Inspiring Poetry by Rupi Kaur That Captures Life in Raw and Honest Words

I first found Rupi Kaur’s poetry while scrolling late at night on Tumblr, and it felt like I had discovered something personal and profound.

I loved her raw and minimalist poems and illustrations.

Born in India and raised in Toronto, Rupi succeeded remarkably with her self-published collection, Milk and Honey. It became a literary phenomenon, selling millions of copies.

She followed it with The Sun and Her Flowers and Home Body, which hit bestseller lists instantly.

Now, she’s officially a New York Times bestselling author!

Speaking openly about love, pain, healing, identity, and the strength of being a woman, she captivated the world by sharing her pure, unfiltered poetry on Instagram and Tumblr.

Rupi hasn’t stopped at poetry. She brought her words to life with Rupi Kaur Live, a poetry series unique on Amazon Prime Video.

In 2022, Rupi also produced This Place, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. Then, in 2024, she co-produced To Kill a Tiger, a film nominated for an Academy Award.

Her journey as a poet and storyteller is as inspiring as her words, and it’s no surprise that her poetry continues to touch hearts across the world.

If you’re looking for words that feel like a warm hug or a gentle nudge forward, here are some (actually a lot) of my favorite poems by Rupi Kaur. Let them meet you where you are and add a little light to your day.

Famous Snippets of Poetry by Rupi Kaur

what is stronger
than the human heart
which shatters over and over
and still lives

the world
gives you
so much pain
and here you are
making gold out of it

~ there is nothing purer than that

your name is
the strongest
positive and negative
connotation in any language
it either lights me up or
leaves me aching for days.

Our backs
tell stories
no books have
the spine to
carry

~ women of colour

they leave
and act like it never happened
they come back
and act like they never left

~ ghosts

you left
and i wanted you still
yet i deserved someone
who was willing to stay

i see you and
begin grieving all over again

of course
i want to be
successful but
i don't crave
success for me
i need to be
successful
to gain enough
milk and honey
to help those
around me
succeed

together we are endless conversation

i will never have
this version of me again
let me slow down
and be with her

~ always evolving

i am a museum full of art
but you had your eyes shut

i have never known anything more
quietly loud than anxiety

i'm careful about
who i spend my energy on

~ i know my worth

my heart aches for sisters more than anything
it aches for women helping women
like flowers ache for spring

learning to not envy
someone else's blessings
is what grace looks like.

my mother sacrificed her dreams
so i could dream

every time you
tell your daughter
you yell at her
out of love
you teach her to confuse
anger with kindness
which seems like a good idea
till she grows up to
trust men who hurt her
cause they look so much
like you

~ to fathers with daughters

i want someone who is
inspired by my brilliance
not threatened by it

tell them i was the
warmest place you know
and that you turned me cold

some people
are so bitter

to them
you must be kindest

do you need me or
do you need someone
there is a difference

what i am to you he asks
i put my hands in his lap
and whisper you
are every hope
i've ever had
in human form

there are far too many mouths here
but not enough of them are worth
what you're offering
give yourself to a few
and to those few
give heavily

~ invest in the right people

 i am loving myself out of the dark

i hear a thousand kind words about me
and t makes no difference
yet i hear one insult
and all confidence shatters

~ focusing on the negative

you were so distant
i forgot you were there at all

there is no place
i end and you begin
when your body
is in my body
we are one person

sometimes the right place is a person

somedays
i am the flower.

somedays,
i am the rain.

a daughter should
not have to
beg her father
for a relationship

i spent the entire night
casting spells to bring you back

i am trusting the uncertainty
and believing i will
end up somewhre
right and good

trust your body
it reacts to right and wrong
better than your mind does

~ it is speaking to you

i do not need the kind of love
that is draining
i want someone
who energizes me

to heal
you have to
get to the root
of the wound
and kiss it all the way up

the right one does not
stand in your way
they make space for you
to step forward

~ growth mechanism

when you are
full
and i am
full
we are two suns

~ stay golden

we all move forward when
we recognize how resilient
and striking the women
around us are

you do not just wake up and become the butterfly

~ growth is a process

i am timid
cause falling into you
means falling out of him
and i had not prepared for that

~ forward

fall
in love
with your solitude

i want your hands
to hold
not my hands
your lips
to kiss not my lips
but other places

if you are not enough for yourself
you will never be enough
for someone else

give to those
who have nothing
to give to you

~ seva (selfless service)

and here you are living
despite it all

i dive into the well of my body
and end up in another world
everything i need
already exists in me
there's no need
to look anywhere else

~ home body

i tremble at the thought of
falling in love with a
tiny part of someone
and mistaking it
for the whole

you must
want to spend
the rest of your life
with yourself
first

they have no idea what it is like
to lose home at the risk of
never finding home again
have your entire life
split between two lands and
become the bridge between two countries

~ first generation immigrant

you are one person
but when you move
an entire community
walks through you

~ you go nowhere alone

i fell from the mouth of my mother's legs
into the palms of this world
with god herself raging in me

~ birth

your beauty is undeniable
but everything sacred and ancient in you
is even more stunning

i am not a victim of life
what i went through
pulled a warrior out of me
and it is my greatest honor to be her

there are days
when the light flickers
and then i remember
i am the light
i go in and
switch it back on

i am not going to pretend
to be less intelligent than i am
so a man can feel
more comfortable around me
the one i deserve
will see my greatness and
want to lift it higher

silly girl
little angel
little devil
so oblivious to
being a miracle worker
you are the mother
the magician
the master of your life

i am water

soft enough
to offer life
tough enough
to drown it away

you pinned
my legs to
the ground
with your feet
and demanded
i stand up

yes
it is possible
to hate and love
someone
at the same time
i do it to myself
everyday

break down
every door they built
to keep you out
and bring all your people with you

~ storm

representation
is vital
otherwise the butterfly
surrounded by a group of moths
unable to see itself
will keep trying to become the moth

~ representation

sometimes
the apology
never comes
when it is wanted
and when it comes
it is neither wanted
nor needed

~ you are too late

you might not have been my first love
but you were the love that made
all the other loves
irrelevant

i thank the universe
for taking
everything it has taken
and giving me
everything it is giving

