Inheritance Of Loss

By Madhav Menon

I use my broken nails as picks for my desperate guitar. I use it to strum a melancholic melody, nostalgic of yesterday

My deeds don't warrant my losses, neither do my pleas for help. Then why do I feel this pain inside my soul, so nostalgic? Why don't I crave salvation from these torturous times, but feel home amidst the chaos?

This sanity of mine which I have built, shatters to my inheritance. For I have been left with a thousand stories, of pain, of lies, of betrayals. I have inherited this from myself, the many lives I lived earlier

What I do, does impact me later. If I pluck leaves, my scalp will be uprooted, if I cut a tree, it will be sure to stick by me, until we both turn to ashes, together. I have inherited my own fate, from myself, and I write my own fate, for myself.

These losses that feel nostalgic to me, are the very blots in my character. They mould my soul in all their rotten existence, they make me crave pain like no other. I stop my hands from venturing there, but find myself holding hands with the devil.

The misty moonlight that shines upon me, upon my old selves. The darkness that consumes all but my broken guitar. The melancholic melody that breaks the silence, the curses of a thousand misdeeds. And me, who is a spectator to all these miracles

Am I special? I don't feel like it, the blood that runs through me is red, the food I eat tastes the same. Am I ordinary? No, these gazes that fall upon me, tell me otherwise.

So, what am I? Am I just a will to my future self, who's already been signed to walk the path of destruction? Or am I a deed, who's to commit the deeds that lead? I am but a human, a mere human in all my existence. I breathe, I eat, I live, and I act as I wish, as I please.

To inherit my losses makes me human, it's neither devilish, nor angelic, just human. To that, I can own up to, to that, I raise my glass to

By Madhav Menon