Spring has come again.

Sometimes you can do without changing the past.

I looked within the drawers, ruffling through my long forgotten things as they were shuffled about.

“My books” I pondered. “Where could they be?” My eyes wandered the room.

Since a child, I kept all things that I deemed important, hidden away in some cupboard or a drawer. Letting go was never easy. Here I was again, rummaging for the same old books, for the same old reasons. I wanted to see what I had written when I was younger, as if they were new to me. Was I that foreign those few years ago?

Then it hit me, under the almirah where my clothes lay neatly. I opened the creaky door and sat on the floor, pulling out the boxes and old things I had stored there. Things I didn’t wish to see would often get banished to here, and so I looked.

There they were. Two books stacked at the back, covered in dust old scribbles. A blue one, from a bank and a brown one of unknown origins. I pulled them out and set them on my table, already cluttered with yarn and knitting needles and such. One would think my hobby is collecting hobbies.

The brown book I had treated as a journal for a year. I wrote down what I felt, when I felt it. It was dear to me as it was my only real method of speaking of how I felt. The blue one on the other hand was filled with drawings and words. Poems I wrote for family and friends, unfinished stories and novel ideas. I frowned at the thought of what had happened to me. I was a bright child who would write till the end of the world if I could, but then the world happened.

Sitting in front of my computer, I opened the book to a page with a poem. It read about the body, my body, and how much I disliked it. “I will rewrite this and publish this” I decided. But when I read it again and again, thinking of how I could adjust what’s wrong or misspelt, I felt lost. Was I truly just going to recycle my words?

I thought about it. These words held true when I wrote them, they might now as well. But I had a new sense for something. I did not want to redo the past. I want to write something new.

“If I am to grow then I must learn again. Learn what I forgot.” I hid the books in their home. It was time to lay them to rest. I looked ahead of me and wrote something new, as I did when I wrote that poem at 16.

Author's Note

I would appreciate some criticism regarding my writing style. It's been a really long time since I wrote anything, so I feel that I'm not really seeing what mistakes I make. If there are any thoughts on how I could write any part differently, I would also appreciate that! Thank you.