~ balance

you have only scratched the surface
of what you're capable of
there are decades
of victories ahead of you

they should feel like home
a place that grounds your life
where you go to take the day off

you're everywhere
except right here
and it hurts

i get so lost
in where i want to go
i forget that the place i'm in
is already quite magical

i have
what i have
and i am happy
i've lost
what i've lost
and i am
still
happy

~ outlook

it is a part of the
human experience to feel pain
do not be afraid
open yourself to it

~ evolving

i'd be lying if i said
you make me speechless
the truth is you make my
tongue so weak it forgets
what language to speak in

love is not cruel
we are cruel
love is not a game
we have made a game
out of love

there is a difference between
someone telling you
they love you and
them actually
loving you

you were so afraid
of my voice
i decided to be
afraid of it too

how many times did you
search for me in your fantasies
and end up crying
instead of coming

if you were born with
the weakness to fall
you were born with
the strength to rise

when death
takes my hand
i will hold you with the other
and promise to find you
in every lifetime

~ commitment

i could be anything
in the world
but i wanted to be his

the rape will
tear you
in half

but it
will not
end you

i am
made of water
of course i am emotional

on the first day of love
you wrapped me in the word special

i notice everything I do not have
and decide it is beautiful

to hate
is an easy lazy thing
but to love
takes strength
everyone has
but not all are
willing to practice

the way they
leave
tell you
everything

~ answers

she was music
but he had his ears cut off

It must hurt to know
I am your most
beautiful
regret

he isn't coming back
whispered my head
he has to
sobbed my heart

don't mistake
salt for sugar
if he wants to
be with you
he will
it's that simple

it was as though
someone had slid ice cubes
down the back of my shirt

~ the orgasm

like the rainbow
after the rain
joy will revel itself
after sorrow

i have survived far too much to go quietly
let a meteor take me
call the thunder for backup
my death will be grand
the land will crack
the sun will eat itself

~ the day i leave

he moved her hand
between her legs
and whispered
make those pretty little fingers
dance for me

take the compliment
do not shy away from
another thing that belongs to you

you cannot
walk in and out of me
like a revovling door
i have too many miracles
happening inside me
to be your convenient option

~ not your hobby

when snow falls
i long for grass
when grass grows
i walk all over it
when leaves change color
i beg for flowers
when flowers bloom
i pick them

~ unappreciative.

you are the ikea furniture
he never got around to making
the backup bookshelf
that is too new to throw away
but not nearly as tempting to open

~ he keeps you around just in case

we need more love
not from men
but from ourselves
and each other

~ medicine

even after the hurt
the loss
the pain
the breaking
your body is still
the only one
 i want to be
undressed under

even when you undress her
you are searching for me
i am sorry i
taste so good that
when the two of you
make love it is
still my name
that rolls off your
tongue accidentally

i stand
on the sacrifices
of a million women before me
thinking
what can i do
to make this mountain taller
so the women after me
can see farther

~ legacy

we have been dying
since we got here
and forgot to enjoy the view

~ live fully

what is the greatest lesson a woman should learn

that since day one
she's already had everything she needs within herself
it's the world that convinced her she did not

other women's bodies
are not our battlegrounds

stay
i whispered
as you
shut the door behind you

is it love 
if they don't even know
how to love themselves

we began
with honesty
let us end
in it too

~ us

look down at your body
whisper
there is no home like you

~ thank you

despite knowing
they won't be here for long
they still choose to live
their brightest lives

~ sunflowers

depression is silent
you never hear it coming
and suddenly it's
the loudest voice in your head

i am ready for you
i have always
been
ready for you

~ the first time

there are miracles in me
waiting their turn to happen
i am never giving up on myself

the way you speak of yourself
the way you degrade yourself
into smallness
is abuse

~ self harm

like flowers ache for spring
my heart craves my mother
more than anything

you've touched me
without even
touching me

the night after you left
i woke up so broken
the only place to put the pieces
were the bags under my eyes

it's easy to love
the nice things about ourselves
but true self-love is
embracing difficult parts
that live in all of us

~ acceptance

the day you have everything
i hope you remember
when you had nothing

the very thought of you
has my legs spread apart
like an easel with a canvas
begging for art

our work should equip
the next generation of women
to outdo us in every field
this is the legacy we'll leave behind

~ progress

if you tried
and didn’t end up
where you wanted to go
that’s still progress

how do you turn
a forest fire like me
so soft i turn into
running water

let it go
let it leave
let it happen
nothing
in this world
was promised or
belonged to you
anyway

~ all you own is yourself

you
have been
taught your legs
are a pitstop for men
that need a place to rest
a vacancy, body empty enough
for guests cause no one
ever comes and is
willing to
stay

removing all the hair
off your body is okay
if that’s what you want to do
just as much as keeping all the hair
on your body is okay
if that's what you want to do

~ you belong only to yourself

it isn't what we left behid
that breaks me
it's what we could've built
had we stayed

you were a dragon long before
he came around and said
you could fly

you will remain a dragon
long after he's left

there is nothing
more painful than
grieving someone
who's still living

i stopped resisting
the unpleasant feelings
and accepted that happiness 
has nothing to do with
feeling good all the time

~ balance

if someone doesn't have a heart
you can't go around
offering them yours

when my mother says I deserve better
i snap to your defence out of habit
he still loves me i shout
she looks at me with defeated eyes
the way a parent looks at a child
when they know this is the type of pain
even they can't fix and says
it means nothing to me if he loves you
if he can't do a single wretched thing about it

you ask
if we can still be friends
i explain how a honeybee
doesn not dream of kissing
the mouth of a flower
and then settle for its leaves

~ i don't need more friends

many try
but cannot tell the difference
between a marigold and my skin
both of them are an orange sun
blinding the ones who have not learned to love the light

now
is not the time
to be quiet
or make room for you
when we have had no room at all
now
is our time to be mouthy
get as loud as we need
to be heard

i will never understand
why you held me
if you were afraid of warmth

~ you should have known i was a fire

there are mountains growing
beneath our feet
that cannot be contained
all we've endured
has prepared us for this
bring your hammer and fists
we have a glass ceiling to shatter

