i grew up on main street surrounded by people that looked like me, melanin hands, gold jewelry, our mother tongues sweet and close enough to decipher. my youth is here.
i fell off the swings in the park next to school more times than i can count. i cried the first time my mom dropped me to my elementary school bus stop. i started going to the library and stacking up overdue fines. i started listening to music other than the ones my parents listened to. my best friends lived two blocks away from me in each direction. they’re still there. i am not.
i learned the best way to crawl under the subway turnstiles from my dad (“why should we pay?”). i learned how to pray to god and ask him for happiness. i learned how to spin stories out of thin air to get out trouble. (“where are you?” “at school.”) i learned how to get in and out of the city before curfew when i wasn’t supposed to. i learned how to be fiercely protective of my heritage. i learned to build friendships for a lifetime. i learned to kiss standing at a bus stop across a greasy pizzeria. i learned to love and be loved.
i started so many years with a bright smile running to the future and today, i am taking cautious steps. i have quietly stopped looking back to what was and what could have been. instead, i know now that everything that burdens my soul is for the better. i pray that these coming years teach me how to say goodbye, to say hello, to say ‘i love you’ again. i pray that god grants me his soft smiles, his hands lazily running through my hair. i pray that he waits. i wonder if he knows how much i still love him. i can’t tell him, but sometimes i whisper it to myself.
this city taught me grief and loss. my dad died on a sidewalk across the same building where my friends taught me to wing my eyeliner. the bus didn’t come any quicker that day while i was waiting with my heart in my throat. i watched the bricks of my life be pulled out one by one. my dad would put his hand on my head every morning and say, “ut gee meri beti?” and then one morning, i saw my dad be buried in the cold air of long island. (“aap ab kabi nahin uttay gein, papa?”) when i was four, my dad would take me to the garden down the block every day after work. i remember his sturdy shoulders holding me up as we walked through the cherry blossom trees. he would buy me a fanta and a packet of chips every single time. he would sit on the bench and let me run around, tearing every flower in sight. i probably shouldn’t have done that. i was nine when they reconstructed the garden. there was a fancy building and a little stepping stone walkway with water underneath when we entered. my dad still bought me fanta.
perhaps life begins when one ends. time doesn’t stay still in the city, it hits you before you know it, but my echoes are frozen in every train station, every brightly lit building, every block i skipped home on, every corner he held me close. i share memories with the people who mean the most to me. my life is woven with strings around my hands and theirs, tied forever. i miss the road i grew up on, but i know it will be waiting for me when i return. my youth is gone.