Shivani maps the joys of growing up, in this verse, exclusively for Different Truths.

At six, you look up to the sky,
Fascinated by the wings of a bird,
Your sight takes leaps from the clouds
taking dragon shapes,
to orange sun rays spilled around.
You giggle at the sight of a puppy,
Affection that you never felt before.
Your eyes sparkle when you get to shout
From across the lawn, ‘Mumma Look!’
And your mother comes enthusiastically
And finds an earthworm slithering away slowly.
You want to go to the space,
Wearing fishbowls on your heads,
To learn about the stars and funny looking creatures.
You watch your cartoons closely,
And you see fantasy,
But you remain unaware,
So, you want to ride horses and build empires with spells,
You enact and learn,
Hoping for people to call you a superhero someday.
 
At ten, you read your first novel,
One with smaller fonts,
Your Geronimo Stilton sit on the shelf,
Soon replaced with Sir Roald Dahl’s elevators,
Chocolates, and giants’ lands,
Until you find Harry Potter and suddenly,
You grow love for wands and wizards,
And magic, that you believe, there is.
You watch movies, of the heroes
And their blazing swords,
Of defeated villains, wearing two horns,
Finding solace in happy endings, believing, and trusting,
A world through your eyes,
Swearing to save the world from monsters,
You tuck yourself in your father’s quilt.
 
At thirteen, you celebrate your birthday with pride,
For you think you’re no more a child.
Wishing on those candles, you smile,
Your friends smudge cake all over your face,
Your family claps, a song of delight,
A happy birthday, they wish,
With blessings for a hundred years.
You come across bigger textbooks,
And knowledge so precious,
Your curiosity takes shape when you 
Hear them say ‘space’.
Soon you learn, those are not fishbowls, 
And wizards do not exist,
And magic is a trick to fool eyes,
That exists only on stage.
 
At fifteen, you find yourself in a place,
Filled with eyes and expectations,
Glaring at you, with all their might,
 And some of your friends turn their backs against you,
And you wonder whether you are doing this right.
You learn about the world in its gloom and its fights,
You experience your first push, one so hard, 
That it shrivels you up,
Sitting in your room, you unfurl into sobs,
A look so stern in the mirror,
Reddened and diluted.
You shout at your parents and
Tell them they don’t understand,
‘Understand what?’, you ask yourself,
And wonder if you’re evil inside.
You lose some nights and 
Days vanish off your calendar,
Sometimes you question,
‘Where’s the spark?’
A spark that once swore to save the world.
 
At sixteen, you scream and wail,
And notice that you’re filling up with an anger unknown,
You slam the doors and break the pens,
Drowning into a hope that
The anger will stop the voices within.
All through the night, a paper sits on your desk,
Motionless in all its heaviness,
The red marks your failure,
And you reconsider the person
You wanted to become;
Soon, you storm into the bathroom,
And dig your fists in the walls,
A fist so small, could never
Save the world, you iterate,
Just a fist after all.
Your earliest crayons lay dusty in
Some old cartons of the house,
The memory of which recurs as your
Eyes follow through your childhood room.
You unravel into the confusion of your identity,
And find out that yours is the only voice you own.

Shivani Singh

Shivani Singh is a 15-year-old student, currently studying in Delhi in 11th grade. She is an alumnus of Mayo College Girls’ School. She composes poems, prose, articles, short stories and more. She is also passionate about instrumental music and singing. She published her first poetry book, ‘The Divine Reality’, at the age of 14 . She aspires to become an architect and a bestselling author.

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