Anurika Sarkar

To The Lover Who Was, There’s a picture of us: you sitting near my balcony and trying to avoid the camera by turning your face and hiding it with your hand. I am sitting in front of you, gleefully looking into the camera, my cheeks close to your lips. I remember the picture still, though it was quite dark and we weren’t visible clearly due to the red lights in my room. We were vulnerable then. There was no pretense, there was no pose, we never uploaded it and nobody ever got to see us that way: you, being the camera shy that you are, and me, trying to make sense of my newfound feelings for you. Often, you would click multiple photos of me, candid and non-candid alike. You would then take your own sweet time to irritate the shit out of me, before you finally agreed to share those pictures with me. I drunk texted you, and you replied with your comforting words, saying how it doesn’t matter what people say and that I am a wonderful person. I remember the first time we made love,

I came across this picture on Facebook today. One look at it, and I knew it would bring out in me something I have long been avoiding to confront! "Maybe on some bright sunny day, on a busy street somewhere, amongst all the hustle and bustle, I would see you. Our eyes would meet, and at that right moment, everything will cease to exist. The look in your eyes, would not meet just my eyes, it would go beyond that, deeper, in to my soul. And that would be the moment when my soul will stir, and awaken to a new life , exactly how dusk feels, when stirred by the glowing dawn. In that heart-pounding moment, all the noise that we had been surrounded with , noise made up of the ghosts of our dark past, noise made up of the jagged shards of our torn hearts... all these noises would start mellowing down, till a point that they completely evaporate, and leave behind a silence, a stillness, where the only thing that's audible would be our souls talking to each other through our beati

Attempted to write a two-liner for the first time. :)

M y head felt heavy and my heart was pounding as fast as it could. But before I could control myself, I collapsed on the floor, only to find myself on a hospital bed the next morning  I woke up. My mother was sitting beside me,with my hands in hers, and my dad was talking to the doctor. I  wasn't from a wealthy family, but my dad earned enough to meet our simple needs and uncomplicated desires. But now, when I looked at my father, I sensed tension in his eyes. Maybe the doctor was asking for a huge fees, which probably my father couldn't afford. The room was really big and air-conditioned as well. I asked mom about the fee thing, but she manoeuvred the topic to my health. I realized that I was right, the cause of their tension was indeed money, but I didn't say anything. I immediately felt utter hatred for myself, for landing my parents into such a situation, and that too for him..... This story started two years ago, when I entered college for my graduation. Nervous, a

White saree with brown border, sometimes blue, and sometimes green with a bunch of keys dangling from the end of the "pallu", golden metallic bangles decorating the wrist, hair in shades of grey and white neatly done as a bun, short height and bronzen skin - this is how she is etched in my memory. My DIDA. My Granny. During the much-awaited long summer vacations we had back at school, I always spent a good part of it by staying over at her place. I slept with her every night, both of us cuddling each other, my head resting calmly at her bosom, listening to the innumerable Bengali stories and poems she had to share. I still remember, she was the first person to wake up every morning at 5.00 a.m. , in the huge joint family of my maternal uncles and aunts. Then after the bath, offered her morning prayers to the plethora of Gods and Goddesses decorated sacredly in the small temple adjacent to her room, which we call "Pujo-r Ghor" . She, then, slowly walked around the