~ let's leave this place roofless

you are snakeskin
and i keep shedding you somehow
my mind is forgetting
every exquisite detail of your face
the way your fingers used to
light fire under my skin
is slipping me
the letting go has
become the
forgetting
which is the
most pleasant
or saddest thing
to have happened

you leave
but you do't stay gone
why do you do that
why do you
abondon the thing you want to keep
why do you linger
in a place you do not want to stay
why do you think it's okat to do both
go and return all at once

do not look for healing
at the feet of those
who broke you

i woke up thinking the work was done
i would not have to practise today
how naive to think healing was that easy
when there is no end point
no finish line to cross
healing is everyday work

i didn't leave because
i stopped loving you
i left because the longer
i stayed the less
i loved myself

it felt like you threw me
so far from myself
i've been trying to
find my way back
ever since

this place makes me
the kind of exhausted that has
nothing to do with sleep
and everything to do with
the people around me

~ introvert

he placed his hands
on my mind
before reaching
for my waist
my hips
or my lips
he didn't call me
beautiful first
he called me
exquisite

i will no longer
compare my path to others

~ i refuse to do a disservice to my life

it isn't blood that makes you my sister
it's how you understand my heart
as though you carry it
in your body

I am the product of all the ancestors getting together
and deciding these stories need to be told

but
if you had not stuck a
knife inside me and walked away
how would I have learnt people
do not die from wounds
caused by other people
people die when they forget
they are more than the pain

day by day i realise
everything i miss about you
was never there in the first place

~ the person i fell in love with was a mirage

how can i be so
cruel to myself
when i'm doing the best i can

~ be gentle

i won't let go cause
being alone hurts more
than chasing someone who's left
but if you've left
aren't I already alone
and surviving it

if i knew what
safety looked like
i would have spent
less time falling into
arms that were not

there is
nothing left
to worry about
the sun and her flowers are here

you are lonely
but you are not alone

~ there is a difference

you have sadness
living in places
sadness shouldn’t live

the irony of loneliness
is we all feel it
at the same time

~ together

when the phrase I'm sad
becomes synonymous to i won't be okay
you realize how much it hurt
beginning to end
them coming
them staying
them leaving
was like preparing your body for death
the funeral that came too early
and never left

it wasn't you i was kissing
—don't be mistaken

it was him on my mind
your lips were just convenient

loving you was breathing
but the breath disappearing
before it filled my lungs

~ when it goes too soon

i think my body knew you would not stay

do not bother holding on to
that thing that does not want you

~ you cannot make it stay

the universe took its time on you
crafted you precisely
so you could offer the world
something distinct from everyone else
so when you doubt
how you were created
you doubt an energy greater than us both

~ irreplaceable

i could not contain myself any longer
i ran to the ocean
in the middle of the night
and confessed my love for you to the water
as i finished telling her
the salt in her body became sugar

~ ode to sobha singh's sohni mahiwal

you look at me and cry
everything hurts

i hold you and whisper
but everything can heal

the way we rise
from every sorrow in life
is the most gorgeous thing i've seen

people go
but how
they left
always stays

you were temptingly beautiful
but stung when i got close

how you love yourself is
how you teach others
to love you

make it a point
to love yourself
as fiercely as you do other people

~ commitment

it is a trillion-dollar industry that would collapse
if we believed were were beautiful enough already

their concept of beauty
is manufactured
i am not

~ human

It is a blessing
to be the color of earth
do you know how often
flowers confuse me for home

every revolution
starts and ends
with his lips

i envy the winds
who still witness you

like a flower
eventually grows out of
losing itself to the winter
i've grown out of you

why is it
that when the story ends
we begin to feel it all of it

the women in my life
raised me to new heights
back when i didn’t have the confidence
to look myself in the eye
they saw the best version of me
and helped me see her too

~ female friendships

we are all born
so beautiful

the greatest tragedy is
being convinced we are not

perhaps the saddest of all
are those who live waiting
for someone they're not
even sure exists

~ 7 billion people

i am sorry this world
could not keep you safe
may your journey home
be a soft and peaceful one

it is important to recognize
the difference between
want and need
cause i may love you
but having you is
not necessarily good for me

the next time he points out
the hair on your legs is growing back
remind that boy
your body is not his home
he is a guest
warn him to never
outstep this welcome
again

i always
get myself
into this mess
i always let him
tell me i am beautiful
and half believe it
i always jump thinking
he will catch me
at the fall
i am hopelessly
a lover and
a dreamer and
that will be
the death of me

the next time you
have your coffee black
you'll taste the bitter state he left you in
it will make you weep
but you'll never
stop drinking
you'd rather have the
darkest parts of him
than have nothing

your body
is a museum
of natural disasters
can you grasp how
stunning that is

the last clear thought I had:
He is as handsome as nature could make a man

i am not my worst days
i am not what happened to me

~ reminder

to be
two legs
on one body

~ a relationship

neither of us is happy
neither of us wants to leave
so we keep breaking one another
and calling it love

you
are your own
soul mate

accept that you deserve more
than painful love
life is moving
the healthiest thing
for your heart is
to move with it

you wrap your fingers
around my hair
and pull
this
is how you make music
out of me

borders
are man-made
they only divide us physically
don't let them make us
turn on each other

~ we are not enemies

the kindest words my father said to me
women like you drown oceans

after the surgery
she tells me
how bizzare it is
that they just took out
the first home of her children

~ hysterectomy february 2016

if you are broken
and they have left you
do not question
whether you were
enough
the problem was
you were so enough
they were not able to carry it

people say things
meant to rip you in half
butyou hold the power to not
turn their words into a knife
and cut yourself

it takes grace
to remain kind
in cruel situations

loneliness is a sign
you are in desperate
need of yourself

like the sky
my beloved is everywhere
but next to me

i know i
should crumble
for better reasons
but have you seen
that boy
he brings
the sun to
its knees
every night

you were not wrong for leaving
you were wrong for coming back
and thinking
you could have me
when it was convenient
and leave when it was not

the idea that we are
so capable of love
but still choose
to be toxic

If you got any more beautiful
the sun would leave its place
and come for you

~ the chase

leaving her country
was not easy for my mother
i still catch her searching for it
in foreign films
and the international food aisle

what's it to me
if you love me or
miss me or need me
when you are doing
nothing to be with me
if you can't allow me to be
the love of your life i will be
the loss of your life instead

a lot of times
we are angry at other people
for not doing what
we should have done for ourselves

