Consume
by Saranya Bhat
Oh, to be loved by a writer—it’s everyone’s dream but not in everyone’s fate. For being a writer is easy, but being a muse is next to impossible. That is what the world doesn’t understand, what it mocks and ridicules us for. Writers are not like others. We are not measured by logic or clarity. We are not tethered to the earth like mortals who live by routine. When we love, we do not love gently or passively. No, we love like a storm, consuming everything in our wake.
What the world fails to see is that when we fall in love, we don’t write to sing praises. We don’t write to confess or to seek validation. We don’t write to prove the depth of our feelings. No, we write because there is nothing else left to do. We write because love is no longer a choice; it is a state of being. Every day without you feels like drifting in an endless, empty sea. My muse consumes me so wholly, so utterly, that even breathing without the thought of you feels like a betrayal of existence.
We write because we are lost. Lost in the head, lost in the soul. Love, for us, is not a gift. It is a punishment. Writers don’t simply fall in love-they fall into obsession, a deep, all-encompassing need. It’s a tether that ties us so tightly to the object of our affection that we no longer know where we end and they begin. And more often than not, the muse doesn’t even know of our existence or worse, doesn’t care. But somehow, that indifference doesn’t break us. It fuels us.
This pain we carry becomes our lifeline. Maybe it’s twisted, maybe it’s wrong, but it’s the only thing that keeps us alive. We are addicted to it. This ache that consumes us becomes the proof that we’re still breathing, still human. We were not made to live sane, balanced lives. There is no joy in that.
What is the meaning of waking up every day without purpose, without something that burns inside you? No, my loved, I need you. I crave this madness. It’s a fire that warms me, even as it scorches everything I once held as rational. It’s not a dream to hurt this way, but it is my reality. My fractured soul needs you to make sense of itself.
I see you everywhere. The wind that grazes my face whispers your name. The colors of the seasons carry your presence. Every note of music, every fleeting shadow-they all speak of you. And if I can’t find you, I create you. My mind forges your presence in every corner of my life because I don’t know how to survive without it. I don’t know how to face the emptiness of the world without chanting your name in my head.
I don’t live as others do. I don’t need their logic, their gods, their rules. I don’t even need air-my breath begins and ends with you. I have been banished to your shadow, cursed to see the world through your eyes, even when I look at myself.
And yes, this frightens people. They see me as a fool, as someone consumed by madness. They tell me to move on, to love nature, to embrace the world as it is. But they will never understand. What do they know of the joy, the agony, the divinity of being consumed by someone else’s essence? What do they know of worshiping someone so wholly that they become your universe? I need no skies beyond because my heaven lies in your existence.
This is what people must learn—that love should consume us. To love, you must abandon all pretense of control, all notions of balance. One must love as a poet does-wildly, recklessly, completely. One must live as a writer does, devoured by their passion, unable to separate their soul from their muse. Because what joy can there possibly be in this life if you don’t spend it chasing the unreachable, yearning for the unattainable? What purpose is there if you don’t ache for something so deeply it leaves you shattered? For me, that something is you.
Perhaps this is madness. Perhaps it’s a kind of doom. But for me, it’s the only way to live. To burn with the thought of you, to drown in your absence, to let my soul be consumed by your shadow-this is my love, my obsession, my curse, and my blessing. And I wouldn’t trade it for anything in this world.
Delighted to share that the 2nd edition of The Chai Literary – ISHQ JUNOON is now released!
Congrats to The Chai Literary team for their efforts in bringing creative and engaging literary content to the readers.
A perfect companion for reflective moments over a comforting cup of tea!
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