A New File

Twenty-seven years are ending here,

and a new Word file opens—

a blank page waiting quietly

for me to scribble my life

in any font I choose.

Yet, before I begin,

I open the old files

saved deep on my desktop

and scroll through the years

to witness the life I have lived.

There is no Backspace now

to erase what has been written,

no Undo to return

to the moments I wish I had changed.

The Enter key lies silent,

reminding me that some chapters

were never meant to be rewritten.

Error windows keep appearing—

Error! Error!—

memories of choices,

mistakes, losses and tears.

Yet, beside every red mark

I find blue strokes too—

small corrections,

unexpected blessings,

and lessons written

in the margins of my life.

I scroll further.

There were Ctrl + X moments—

things I had to cut away;

Ctrl + V moments—

things I carried forward;

and endless Tabs

opening into rooms

I never knew I would enter.

Some files crashed.

Some were never saved.

Some remained unfinished.

Some became read-only,

no longer allowing me

to edit the past.

The Justify button is still there,

as if reminding me

that not every line of life

will look perfectly aligned.

And perhaps,

that is all right.

For today,

I close the old files.

I will not delete them.

Let them remain—

not as wounds,

but as wisdom;

not as regrets,

but as lessons;

not as chains,

but as chapters of the past.

And now,

my new file is refreshed.

The cursor blinks patiently

on a brighter, emptier page.

There is more hope in this document,

more peace between its lines,

and more courage behind its words.

This time,

I will write slowly.

I will choose my words carefully.

I will not let every passer-by

edit my story.

Let this new file be

locked by its author—

not against love,

but against unnecessary interference;

not against change,

but against losing myself again.

And if life gives me

another error message,

I will not fear it.

I will read it,

learn from it,

and continue typing.

For this birthday,

I do not ask for

a perfect document.

I ask for a meaningful one—

a life filled with hope,

peace, love and purpose,

where every new page

becomes a little wiser

than the one before.

The old files remain behind.

The cursor is waiting.

New document.

New chapter.

New me.

And this time,

I will make my life

a treasure worth saving—

a beautiful thesaurus of memories,

where every difficult word

has found its meaning,

and every new word

has the possibility

of becoming a blessing.

Song of Peace

When I turned on the BBC this morning,

all I heard was war—

not in one nation,

but in many;

not in one battlefield,

but across a wounded world.

I heard explosions

where children once played,

internet curfews

where voices longed to be heard,

countless casualties

whose names became statistics,

and smoke rising

where homes once held tomorrow.

When I turned on the local news this morning,

all I heard was death—

not only upon broken lands

torn apart by conflict,

but also on elevated roads

where ordinary journeys never reached home,

and beneath relentless rains

that carried away lives, dreams,

and every certainty.

Every headline bore another sorrow.

Every bulletin unveiled another grief.

Every breaking news

broke another heart.

When I turned inward,

all I heard was fear—

fear hidden behind silence,

fear flowing through tears,

fear gathering beneath the mountains of trash

we have left upon the earth.

For we have scarred

not only one another,

but also the world

that has patiently carried us.

Yet when I turned toward hope,

my heart found only one song:

Peace.

For war breeds worry.

The climate demands answers.

Life is too precious

to become another casualty.

Let us sing the song of hope,

not because the world is peaceful,

but because it longs to be.

Let us live—

not alone,

but together.

Let us become fearless hearts

that speak with compassion,

listen with humility,

and choose understanding

before judgment.

Let us replace explosions

with children's laughter;

replace hatred

with healing;

replace suspicion

with trust;

replace walls

with welcoming hands.

Let us plant trees

where smoke has risen,

build bridges

where hatred has divided,

and leave footprints of kindness

where fear once walked.

For the sky belongs to all.

The earth belongs to all.

The future belongs to all.

And peace must belong to all.

This world is vast in beauty,

yet brief in our keeping.

Let us not spend it

counting wars,

mourning disasters,

or fearing tomorrow.

Instead,

let us spend it

building hope,

protecting creation,

embracing one another,

and singing the oldest,

gentlest song

humanity has ever known—

the song of peace.

Amen

Rachel closed her eyes,

not because sleep had found her,

but because grief had.

Drop

after drop

after drop—

the medicine learnt the map of her veins,

while sorrow wandered where no medicine could follow.

For three months

she had carried

a whisper,

a promise,

a heartbeat too small for the world,

yet large enough to become her world.

She had spoken to silence

until silence answered as a child.

Now

her womb

was a chapel

after the candles had gone out.

The doctors

gathered their careful words,

folded their careful hopes,

and left

without touching

the emptiness

they had named.

Rachel counted

not weeks,

not months,

but absences.

A cradle never rocked.

Tiny hands never opened.

A lullaby forgot its own ending.

Only

the drip

kept singing

its patient hymn.

Upon the table

an old journal waited,

its pages breathing

the fragrance

of forgotten prayers.

Someone

had cried

between its lines.

Someone

had loved

beyond language.

She opened it.

The page lifted like a small wing.

One sentence

waited

as though

it had crossed

centuries

to find

her.

All I said was Amen.