~ responsibilty

you are in the habit
of co-depending
on people to
make up for what
you think you lack

who tricked you
into believing
another person
was meant to complete you
when the most they can do is complement

if i am the longest relationship
of my life
isn't it time to
nurture intimacy
and love
with the person
i lie in bed with each night

~ acceptance

you must enter a relationship
with yourself
before anyone else

it is your blood
in my veins
tell me how i'm
supposed to forget

your voice does to me
what autumn does to trees
you call to say hello
and my clothes fall naturally

on days
like this
i need you to
run your fingers
through my hair
and speak softly

~ you

you didn't lose it
happiness has always been here

~ you just lost perspective

if the hurt comes
so will the happiness

~ be patient

this morning
i told the flowers
what i'd do for you
and they blossomed

that's the
thing about love
it marinates your lips
till the only word your
mouth remembers
is his name

you have to stop
searching for why at some point
you have to leave it alone

i came all this way
to give you all these things
but you aren't even looking

why are you so unkind to me
my body cries

cause you don't look like them
i tell her

wish pure love and soft peace
upon the ones
who've been unkind to you
and keep moving forward

~ this will free you both

the thing
worth holding on to
would not have let go

you cannot leave
and have me too
i cannot exist in
two places at once

~ when you ask if we can still be friends

she was a rose
in the hands of those
who had no intention
of keeping her

how can our love die
if it's written
in these pages

you lose everything
when you don't love yourself

~ and gain everything when you do

perhaps
i don't deserve
nice things
cause I am paying
for sins I don't
remember

nothing is safer
than the sound of you
reading out loud to me

~ the perfect date

you are the faint line
between faith and
blindly waiting

~ letter to my future lover

Some More Beautiful Rupi Kaur Poems

how is it easy for you
to be kind to people he asked

milk and honey dripped
from my lips as i answered

cause people have not
been kind to me

i'm too in love with my life
to be spilling all over the floor
for the next man
who gives me butterflies
when i could look in the mirror
and take my own breath away

my favorite thing about you is your smell
you smell like
earth
herbs
gardens
a little more
human than the rest of us

you are waiting for someone
who is not coming back
meaning
you are living your life
hoping that someone will realize
they can't live theirs without you
but realizations don't work like that

~ absence of logic and presence of pain

emptying out of my mother's belly
was my first act of disappearance
learning to shrink for a family
who likes their daughters invisible
was the second
the art of being empty
is simple
believe them when they say
you are nothing
repeat it to yourself
like a wish
i am nothing
i am nothing
i am nothing
so often
the only reason you know
you're still alive is from the
heaving of your chest

on the last day of love
my heart crackled inside my body

on days i could not move
it was women
who came to water my feet
until i was strong enough
to stand
it was women
who nourished me
back to life

~ sisters

no
it won't
be love at
first sight when
we meet it'll be love
at first remembrance cause
i've seen you in my mother's eyes
when she tells me to marry the type
of man i'd want to raise my son to be like

he only whispers i love you
as he slips his hands
down your waistband
of your pants

this is where you must
understand the difference
between want and need
you may want that boy
but you certainly
don't need him

the hummingbirds tell me
you've changed your hair
i tell them i don't care
while listening to them
describe every detail

~ hunger

you talk too much
he whispers into my ear
i can think of better ways to use that mouth

i want to apologize to all the women
i have called pretty.
before i've called them intelligent or brave.
i am sorry i made it sound as though
something as simple as what you're born with
is the most you have to be proud of
when your spirit has crushed mountains
from now on i will say things like, you are resilient
or, you are extraordinary.
not because i don't think you're pretty.
but because you are so much more than that

love will come
and when love comes
love will hold you
love will call your name
and you will melt
sometimes though
love will hurt you but
love will never mean to
love will play no games
cause love knows life
has been hard enough already

when they buried me alive
i dug my way
out of the ground
with palm and fist
i howled so loud
the earth rose in fear and
the dirt began to levitate
my whole life has been an uprising
one burial after another

~ i will find my way out of you just fine

when you make love you try to
bury yourself beneath sheets
but the stretch marks you try to hide
are proof you've survived
your breasts are mountains not everyone
knows how to climb
the goddess between
your legs is the world
on their tongue
she makes mouths water
your femininity is so right
like craters and waterfalls
there are few things on
this side of the universe
crafted with such excellence
you just so happen
to be one of them

i made change after change
on the road to perfection
but when i finally felt beautiful enough
their definition of beauty
suddenky changed

what if there is no finish line
and in an attempt to keep up
i lose the gifts i was born with
for a beauty so insecure
it can't commit to itself

~ the lies they sell

there are whole blackouts
in some of the years i have lived
my therapist says our minds erase trauma
to help us move on
but every experience i’ve had
is memorized in my flesh
even if my mind forgets
my body remembers
my body is the map of my life
my body wears what it’s been through
my body signals the alarms when
it thinks danger is coming
and suddenly
the hungry little demons from my past
come raging out of my flesh
screaming
don’t you forget us
don’t you ever try to
leave us behind again

most importantly love
like it's the only thing you know how
at the end of the day all this
means nothing
this page
where you're sitting
your degree
your job
the money
nothing even matters
except love and human connection
who you loved
and how deeply you loved them
how you touched the people around you
and how much you gave them

i know you look for me when you find yourself
in place we'd once been. you imagine me
walking through the crowd full of people.
wearing the smle you fell in love with. i know
your stomach flips when you imagine our
conversation in your head. and sinks when you
worry 'll look right past you and walk away.
most of all you wonder if it will ever be okay.

