Tag: college

Graduation

May 23rd, 2025

When I was sixteen I dreamt of love

My dreams contained thoughts of dates,

romance, kissing, holding of hands

Crying, screaming, love notes, anger

Pain, rage, indents on my palms

From squeezing my fists so unbelievably tight

Whilst keeping my mouth closed shut

I dreamt of emotions that I was feeling

Of emotions that I wished to have

Of emotions that I would never pray

My worst enemy could understand

And emotions that I said I didn’t want

But secretly craved to experience

Six pillows of support felt so unbelievably suffocating

Stuffed so close together with barely any room to breathe

That I hadn’t even considered it could feel even more isolating

When it became five

I’ve always been bad at verbal speech

It was as though I would talk so much

Yet not say a single thing at all

So I wrote

Up and down my little pen traced my small black notebook

Blisters formed on my finger as I wrote again and again

What I said and what I didn’t,

What I wished I would say and what I hoped I would not

Inside my book held screams and tears and pain

Hopes and wishes and dreams

Pieces I would never show anyone

At the age of eighteen I felt alone again

My lonesome journal was no longer enough

So in typical cheesy form, I took a chance and did something new

I got up out of bed and headed out the door

and sought out a ragtag group of writers

to spill out our sorrows on parchment

Without the devastating fear of judgement and further misery

It’s funny

At 21 I have felt all of the things that I wrote about at 16

The things that I wanted to feel, the things that I didn’t

The things that I wished for, and the things that I hated

I found love and I found heartbreak

I found friends and I found foes

I’ve cried and screamed

Teardrops have fallen onto my journal

And yelps of pain I could never share

Have shaken me to my very core

But what I didn’t expect

Was I would not face this alone

My poems of despair had an audience

My short stories “not about me”

Were all heard and internalized by others

When I plunged into the water

I did not realize that others were waiting

for me to dip my toe in first

The love that I idolized and craved so deeply

Was not something I had to search for

My loneliness was no longer there

For even though I still had pain sometimes

I knew someone was listening

So,

As I share my bedtime story

And lay the blanket down

Getting things ready for a bright new day tomorrow

Maybe every once in a while

A sweet dream of yesterday will pass by

Or I’ll get a light tap on the shoulder

To ask for a glass of milk

But otherwise

We will all wake up refreshed and excited

As the sun rises along a burnt orange horizon
the smile

January 30th, 2025

i am perfect.

better phrased, i am THE perfect.

i smile when people walk by me

i make casual conversation

i listen to “normal” music

there is nothing strange about me

nothing WRONG with me.

other people are not perfect

and they are looked down upon

for that very notion

they listen to weird music

they don’t give people “the smile”

maybe they will open their lips

and show their teeth

but they don’t give the one

that they’re supposed to give

they don’t wear the clothes

that they’re supposed to wear

but i am not like that

the other day i was cursed

i visited my hometown

and saw my friend

i did not know that we would be going out

and i was unprepared

she asked me why it mattered

but i couldn’t explain

i wasn’t wearing perfect clothes

i did not bring my 5 varieties of perfumes

or shower with my 2 different kinds of soaps

i did not do my complicated skin care routine

so i smiled extra hard

i was pristinely polite

i tried to be as perfect as possible

but alas they saw right through me

they saw the savage woman

who was clearly hiding something

they saw the filthy little girl

who could kill them at any second

who ate land spices

and held mass weaponry

to destroy them all

they saw the foreign lady

who lived in a stolen mansion

who could hack into their bank accounts

and would eat their kids for breakfast

my skin had peeled back

a wolf in sheep’s clothing

perfect dee was gone

deepali had emerged

i walked to the restroom

heart racing as fast as possible

a perfect man walked by me

i tried to smile in my gray fur

but he stared right through my canines

it needed to have the matching skin

and i froze feeling the same fear that they felt

would his fear truly burn so unbearably

that he would eradicate my kind?

i come back to school

i wake up early to shower

with my 6-step hygiene routine

have i mentioned my perfumes?

i walk by a woman

i am wearing my pristine white clothing

i smile the perfect smile

she smiles back

and for a second i am perfect

except for one thing
A Charm Bracelet

July 10th, 2023

Sera’s everyday routine consisted of her waking up, grabbing a coffee, heading to class, getting lunch, studying with her peers, grabbing dinner, and sleeping. Some days she would study more, and on weekends she either tended to spend the entire day studying or heading out to visit the city.

Sera had a good life. She had friends, she had a family that cared for her, she had food and shelter, she had water, she had technology, her family had enough money that she wouldn’t have to worry about tuition or anything else being a serious issue, she had everything.