The ink

began to bloom.

A young girl

rose from the page—

not crowned,

not painted,

not standing upon stained glass,

but barefoot,

afraid,

holding tomorrow

inside an ordinary womb.

She wrote

of angels

who frightened

more than comforted.

She wrote

of Joseph,

whose silence

was another way

of saying

love.

She wrote

of long roads,

heavy feet,

morning sickness,

warm bread,

shared dates,

Elizabeth's embrace,

and a child

who first kicked

beneath her heart

before he walked

away from her hands.

Rachel

read.

Then

she listened.

Then

she remembered

a life

she had never lived.

The voices

crossed

like rivers.

One

had carried

a child

for three months.

One

had carried

a son

for thirty-three years.

Grief

asked neither

their names

nor their seasons.

It knew

only

that both

were mothers.

The journal

kept unfolding.

The hospital

grew distant.

The drip

became

a metronome

for memory.

The pages

became

another heartbeat.

And somewhere

between

an empty womb

and an empty tomb,

between

loss

and love,

between

question

and surrender,

two women

found

the same word—

the smallest prayer,

the deepest wound,

the quietest victory—

Amen.

postmortem

She lay upon the dissection table,

her heart laid open,

her blood grown cold—

while her words still bled

through an endless winter of silence.

The memories gathered around him,

staring with knitted brows

and lips forever sealed,

as though they knew

what neither of them had spoken.

With trembling hands

he began to read

the unseen history of her soul,

each wound a sentence,

each scar a forgotten chapter,

each vein preserving

the map of a love

that had outlived its own heartbeat.

The scattered pieces of her mind

overflowed with love,

yet drifted past him

like rain withheld by reluctant clouds—

a monsoon that never found

the courage to fall.

The showers of her dreams

remained knotted

within the sacred rites

of duty, silence, and surrender.

Each hope she buried alive

returned as an echo,

circling the shores

of a mesmerizing lake of pain,

where her passion endured

not as freedom,

but as captivity.

Her poems waited patiently,

page after page,

for a single answer,

for the warmth of a listening heart.

But he searched too late,

holding every verse

like an unfinished confession.

The postmortem was complete.

The body revealed nothing

the heart had not already endured.

Only then did he realize

that love leaves no evidence

beneath the surgeon's blade.

It hides instead

between unfinished poems,

unfallen rain,

sealed lips,

and the key

he never knew he carried.

Red Carpet

On the red carpet,

I want to sign my book,

where the ink blooms into smiles

and the nib writes new horizons.

On the red carpet,

I want to thank my book,

where words become life

and every page finds its voice.

On the red carpet,

I want to thank my beloved,

whose waiting became devotion

and whose faith flowered with time.

On the red carpet,

I want to believe in myself,

as an author

who thought, wrote, and lived.

On the red carpet,

I want to hold an award,

not for glory alone,

but for every silent hour

that trusted a dream.

On the red carpet,

I want my book to stand tall,

carrying the journey

from an unnoticed page

to a remembered name.

On the red carpet,

I want to know

that every word I nurtured

has found its reader,

its home,

and its light.

Who ?

Who decides her happiness,

if not the moment she dares to rise?

Who shapes her fate,

if not the strength behind her smile?

Who defines her future,

if not the courage to carve her own path?

Who crowns her success,

if not the grace she pours into herself?

Who measures her beauty,

if not the brilliance of her mind?

Who counts her years,

if not the love her heart has known?

She is beauty—

unshadowed by shyness.

She is light—

untouched by failure.

She is love—

woven with her dreams.

She is a gem—

unyielding, unbroken, unteased.

She is a flame—

quiet, fierce, and self-lit,

burning bright

by the power within.

Proud to Be an Ahankari

They said — “Be quiet, be sweet, obey.”

But my heart was not made to decay.

They said — “Customs are truth, don’t ask why.”

But I saw logic buried where lies lie.

I break the chains they call divine,

To free the truth that once was mine.

Proud to be an Ahankari.

Society loves a silent girl,

With folded hands and lowered world.

But I raise my head, I dare to speak,

For silence is not what makes me meek.

I question rules that blind and bind,

I honour God with a thinking mind.

Proud to be an Ahankari.

They build their thrones on women’s tears,

Then call it duty through the years.

They bless the ones who never fight,

And shame the souls that seek their right.

But I will walk where truth may burn,

For respect is something one must earn.

Proud to be an Ahankari.

I don’t defy the sacred skies,

I only strip the world of lies.

If faith is pure, it will not fear

The voice of reason loud and clear.

It’s not my God who cages me,

It’s society’s gaze that chains me free.

Proud to be an Ahankari.

I wear my dreams, not what they say,

I carve my dawn from their decay.

No rule can shame the life I lead,

No crowd can curse my honest creed.

For every woman who stands apart,

Rebellion is her prayer of heart.

Proud to be an Ahankari.

Let them whisper, let them blame,

I carry no guilt, I carry no shame.

Their comfort ends where my courage starts,

Their norms can’t weigh my living heart.

I am not proud of sin or scar,

But proud of knowing who I are.

Proud to be an Ahankari.