I should be writing elegies

I should be writing elegies.

Over five months, I have squandered many parts of the people I have loved.

I’ve grieved noses, chapped lips, fresh aquatic scents, a flurry of greys, memes, video notes, and laughs that are so full-throated that they shake off sorrow for three to five business days. I’ve grieved my ability to write.

Best friends, valentines, pens, cursors, and family, have eluded me. And I, them.

Worry not, it’s mutual. I think. I don’t know. I’m not too sure any more.

Sometimes when I cork my head too quickly on the road, the airport, or the railway station, I think I spot these lost parts in other people’s bodies — in a deviated septum, a duck walk, a gurgling laugh.

Do I have it in me to go up to them and say hello?

“Hey! It’s been a while.”

“Yup.”

“How have you been? How is work?”

“Work is work. I’ve been doing better than before though. How are you?”

“I’ve been okay too. I haven’t been writing much.”

“Yes, I can see. Serves you right.”

“How mean.”

Does it serve me right though? Have been terrible enough to be cursed with a writing drought and an inability to articulate? Have I been horrid enough to not receive your grace, kisses and WhatsApp stickers? Only imaginary, oddly specific conversations serve as answers.

However, as always with me, the truth lies elsewhere.

Because honestly, I should be writing elegies. Should.

Instead, I find myself writing love notes.

I recently scrambled some words on a hot pan of unfinished notes, and a tempering of romance, to conjure this up:

“I enjoy listening to Mitski but I sometimes wonder if she is far too dramatic.

In one of her songs (it’s called I Want You. Beautiful. Check it out when you can) she just declares that at the end of the world, everyone’s starting over but she is done with it. It is about time. She’d rather find a quiet place. All she wants to do is scream ‘I love you’.

Over these few months, I think I’ve been trying and very obviously failing to pace myself with you.

As I write this, I laughing to myself. I was so sure that love for me would be elusive in 2025. I declared that I would take the year to be anything I wanted to be. I would especially shed this identity of someone who loves, because for years, it has pretty much been all I’d ever been.

And then you come along.

I sigh.

Let me go and find that quiet room to scream that I love you.”

I should be writing elegies.

I’ve grieved noses, chapped lips, and elaborate updates on national security in Bangladesh.

Instead, I find myself noticing how your ears turn pink, when your hands turn cold, why your shoulder slumps and when you say “Top of the morning”.

Here I am, standing a little stooped, writing love notes to you.