did you think i was the city
big enough for a weekend getaway
i am the town surrounding it
the one you've never heard of
but always pass through
ther are no neon lights here
no skyscrapers or statues
but there is thunder
for i make bridges tremble
i am not street meat i am homemade jam
thick enough to cut the sweetest
thing your lips will touch
i am not police sirens
i am the crackle of a fireplace
i'd burn you and you still
couldn't take your eyes off me
cause i'd look so beautiful doing it
you'd blush
i am not a hotel room i am home
i am not the whiskey you want
i am the water you need
don't come here with expectations
and try to make a vacation out of me

i do not want to have you
to fill the empty parts of me
i want to be full on my own
i want to be so complete
i could light a whole city
and then
i want to have you
cause the two of us combined
could set it on fire

rise
said the moon
and the new day came
the show must go on said the sun
life doesn not stop for anybody
it drags you by the legs
whether you want to move forward or not
that is the gift
life will force you to forget how you long for them
your skin will shed till there is not
a single part of you left they've touched
your eyes finally just your eyes
not the eyes which held them
you will make it to the end
of what is only the beginning
go on
open the door to the rest of it

it was when i stopped searching for home within others
and lifted the foundations of home within myself
i found there were no roots more intimate
than those between a mind and body
that have decided to be whole

remember the body
of your community
breathe in the people
who sewed you whole
it is you who became yourself
but those before you
are a part of your fabric

~ honor the roots

you tell me
i am not like most girls
and learn to kiss me with your eyes closed
something about the phrase - something about
how i have to be unlike the women
i call sisters in order to be wanted
makes me want to spit your tongue out
like i am supposed to be proud you picked me
as if i should be relieved you think
i am better than them

i struggle so deeply
to understand
how someone can
pour their entire soul
blood and energy
into someone
without wanting
anything in
return

~ i will have to wait till i'm a mother

the necessity
to protect you
overcame me
my beloved
i love you too much
to remain quiet
while you weep
i rise to kiss the poison out of you
wipe your bruises with my palm
i resist the temptation of my
tired feet and keep marching
with tomorrow in one hand
and a fist in the other
i will carry you to freedom

~ valentine's day ode to the world

telling someone they need to let go to move on is
speaking to them in a language they do not
understand. letting go can be the most difficult
thing to do. some of us never let go. we remain
stuck forever. the language of letting go means
placing yourself at the centre of a foreign place.
where you understand nothing. a place so
uncomfortable it stirs an anxiety in your belly.
where ecah second is stretched into a lifetime. it is
the acceptance of their death. whether there has
been a death or not. letting go is not knowing
when you will come out of them. it is knowing
eventually you shall.

my voice
is the offspring
of two countries colliding
what is there to be ashamed of
if english
and my mother tongue
made love
my voice
is her father's words
and mother's accent
what does it matter if
my mouth carries two worlds

~ accent

there is nothing wrong with you
this is growth
this is transformation
protecting yourself
getting lost in the noise
figuring it out
feeling used
uncared for
losing hope
burning out
this is fear
this is processing
this is surviving
this is being alive

~ journey

you have so much
yet you are always hungry for more
the trick to being well fed is
you have to stop looking up
at everything you don't have
and look around at everything you do

~ where the satisfaction lives

you treat them as if
they have a heart like yours
but not everyone can be
as soft and as tender as you
you don't see
the person they are
you see the person
they have the potential to be
you give and give till
they have taken everything
out of you and leave
you empty

when the world comes crashing at your feet
it's okay to let others
help pick up the pieces
if we're present to take part in your happiness
when your circumstances are great
we are more than capable
of sharing your pain

~ community

what if
there isn't enough time
to give her what she deserves
do you think
if i begged the sky hard enough
my mother's soul would
return to me as my daughter
so i can give her
the comfort she gave me
my whole life

god must have kneaded you and i
from the same dough
rolled us out as one on the baking sheet
must have suddenly realized
how unfair it was
to put that much magic in one person
and sadly split that dough in two
how else is it that
when i look in the mirror
i am looking at you
when you breathe
my own lungs fill with air
that we just met but we
have known each other our whole lives
if we were not made as one to begin with

~ our souls are mirrors

i know it's hard
believe me
i know it feels like
tomorrow will never come
and today will be the most
difficult dayto get through
the hurt will pass
as it always does
if you give it time and let it
so let it go
slowly
like a broken promise
let it go

what terrifies me most is how we
foam at the mouth with envy
when others succeed
but sigh in relief
when they are falling

our struggle to
celebrate each other is
what's proven most difficult
in being human

the orange trees refused to blossom
unless we bloomed first
when we met
they wept tangerines
can't you tell
the earth has waited its whole life for this

~ celebration

father. you always call to say nothing in particular. you ask what i'm doing or where i am and when the silence stretches like a lifetime between us i scramble to find questions to keep the conversation going. what i long to say most is. i understand this world broke you. it has been so hard on your feet. i don't blame you for not knowing how to remain soft with me. sometimes i stay up thinking of all the places you are hurting which you'll never care to mention. i come from the same aching blood. from the same bone so desperate for attention i collapse in on myself. i am your daughter. i know the small talk is the only way you know how to tell me you love me. cause it is the only way I know how to tell you.

you are a mirror
if you continue to starve yourself of love
you'll only meet people who'll starve you too
if you soak yourself in love
the universe will hand you those
who'll love you too

~ a simple math

this is the recipe of life
said my mother
as she held me in her arms as i wept
think of those flowers you plant
in the garden each year
they will teach you
that people too
must wilt
fall
root
rise
in order to bloom

can you hear the women who came before me
five hundred thousand voices
ringing through my neck
as if this were all a stage built for them
i can't tell which parts of me are me
and which parts are them
can you see them taking over my spirit
shaking out of my limbs
to do everything
they couldn't do
when they were alive

i will always be scared i am
not beautiful enough for you
or if i am beautiful at all
i will change what i’m
wearing five times before i
see you wondering which pair
of jeans will make my body
more tempting to undress
tell me
is there anything i can do
to make you think, her
she is so striking she makes
my body forget it has knees
write it in a letter and address it
to all the insecure parts of me
my uneven fingers my thin legs
your voice alone drives me to tears
yours telling me i am beautiful
yours telling me i am enough

when my mother was pregnant
with her second child i was four
i pointed at her swollen belly confused at how
my mother had gotten so big in such little time
my father scooped me in his tree trunk arms and
said the closest thing to god on this earth
is a woman's body it's where life comes from
and to have a grown man tell me something
so powerful at such a young age
changed me to see the entire universe
rested at my mother's feet

many tried
but failed to catch me
i am the ghost of ghosts
everywhere and nowhere
i am magic tricks
within magic within magic
none have figured out
i am a world wrapped in words
folded in suns and moons
you can try but
you won't get those hands on me

perhaps we are all immigrants
trading one home for another
first we leave the womb for air
then the suburbs for the filthy city
in search for a better life
some of us just happen to leave entire countries

beautiful brown girl
your thick hair is a mint coat not all can afford
beautiful brown girl
your skin can't help but carry as much as possible
i know you hate the hyperpigmentation
but you are a magnet for the light
carrying as much sun as possible
you are a magnet for the light
unibrow—the bridging of two worlds
vagina—so much darker than the rest of you
it is trying to hide a gold mine
you will have dark circles too early
—appreciate the halos
Beautiful brown girl,
you pull god out of their bellies

women have been starved of space for so long
when one if us finally
makes it into the arena
we get scared that another woman
will take our spot
but space doesn't work like that
look at all the men in the arena getting stronger
as their numbers multiply
more women in the arena means
more room for all of us to rise

