Shorts

This post is based on the idea of abstractly expanding from a single word or a short phase taken as cue. It is part writing practice, part slice-of-life commentary. For the first post of what I hope becomes a series, my cue words are 'hope', 'love' and 'hurt'. More cue words are invited from readers.

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Hope

I hoped that these were the voices. I hoped that it meant nothing. I was sure that, on thinking rationally, I'd change my mind. But no: this was real, this was starkly true. This was happening. It wasn't the voices, it was me; and, try as I might, I wasn't about to change my mind.

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Love

There are some people who do not always love the same. They love in bits and pieces, because they know bits and pieces so much better than they know the whole and the healthy. Their love is post-apocalyptic -- it comes in urgent bursts and goes in apathy; it is true when it is the need of the hour, and a sleeping giant otherwise.

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Hurt

My body hurts, my mind hurts, everything I ever knew hurts. I'm not telling anyone about this and it hurts, it hurts that I'm not allowed to hurt, that if I hurt I'm going to be made fun of, that the ideas of what it means to be strong are so strong and so wrong that the strong are right and those who hurt are wrong. Wrong, because they are of no use. Wrong, because the world will not notice them gone. Wrong, because when you go to sleep, tired, your heroes stand guard -- and these heroes are never wrong, never hurt -- they are, always and forever, strong.

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