"remnants of us" || 14.08.2023
I always thought holding on was hard, but I could make it work. As I grew up, I realized that sometimes it's better to just let go. But that doesn't mean that once in a while I didn't try holding on despite knowing that the drinks that bring back all the memories are long overdue. I don't drink wine, so nothing ages well for me. Your perfume is a broken bottle and the shards of glass are still scattered all across my wooden floor. My ink-stained diary is in a cardboard box on a cupboard I no longer open. My fountain pen rests on the bottom shelf with all the things I treasure, but have no use for anymore. The sunflower curtains I loved so much are moth-eaten and they lay abandoned somewhere in the attic. My favorite nail polish has dried out and there are still stains on the surface of my old table from all the times I dropped the bottle, because I've always been a little clumsy.
They say relationships are like elastic bands. If one let's go then it hurts the one who held on. But I would've been okay with that too because elastic bands hurt- once, suddenly, unexpectedly, and then with time the pain subsides. But our relationship doesn't have a name and it reminds me of a childhood I never had, one where I'm on the beach after a long day of playing in the water. My skin is wrinkled and my hair is a mess of knots that'll take too long to untangle. As the sun sets over the horizon and seagulls fly across the golden sky, above the glistening waters, everything is calm. But I've never been calm, I'm not the kind of person that's calm (but that's a story for another day). My sand castles are broken, and I sit on the shore, taking a handful of the dirt. The sand slips from between my fingers. No matter how hard I hold on, it keeps slipping, slipping and slipping. It takes painstakingly long but I know I can't stop it and in the end I'm left with only the remnants on my palm, too little to do anything with it. When sandcastles break, I can cry and complain. But the remnants of sand on my hand are nothing. A reminder of what we were; nothing. So tell me, my favorite nothing, now that you're gone what do I mourn?
- Sabikun Nahar Titlee
an exert from [ The Waves That Don't Settle ]