~ stronger together

we've been taught
you can either be logical or creative-pick one
and now millions of people think creativity is a skill
only accessible to a select few
when the turth is human beings
are imaginative by nature
and like any other muscle in the body
when we stop using our creativity
it feels like we've lost it but
creativity never disappears
it sits inside us waiting to
come alive again

talk to me
your voice
sounds like
coming home
from a war
that took
too many
parts of me

whisper
my name
i want to
fill a
mouth
full of
belonging

~ long distance love

i tried to leave many times but
as soon as i got away
my lungs buckled under the pressure
panting for air i'd return
perhaps this is why i let you
skin me to the bone
something
was better than nothing
having you touch me
even if it was not kind
was better than not having your hands at all
i could take the abuse
i could not take the absence
i knew i was beating a dead thing
but did it matter
if the thing was dead
when at the very least
i had it

~ addiction

i like the way the stretch marks
on my thighs look human and
that we're so soft yet
rough and jugle wild
when we need to be
i love that about us
how capable we are of feeling
how unafraid we are of breaking
and tend to our wounds with grace
just being a woman
calling myself
a woman
makes me utterly whole
and complete

my god
is not waiting inside a church
or sitting above the temple's steps
my god
is the refugee's breath as she's running
is living in the starving child's belly
is the heartbeat of the protest
my god
does not rest between pages
written by holy men
my god
lives between the sweaty thighs
of women's bodies sold for money
was last seen washing the homeless man's feet
my god
is not as unreachable as
they'd like you to think
my god is beating inside us infinitely

if he can't help but
degrade other women
when they're not looking
if toxicity is central to his language
he could hold you
in his lap and be soft
honey
that man could feed you sugar and
douse you in rose water
but that still could not
make him sweet

~ if you want to know what the type of man he is

when my daughter is living in my belly
i will speak to her like
she's already changed the world
she will walk out of me on a red carpet
fully equipped with the knowledge
that she's capable of
anything she sets her mind to

~ ode to raymond douillet's short tour and farewell

i can live without romantic love
but i can't survive without
the women i call friends
they know exactly what i need
before i even know i need it
the way we hold space
for each other is just different

i will tell you about selfish people. even when they know they will hurt you they will walk into your life to taste you because you are the type of being they don't want to miss out on. you are too much shine to not be felt. so when they have gotten a good look at everything you have to offer. when they have taken your skin your hair your secrets with them. when they realize how real this is. how much of a storm you are and it hits them. that is when the cowardice sets in. that is when the person you thought they were is replaced by the sad reality of what they are. that is when they lose every fighting bone in their body and leave after saying "you will find better than me". you will stand there naked with half of them still hidden somewhere Inside you and sob. asking them why they did it.  why they forced you to love them when they had no intentions of loving you back and they'll say something along the lines of i just had to try. i had to give it a chance. it was you after all. but that isn't romantic. it isn't sweet. the idea that they were so engulfed by your existence they had to risk breaking it for the sake of knowing they weren't the one missing out. your existence meant that little next to their curiosity of you. that is the thing about selfish people. they gamble entire beings. entire souls to please their own. one second they are holding you like the world is in their lap and the next they have belittled you to a mere picture. a moment. something of the past. one second. they swallow you up and whisper they want to spend the rest of their life with you. but the moment they sense fear. they are already half way out the door. without having the nerve to let you go with grace. as if the human heart means that little to them. and after all this. after all of the taking. the nerve. isn't it sad and funny how people have more guts to undress you with their fingers than they do to pick up a phone and call. Apologize. for the loss. and this is how you lose her.

what is it with you and sunflowers he asks

i point to the field of yellow outside
sunflowers worship the sun i tell him
only when it arrives do they rise
when the sun leaves
they bow their heads in mourning
that is what the sun does to those flowers
it's what you do to me

~ the sun and her flowers

what i miss most is how you loved me. but what i didn't know was how you loved me had so much to do with the person i was. it was a reflection of everything i gave you. coming back to me. how did i not see that. how. did i sit here soaking in the idea that no one else would love me that way. when it was i that taught you. when it was i that showed you how to fill. the way i needed to be filled. how cruel i was to myself. giving you credit for my warmth simply because you had felt it. thinking it was you who gave me strength. wit. beauty. simply because you recognized it. as if i was already not these things before i met you. as if i did not remain all these things after you left.

i am confident i am over you. so much that some mornings i wake up with a smile on my face and my hands pressed together thanking the universe for pulling you out of me. thank god i cry. thank god you left. i would not be the empire i am today if you had stayed.

but then.

there are some nights i imagine what i might do if you showed up. how if you walked into the room this very second every awful thing you’ve ever done would be tossed out the closet window and all the love would rise up again. it would pour through my eyes as if it never really left in the first place. as if it’s been practicing how to stay silent so long only so it could be this loud on your arrival. can someone explain that. how even when the love leaves. it doesn’t leave. how even when i am so past you. i am so helplessly brought back to you.

list of things to heal your mood:

