressing onto the finger until none leaks anymore.

She looks at it curiously, the cut has formed white edges, and red wells up deep inside. It is a sight so rare, so mysterious to her; the one who has always suffered unseen pain, with no visual aid to it, it fascinates her. She draws the broken glass closer, running her fingers over it, letting it prickle and wound, allowing it to coat it all red, finding satisfaction in the graphics of her pain.

-Momina.

Impassive

As invisible as a thought,

As silent as a dream. 

As open as a secret;

Screaming out to be released.

Confined to four walls,

Yet, content and serene.

Impassive to the world,

The loneliness, unseen.

Isolated among friends,

But with stranger naive.

Expose to Familiarities,

Triggers fires, obstinate.

-Momina.

More Love

Hello everyone,

So these have been due for quite a while now, my apologies! Thank you so so much Aqsa and Mani Khaan for tagging me for the 'Liebster award'.

Thank you, Mani. :Dxx

Thank you, Aqsa :Dxx

My utter gratitude to both of me, honestly, your appreciation means a lot and I can't thank you enough for reading and liking my pieces to this extent.

So, I this time, however, I am going to skip the 'facts'.

These are the answers to your questions, Aqsa:

1. Are you an introverted or extroverted person?

I am an introvert who is friends with the most extrovert people.

2.One thing in life that means the most to you?

Definitely my sister.

3. You are woken from deep sleep at 3 in the morning! What will be the first words out of your mouth?

A very incoherent 'What?'.

4. Who do you trust and listen to more, the heart or the brain?

Actually, it's all the brain, I think. So I am not sure.

5. Your passion?

My skills, my ability to write.

6. Your zodiac sign? Do you posses the traits defining your zodiac?

Taurus! I guess I do, most of them, anyway.

7. It is said: 'Don't ask what the meaning of life is, you define it!', so what's you definition of life?

The prospect of life is too complex and vast and it keeps changing daily. I think life is about befriending strangers, trying to love the people you hate, holding on to the people you love. It's about discovering the unseen and feeling. It's about inspiring and being inspired.

8. One word that defines you?

"Wallflower", said Urbah.

  9. There is someone saying bad things about you!...Will you prefer confronting that someone or silently walking away?

I prefer silently walking away, but I am extremely lucky to have friends who'll take me along and confront that person. Thank you, you all! :')

10. Are you a realistic person or do fairy tales mean more to you?

I am a realistic person, fairy tales are stories woven out of dreams, I prefer to only take lessons from them.

These are the questions by Mani Khanna:

1.Most embarrassing moment?

I think my most embarrassing moment would be declaring the most embarrassing moment on the blog.

2. Two wishes.

I wish to own a typewriter someday and I wish people could notice the joy in little things.

3. Dream Job?

As stupid as it may sound, I honestly have no dream job, I don't really plan.

4. Name one person that comes in your mind,

Love: My little sister.

Hate: Nothing really except maybe Chemistry.

Best: My family and friends.

Blog: That pops up several images and names.

Adviser: Parents.

5. Describe me in one word.

Forgiving.

6. One person you wanted to meet, dead or alive?

That list is very long.

7. Friendship is?

Friendship is when you love people for who they are, when you can approach them, point out their wrongs, level arguments. When you love them and hate them, and are at peace with them.

8. A girl and a boy can be friends, justify with a reason.

Of course they can, friendship is regardless of gender. Society condemns a lot that isn't wrong, they just need to complicate things, hence, they make their own rules.

9. Best moment till date?

1st January 2008, the day my baby-sister was born.

10. One thing you are afraid of?

Allah.

11. One thing you don't like to share with people?

Anything at all. I am very personal.

Thank you, once again and lots of love.

-Momina.

That Moment.

Do you remember those moments when you were talking with someone and suddenly the walls went down; the walls that defined the middle lines between acquaintances and friends? Do you remember those moments after which it was all simple, frank? When you no more had to think before you said something. And when you asked without worry, and answered without logic. That moment when you were suddenly friends, do you remember?

What did you spoke of? What simplified it all? And does it matters, that moment? Or the moments before and after that? Were there circumstances? Did you want to be friends or were you mortal enemies? Do these things matter?

They do. For that moment you gained. That moment you changed. In that moment you were something special, for each other. Not just another person added into a friend circle, but someone you looked forward to speaking. That moment was special. Not because it was easy to talk afterwards but simply because you could talk without barriers. You could dare to approach a subject, to start a conversation, to point out a wrong, to level an argument.

That moment, was everything. 

-Momina.