There were scraps of stale dank nights caught up inside the reels of yellowed papers, put off within drawers of wood and dirt. Orphaned words, rubbed off their black inkiness, on high-coloured dampness left alone from decades of negligence. I no more fancy shabby inelastic stockings that feebly sulk down much below from where it's supposed to be, or curled-up unclean ribbons cut into halves to lend to friends before assemblies during the girlhood days. I no more think about borrowed coins getting lost from clumsy fists, or dirty linen swaying sleazily on rooftop strings. Look, I’m a woman now. I can gulp down the strongest of beers without a hint of grimace or blink. Look, how I’ve grown out of miniature skirts and fickle friendships. Waxed legs, skinny arms, unkind words, all stuck together in place. The chipped nails did give way to bloodied finger-tips, dipped in the butterscotch creaminess of ruthless denials. The butterfly breaths are passé…welcome to the clinging stickiness of revenge and pretense. I was sick of being afraid then, and thus, the pirates of melancholia came stealing the fear out of me. Those were the pre-eclipse pre-love pre-defeat pre-disease days. That was before I knew how absolutely unforgiving the woman in my head can get; devastatingly cruel, brutally forged. And how absolutely bored the forsaken girl in my skin can behave; headless, she hid for decades, inside the drawers that I kept. Yes, the high-coloured dampness is nothing, just the wood and dirt i call as me.

One of these days, I will re-make the turmeric-yogurt face-mask….the dark circles and degrees can wait a bit more for their call.