1) cry it. walk it. write it. scream it. dance it.
    out of your body.
2) if after all that
    you are still
    spiraling out of control
    ask yourself if sinking into the mud is worth it
3) the answer is no
4) the answer is breathe
5) sip tea and feel your nervous system settle
6) you are the hero of your life
7) this feeling doesn't have power over you
8) the universe has prepared you to handle this
9) no matter how dark it gets
    the light is always on its way
10) you are the light
11) walk yourself back to where the love lives

apparently it is ungraceful of me
to mention m peiod in public
cause the actual biology
of mybody is too real

it is okay to sell what's
between a women's legs
more than it is okay to
mention its inner workings

the recreational use of
this body is seen as
beautiful while
its nature is
seen as ugly

for you to see beauty here
does not mean
there is beauty in me
it means there is beauty rooted
so deep within you
you can't help but
see it everywhere

hair
if it was not supposed to be there
would not be growing
on our bodies in the first place

~ we are at war with what comes most naturally to us

i need someone
who knows struggle
as well as i do
someone
willing to hold my feet in their lap
on days it is too difficult to stand
the type of person who gives
exactly what i need
before i even know i need it
the type of lover who hears me
even when i do not speak
is the type of understanding
i demand

 ~ the type of lover i need

you were the most beautiful thing i'd ever felt till now. and i was convinced you'd remain the most beautiful thing i'd ever feel. do you know how limiting that is. to think at such a ripe young age i'd experienced the most exhilarating person i'd ever meet. how i'd spend the rest of my life just settling. to think i'd tasted the rawest form of honey and everything else would be refined and synthetic. that nothing else would be refined and synthetic. that nothing beyond this point would add up. that all the years beyond me could not combine themselves to be sweeter than you.

~ falsehood

you said. if it is meant to be. fate will bring us back together. for a second i wonder if you are really that naive. if you really believe fate works like that. as if it lives in the sky staring down at us. as if it has five fingers and spends its time placing us like pieces of chess. as if it is not the choices we make. who taught you that. tell me. who convinced you. you’ve been given a heart and a mind that isn’t yours to use. that your actions do not define what will become of you. i want to scream and shout it’s us you fool. we’re the only ones that can bring us back together. but instead i sit quietly. smiling softly through quivering lips thinking. isn’t it such a tragic thing. when you can see it so clearly but the other person doesn’t.

your art
is not about how many people
like your work
your art
is about
if your heart likes your work
if your soul likes your work
it's about how honest
you are with yourself
and you
must never
trade honesty
for reliability

the most important conversations
you’ll have are with your fingers

when they nervously graze hers
for the first time during dinner
the thrill of raising goosebumps on
her breasts while unbuttoning her shirt

on days you are angry,
they’ll ball into fists
and she’ll cry,
but as they shake
for forgiveness
she’ll see what
apologies look like

and when one
of you is dying
in a hospital bed at 65,
your hands’ll grip hers
to say things words
can’t describe fingers

~ fingers

they convinced me
i only had a few good years left
before i was replaced by a girl younger than me
as though men yield power with age
but women grow into irrelevance
they can keep their lies
for i have just gotten started
i feel as though i just left the womb
my twenties are the warm-up
for what i'm really about to do
wait till you see me in my thirties
now that will be a proper introduction
to the nasty. wild. woman in me.
how can i leave before the party's started
rehearsals begin at forty
i ripen with age
i do not come with an expiration date
and now
for the main event
curtains up at fifty
let's begin the show

~ timeless

that dazed look on your face
when you can't tell if i'm
being friendly or flirtatious

the way your cheeks flush
as you wonder if this was a move
or just regular conversation

i fill you
with so much fantasy
you mistake it for adoration

and it probably doesn't
help to know i did
it all on purpose

he makes sure to look right at me as he places
his electrical wire fingers on my skin
how does that feel he asks
commanding my attention
responding is out of the question my
lips quivering in anticipation
he smiles
he knows this is what hunger looks like
i am a switchboard
he is the circuits
my hips move with his — rhythmic
my voice isn't my own when i moan
it is music
he sparks enough electricity inside me
to power cities
when he finishes what he's started
it is me who looks at him
and says that was magic

i don’t know what living a balanced life feels like
when i am sad
i don’t cry i pour
when i am happy
i don’t smile i glow
when i am angry
i don’t yell i burn

the good thing about
feeling in extremes
is when i love
i give them wings
but perhaps
that isn't
such a good thing
cause they always
tend to leave and
you should see me
when my heart is broken
i don't grieve
i shatter

i miss the days when
my friends knew every mundane detail
about my life and i knew every ordinary detail about theirs
adulthood has starved me of that consistency​ ​that us
those walks around the block
those long conversations when we were
too lost in the moment to care
what time it was when we won-and celebrated
when we failed and celebrated even harder
when we were just kids
now we have our very important jobs
that fill up our very busy schedules
we have to compare calendars
just to plan coffee dates
that one of us will eventually cancel
because adulthood is being
too exhausted to leave our apartments most days
i miss belonging to a group of people bigger than myself
it was that belonging that made life easier to live

~ friendship nostalgia

stay strong through your pain
grow flowers from it
you have helped me
grow flowers out of mine so
bloom beautifully
dangerously
loudly
bloom softly
however you need
just bloom

~ to the reader

you are a sucker for firsts
they always make you feel
a little lighter like
the first time your
lover's lips kiss that
tender spot on your neck
nothing puts your
stomach into more knots
than first moments
that remind you
this life is electric
each second is
worth melting for

~ january first

you tell me to quiet down cause
my opinions make me less beautiful
but i was not made with a fire in my belly
so i could be put out
i was not made with a lightness on my tongue
so i could be easy to swallow
i was made heavy
half blade and half silk
difficult to forget
and not easy for the mind to follow

sometimes
i love you means
i want to love you

sometimes
i love you means
i'll stay a little while longer

sometimes
i love you means
i'm not sure how to leave

sometimes
i love you means
i have nowhere else to go

i reduced my body to aesthetics
forgot the work it did to keep me alive
with every beat and breath
declared it a grand failure for not looking like theirs
searched everywhere for a miracle
foolish enough to not realise
i was already living in one

