End of another so called year, and all I can remember is what an emotional mess I was on this day a year back. Not that I have improved too much, I keep having those outbursts, but hey, that is just being human. The year otherwise was the most unremarkable, lowest, painful and mired with sorrows and blankness in life. But look, its over, everything around us will be over to give way to something new, stay braced Preeti!
The brouhaha around a new year is so absurd, everything remains the same unless we choose to do something about our lives. A simple wish for people around you is more than enough isn’t it?
New year is each new day when I outshine myself, or when I am failing, find the grit to persist. In many ways, 31st december 2018 is new year for me, for I outshone who I was a year back, or even who I was a day back.
A new pursuit is filling the void in life with the art of poetry. It helps me find words to chapters of life gone by or rushing past me right away.
Life’s swift and short, poetry that which says so much in a few words.
This is my poem of the day, from Tagore’s Gitanjali:
You save me by denying me
the many things I want
You fulfil my life by looking after me
so sternly
You save me by denying me
the many things I want
For those great gifts I do not ask for-
Air and light and health and mind and breath
For those great gifts I do not ask for-
Air and light and health and mind and breath
You each day make me fit for you
By sparing me from overmuch desire
You save me by denying me
the many things I want
I sometimes forget, sometimes
follow your path
But cruelly you refrain from leading the way
I sometimes forget, sometimes
follow your path
But cruelly you refrain from leading the way
This is your kindness, I know, I know
To turn me back to make me yours
This is your kindness, I know, I know
To turn me back to make me yours
You round my life and make me fit for you
By sparing me from incomplete desires
You save me by denying me
the many things I want
You fulfil my life by looking after me so sternly
You save me by denying me
the many things I want
My desires are many and my cry is pitiful but thou ever didst save me by hard refusals– and this strong mercy of thine has been wrought into my life through and through.
Day by day thou art making me worthy of the simple great gifts that thou gavest to me unasked– this sky and the light, the body and the life and the mind– saving me from the perils of overmuch desire
There are times when I languidly linger and times when I waken up and hurry in search of my goal, but cruelly thou hidest thyself before me.Day by day thou art making me worthy of full acceptance by refusing me ever and anon, saving me from perils of weak uncertain desire
–Gitanjali 5(14), Rabindranath Tagore, Translated by William Radice
I thank God, the universe for not ever giving me anything easily, especially If I do not deserve. Life has always tested the strength of my desires, I have always won on that front. Most importantly, on having the desire to be the best version of myself.
Quintessential material pursuits like going abroad for a summer school, becoming a cabinet member at school, or zillion other things at different junctures. I got what I got when I deserved it. Thus the next thing I want in my life will also come to me, when I deserve it. Period.
Preeti Kumari 
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