Elly Grey

When you thought that everything had ended and each time you were disappointed, you carried yourself through it all and survived. You nurtured your heart because you knew it was fragile and pure, and that you deserved all the peace and happiness in the world. You treated yourself with care and love because you knew nobody else was going to do that for you. And look at you now: where you thought you wouldn't survive, you've bloomed. Dear Me,  Be proud. You did well.  Love: Me. 

 This soil, these fields, forever in our blood. The earthen kitchen that burned a fire so warm that for hundreds of years, we sat around it telling stories and lore. The tree that was planted, and grew, for children to swing from. The warmth of smiles of loved ones whose hearts were always open, so no matter where we travel or how far, we centre back here. There's a reason why our own are buried into this very soil. Right here. This is everything. 

 I am not steadfast in my prayers, but when I need something, I will ask.  And tonight I prayed for you. I asked for you to have long life. I asked that you be given good health.  I prayed over water.  Recited  duroods that are prescribed. I touched your photo in the parts you are hurting. I blew my breath over you. I begged for your life.  My heart is aching with love for you. What I wouldn't do to take this pain away.  It is my faith that tells me it will be okay. 

 Magical hands and a brilliant mind. I would not have trusted anyone else with my eyes. Thank you for all that you did for me. Thank you for understanding my anguish and pain. Thank you for giving me the time and responding to me, when I was worried. I'll never forget you. Your gentle voice and smile. My doctor, the Magician. Rest in peace Dr Raf. 💙

 I was supposed to come see you while you were sick, but I gambled with time and lost. I kept believing there would be another tomorrow, but you slipped away before I could reach you. Now I’ll never see your face again, or that warm, beautiful smile. I should have been there. I was just too late. Time ticks on, and death waits for no one. I failed to act when it mattered, but never again. Time has taught me what delay costs. 

I believe we’ve met before somewhere, lifetimes ago. I believe we loved back then, too. This pull between us, this quiet ease, runs too deep to belong to just one life. You and I find each other, again and again,  I don’t think my world could be whole without you. A sudden click, an immediate calm, hands that know how to fit, lips that seal with familiar kiss. Hello.  Yes, it is you.  I feel so good around you.  You've found me again.  Effortless second nature. Another lifetime with you.  This feels so easy. I'm caught in your gravity, fixated... ...could we be reincarnated? 

 In the palm of your hand and my feet never touch the ground. 

"What are you looking at, Daddy?" ​" Karachi ." ​I searched my father’s face to see if he was joking, but before us lay only the vast, unbroken Pacific. There was no land in sight. ​"Where?" I traced his gaze toward the horizon, trying to see through his eyes. ​"If you stare right where the sky meets the water, you’ll see it." ​I squinted, trying with all my might, but saw nothing except a line of blue and empty air. ​It took decades for me to finally understand what he meant. He was homesick, worlds away, anchored only by the sky and the ocean, stretching out endlessly, connected to the Arabian Sea that lapped against the shores he had left behind. The water was his bridge home . ​Now, whenever I look out across the horizon, I feel the weight of his words. I squint into the distance, and I swear—I can see Karachi , too.

  I loved you and that feeling will never die. One day when I'm alone on an empty train you'll cross my mind and I'll think of us and how we were. Does love die? No. But the pain of loss, we hide. We bury it, deep within, to forget how beautiful vulnerability for a moment was.  

These words go nowhere. There is no name on the envelope, no address, just thoughts bouncing around in my mind, occasionally spilling onto paper. My fingers tremble in silence, as if asking me: What is the point? ​I do not know. ​I tell myself that if I write to you, these thoughts will reach you somehow. Why do I bother? Perhaps I still believe I can undo what happened, bring you back into your home, back into my life. ​You would open your mailbox and find my letter. You would smile, tear open the envelope, inhale the faint scent of the stationery, and begin reading: ​ My Darling, How I have missed you… ​Yet years have passed. Your house sits empty, the rosebushes overgrown. The curtains are drawn; even the street has fallen eerily quiet. The postman will never carry these pages, these blank letters to the lost. 

Coming into her own after the destruction you left her in. She's not looking back this time, no matter how you sweet talk her. This is her rebirth. Her newness. Her Phoenix reborn. From broken bricks she's rebuilt her castle. From scraps, she's pieced together her world. She wipes the grit from a split lip, spits the red into the dirt, and smiles:  You will not ruin me again.

  ' Grace, beauty and delicate nature. A wild rose'. That's what your name means. I wonder if you knew?  You tended to your garden so lovingly. Everything you touched bloomed.  Did you realise that your name was the embodiment of your nature?  And now you've gone into the most fragrant Garden. The one that is forever in bloom. 

  Like colourful shards of stained glass pieced together to tell a story. Like a bush of lavender in October, heavy with fresh blooms. My life is a mosaic of everyone I’ve ever loved. They may never have known one another, but what counts is that they touched me  and quietly altered the course of who I became. Like a jar of assorted sweets, where every favourite holds a memory. Like the quiet rhythm of the seasons, each bringing its own kind of grace. My life is a mosaic of everyone I've loved.

  There's a spell I'm going to teach you, using an open window: So go ahead, open a window. Look out in hope. Now think of three positive things in your life. Say them to the sky. Now say what you wish to claim. Now say your sweetheart's name. And now look in hope, out of the open window.  Smell the air, hear the rustle of leaves and feel the temperature change around you. Refuse to stay stagnant in your head. Your open window is telling you, it's all yours. 

Hollow verses. Empty vessels. Echoes that got lost in the wind. Gentle, sweet nothings,  tangled in my curls. Words not written or recorded. Your word now against mine.  Did you say them to me? Yes you did. Look at me, into my eyes. You did. You did.  But they were just that. Meaningless words, with no substance. Hollow verses that you once said to me. 

Your heart.  All mine.  (I'm selfish like that).

I will not carry your demons for you. No. I'm not that nice.  You've got to grow up and face those bastards now on your own.  They are your demons. Not anybody else's.  Drown those suckers so you can finally take a breath. Kill them, so you can live.  So do you see why I can't carry that burden for you? Because they are your demons. Not mine.  Come to me when you're healed. Then we'll have fun. 

He didn't say much when it ended. He sort of just left, leaving things undone and unsaid.  I didn't understand it at the time. I made noise. I chased. I pestered him for more. But there was nothing. There was no more.  For a long time, I thought it was me and that I was flawed. It took me time to realise that he and I were not meant to be. And when it's not meant to be, whatever that bond was, it will break. Leaving things undone, unsaid with no more.  We were two hearts beating separately. We were. But the bond between us had one heart and on a particular day, that heartbeat stopped. Leaving things undone, unsaid with no more.  And it'll be on the most plainest, quiet day, I'll hear a thud, a gentle heartbeat. Like an echo or a phantom sound. Whispers of the wind, words that were unsaid, left undone. No more...making a sound. 

Mirror, Mirror  Do you recognise me?  I'm the girl who would look into thee.  But now I've changed. Those insecurities have gone.  Mirror, Mirror, look at who I have become.   No longer am I standing in front of you, questioning my being. No longer am I nitpicking the beauty you're seeing. No longer will I talk down to myself. No longer will I think to be someone else.   I know who I am and what I stand for. Mirror, Mirror, I don't need you anymore.

We have unfinished business, Me and you. Heaven can wait because  I'm yet to show you heaven here.  So close your eyes. Take my hand. I'm about to take you on a trip that will blow your mind.