(trigger warning: rape and sexual abuse)

the therapist places
the doll in front of you
it is the size of girls
your uncles like touching

point to where his hands were

you point to the spot
between its legs the one
he fingered out of you
like a confession

how're you feeling

you pull the lump
in your throat out
with your teeth and
say fine
numb really

~ midweek sessions

you must find no worth in yourself
if you think I am worth less
after you've touched me
as if worth is something we transfer
as if your hands on my body
could magnify you and then
reduce me to nothing

my issue with what they consider beautiful
is their concept of beauty
centers around excluding people
i find hair beautiful
when a woman wears it
like a garden on her skin
that is the definition of beauty
big hooked noses
pointing upward to the sky
like they’re rising
to the occasion
skin the color of earth
my ancestors planted crops on
to feed a lineage of women with
thighs thick as tree trunks
eyes like almonds
deeply hooded with conviction
the rivers of punjab
flow through my bloodstream so
don’t tell me my women
aren’t as beautiful
as the ones in
your country

what love looks like

what does love look like the therapist asks
one week after the breakup
and i’m not sure how to answer her question
except for the fact that i thought love
looked so much like you

that’s when it hit me
and i realized how naive i had been
to place an idea so beautiful on the image of a person
as if anybody on this entire earth
could encompass all love represented
as if this emotion seven billion people tremble for
would look like a five foot eleven
medium-sized brown-skinned guy
who likes eating frozen pizza for breakfast

what does love look like the therapist asks again
this time interrupting my thoughts midsentence
and at this point i’m about to get up
and walk right out the door
except i paid too much money for this hour
so instead i take a piercing look at her
the way you look at someone
when you’re about to hand it to them
lips pursed tightly preparing to launch into conversation
eyes digging deeply into theirs
searching for all the weak spots
they have hidden somewhere
hair being tucked behind the ears
as if you have to physically prepare for a conversation
on the philosophies or rather disappointments
of what love looks like

well i tell her
i don’t think love is him anymore
if love was him
he would be here wouldn’t he
if he was the one for me
wouldn’t he be the one sitting across from me
if love was him it would have been simple
i don’t think love is him anymore i repeat
i think love never was
i think i just wanted something
was ready to give myself to something
i believed was bigger than myself
and when i saw someone
who probably fit the part
i made it very much my intention
to make him my counterpart

and i lost myself to him
he took and he took
wrapped me in the word special
until i was so convinced he had eyes only to see me
hands only to feel me
a body only to be with me
oh how he emptied me

how does that make you feel
interrupts the therapist
well i said
it kind of makes me feel like shit

maybe we’re looking at it wrong
we think it’s something to search for out there
something meant to crash into us
on our way out of an elevator
or slip into our chair at a cafe somewhere
appear at the end of an aisle at the bookstore
looking the right amount of sexy and intellectual
but i think love starts here
everything else is just desire and projection
of all our wants needs and fantasies
but those externalities could never work out
if we didn’t turn inward and learn
how to love ourselves in order to love other people

love does not look like a person
love is our actions
love is giving all we can
even if it’s just the bigger slice of cake
love is understanding
we have the power to hurt one another
but we are going to do everything in our power
to make sure we don’t
love is figuring out all the kind sweetness we deserve
and when someone shows up
saying they will provide it as you do
but their actions seem to break you
rather than build you
love is knowing who to choose

i don't know why
i split myself open
for others knowing
sewing myself up
hurts this much
afterward

1. You are allowed to say no
2. Years ago his father beat the language of love
    out of your husband’s back
    he will never know how to say it
    but his actions prove he loves you
3. Go with him
    when he enters your body and goes to that place
    sex is not dirty
4. No matter how many times his family brings it up
    do not have the abortion just because I’m a girl
    lock the relatives out and swallow the key
    he will not hate you
5. Take your journals and paintings
    across the ocean when you leave
    these will remind you who you are
    when you get lost amid new cities
    they will also remind your children
    you had a life before them
6. When your husbands are off
     working at the factories
     make friends with all the other
     lonely women in the apartment complex
     this loneliness will cut a person in half
     you will need each other to stay alive
7. Your husband and children will take from your plate
    we will emotionally and mentally starve you
    all of it is wrong
    don’t let us convince you that
    sacrificing yourself is
    how you must show love
8. When your mother dies
    fly back for the funeral
    money comes and goes
    a mother is once in a lifetime
9. You are allowed to spend
    a couple dollars on a coffee
    I know there was a time when
    we could not afford it
    but we are okay now. Breathe.
10. You can’t speak english fluently
     or operate a computer or cell phone
     we did that to you. it is not your fault.
     you are not any less than the
     other mothers with their
     flashy phones and designer clothing
     we confined you to the four walls of this home
     and worked you to the bone
     you have not been your own property for decades
11. There was no rule book for how
     to be the first woman in your lineage
     to raise a family on a strange land by yourself
12. You are the person I look up to most
13. When I am about to shatter
     I think of your strength
     and harden
14. I think you are a magician
15. I want to fill the rest of your life with ease
16. You are the hero of heroes
     the god of gods

~ advice I would’ve given my mother on her wedding day

1. take refuge in your bed
2. cry. till the tears stop (this will take a few days).
3. don’t listen to slow songs.
4. delete their number from your phone even though it is memorized on your fingertips.
5. don’t look at old photos.
6. find the closest ice cream shop and treat yourself to two scoops of mint chocolate chip. the mint will calm your heart. you deserve the chocolate.
7. buy new bed sheets.
8. collect all the gifts, t-shirts, and everything with their smell on it and drop it off at a donation center.
9. plan a trip.
10. perfect the art of smiling and nodding when someone brings their name up in conversation.
11. start a new project.
12. whatever you do. do not call.
13. do not beg for what does not want to stay.
14. stop crying at some point.
15. allow yourself to feel foolish for believing you could’ve built the rest of your life in someone else’s stomach.
16. breathe.

~ to do list (after the breakup)

Short Poetic Quotes by Rupi Kaur

accept yourself as you were designed

my tongue is sour from the hunger of missing you

i am waking up to my godself

to be soft is to be powerful

i am learning how to love him by loving myself

the thing about writing is I can't tell if it's healing or destroying

what we lived through is living in us

I will welcome a partner who is my equal

you deserve to be completely found in your surroundings not lost within them

losing you was the becoming of myself

when you are full I am full, we are two suns

i am losing parts of you like i lose eyelashes unknowingly and everywhere

love is knowing whom to choose

never feel guilty for starting again

it’s your voice that undresses me

you mustn't have to make them want you they must want you themselves

you can imitate a light like mine but you cannot become it

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