She had no logical reason to be unhappy. She had anything she could want.

She was fine. Everything was fine.

She was fine.

She was fine.

Everything was fine.

Everything was fine.

Everything was fi-

“What did you get?”

Sera looked up to see someone staring at her drink.

She realized that she had been zoning out again and quickly shook her head before responding.

“Just a matcha latte. What about you, did you get anything?”

The individual shrugged, before sitting down next to her.

“Not thirsty”, the person began, “Just looking for a place to sit.”

Sera didn’t really mind people sitting next to her. She didn’t really like being alone, anyways. It forced her to spend too much time thinking, and she didn’t like thinking. She really didn’t like thinking.

She nodded at them silently.

“What’s your name, by the way? I wasn’t able to catch it”, she stated.

The individual smiled at her, raising their hand to shake her’s.

“My name’s Gene, short for Genevieve. Would you mind telling me yours?”

“Sera, short for Seraphina”.

Gene and Seraphina talked for about fifteen minutes before they exchanged numbers and went their separate ways. Sera could tell after about five minutes that Gene was attempting to flirt with her.

Sera felt nothing.

She wasn’t sure why, she wasn’t always like this. She used to feel giddy when she would realize that someone had any romantic interest in her, but now it just felt- well that’s just it, it felt like nothing.

Everything felt like nothing.

She tried to make herself feel better and change the bitter feelings in her gut- she would write in a journal everyday, she would try new things, she would spend more time with friends, do more spontaneous things- but for some reason it didn’t seem to help.

Nothing seemed to help.

She remembered when she was a kid, when she would get excited for something, she would spend the entire night unable to sleep due to her sheer excitement. She always got irritated by habits like that, how she would get excited by such little things when she was a kid, while her friends would act like it was crazy. Why would she get so excited just to be able to go grocery shopping the next day with her mom? It was so stupid of her, there was no logical reason behind it.

She missed those feelings.

Her friends had been planning a trip together for months, and now she felt nothing towards it. She would have been so unbelievably excited when she was younger, but now it just felt like another day that would end.

She told herself that she was fine. Everyone kept telling her that she should just take it one day at a time, that things would be okay soon, hard times are only temporary, the typical phrases people provide to offer comfort.

So why did every single morning feel so agonizing?

Why did she wake up with her heart beating a million times per minute every single day?

Why was she on the verge of tears all the time?

Why were all of her dreams now becoming nightmares?

She looked up from her matcha latte and began to pack her things.

She had been staring at it for about thirty minutes, rather than checking her emails like she had planned.

Whenever she felt particularly emotional, she liked to go to a creek near her apartment. Not many people knew about it, and it was a nice place to look at. She always liked watching the ducks and little water droplets, letting her mind quiet for a little bit.

Something she always did as she began to walk down the road and watch the tree branches wave in the wind, was to talk to fate.

She was a big believer in fate, in a higher power, in destiny, that things happened for a reason.

She believed that it was the most powerful in forces of nature, that fate was somehow listening and, if she listened too, she would hear what it had to say.

Specifically when she was feeling low, she would look for signs- signs that things would get better.

When she reached the creek, she sat on a tiny bench that had a near-perfect view of the water and the sun.

It was a bit cold.

The leaves swerved and fell in tiny waves, the wind was blowing through the trees and the water, causing tiny ripples and movement, and the sound of the water droplets echoed into her ears as she closed her eyes.

Sera tried to think of nothing. That was one of her favorite things to do.

She was successful for about two minutes before her eyes began to water again.

Why was it so cold?

Droplets began to dripple softly onto her palms, as her breaths grew more and more shallow, mimicking the tight sounds of the wind blowing into her ears.

“Help, help”, Sera began to whisper, “Please, make things better, make things okay, make me okay, please, please, why did you do this, please”.

Everything was quiet.

Sera looked down at her feet before wiping her tears, getting ready to get up to go back to her apartment.

As she stood up, a slight glimmer shot in the water that caught the side of her eye. It was very small, yet it seemed pretty- pretty enough to go look at.

She treaded quietly to it, viewing her reflection in the water. She looked like she had been crying, obviously, but her eyes had something more to it.

Her family always said to her that she had “kind eyes”. She thought it was one of her best assets.

She looked further down and noticed a tiny charm someone had dropped next to the water.

She bent down and picked it up, feeling the wind blow harder on her face, before giving a small smile when she read the word written onto it.

It was the first time she had smiled in a while.

She knew that it was stupid, but she had always believed in signs.

She placed the charm carefully in her right back pocket, before heading back to her apartment, repeating the phrase in her head like a prayer.

“Hope”.

Tag: college

Graduation

the smile

A Charm Bracelet