The sky was alight but the sun was yet to rise above us. My sleep broke as my dreams took an unbidden turn. I sat on my bed, rubbing my eyes while longing for sleep to take me again. I could feel the perturbation swirling inside me and wanted nothing more than calm. I lay back down, my head sinking in the pillow. Sleep swept over me as soon as my eyes closed. I woke up a few hours later; the twilight had turned to late morning but the rage continued to course through me. It felt like a storm of a myriad of emotions. The anger was emerging strongest among them all. It was directed at nobody and yet, it was directed at everybody who had the misfortune to be at my side.

It had no reason and so it had no outlet. And as it always goes, you harm either yourself or those you love most. I hadn’t felt such tempestuous emotions in a long time. However, I had long since learnt to rein them in. All I had to do what give my fury a shape in my mind. To a twelve year old me, it looked like a giant cube of violently wriggling flesh covered in blood. My vision of it hasn’t changed in the past near-decade; perhaps because it’s the image that helped me control this storm inside me. It has failed at times but it has seen me through many furores.

I close my eyes and imagine the cube of bloodied flesh lassoed by a thick jute rope. It struggles and strains and pulls and wriggles to get free and my arms ache to hold on to it and pull it back. Please, please let me rein it in. I can’t lose more people to this rage. My eyes remain clenched while my breath heaves as though the struggle is physical. Soon, my breath will even out and my head will throb softly and my anger will be a small whimpering wolf that was forbidden from howling. And I’ll go about my day because this isn’t new to me. Sometimes I wish it was. Sometimes I wish I never knew these things. Sometimes I smack myself out of this self pity. But it’s better out on paper than writhing in my mind.