When a law student tries Spoken Word

Its been a while. From the last time I wrote and now, my world has shifted, to say the least. But that's not what this is about. This is something I impulsively penned for a literary event in college. And I wanted to catalogue it here so I'd have it.

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Love, Loss, Moving on

Hey everyone! I'm Anjali from first year.

So, I feel like I have a lot of love to give, and honestly, after loving and losing someone, I've learnt a fair bit about moving on - from spaces where you feel stuck, and from spaces where you feel suffocated. So today that's exactly what I'm going to be talking about - LOVE, LOSS AND MOVING ON. So when I was thinking about what I wanted to sound like on this stage, I realised that true authenticity lies in sounding not like something or somebody but in sounding uncomfortably like yourself.

This is what I think. When we're younger, we're so full of life, so our ability to give love and reel from heartbreak is higher. So that's why at this stage, you want to date more, have more experiences, etc. At this stage, because you already have so much going on (and I don't mean moot courts and CIAs), even then, especially then, your heart is strong. It has the ability to bestow love on others. Your heart has a very high quota, and I think this quota is limited. It is limited. Just like the waters of the see of that don't seem to end, like the night feels endless until the sunrise on the horizon interrupts it. Like the series you binge for days that finally finishes - no matter how limitless something may seem, at some point, you will run out.

Maybe that's why we've been trained to look at forever, an illusion that something will remain eternal. It will last long, but at some point, the chances are, it will cease to exist. So I guess what I'm really trying to say is that love is not limitless because forever is not infinite.

Does this mean love has limits? I don't think so - your ability to love has limits - your quota to love and feel for someone does not. Well, if love was so practical, what would the ballads and the poets write about? Materialistically, love is a box. Beyond all the roses and chocolates and the bracelets and the cards and the perfumes and the watches, the purest form of love is not seen, simply felt.

You know, Tagore had said "jaisi ho, waise hi aajao - shringaar ko rehne do." Pyaar mein shringaar nahi hota. Pyaar ki koi ghadi, koi sahi samay nahi hota. Wo bas ek aaraam se alag alag tariqon mein jatayi hui ek bhavana hai. Aur ye pyaar kisko kis se ho, ye koi tey nahi kar sakta, kyuki pyaar koi gila nahi ki koi usse suljhaye aur pyaar koi kaanoon nahi jispar koi faisla sunaye. Love is simple. 

You know where the problem lies? When you love someone. And I'm not just talking about the romantic kind of love. I'm going to say it - I lost my grandmother a couple of years ago. She was like a parent to me and loosing her was monumental in my life. I'm not going to talk about her, because I can't - so instead I'm going to talk about loving, not just a person, but a dream, a wish, loosing it, and moving on.

At this point, I remember a poem from Shri Harivansh Rai Bachchan ji-

जीवन में एक सितारा था,
माना वह बेहद प्यारा था,
वह डूब गया तो डूब गया।

अंबर के आनन को देखो,
कितने इसके तारे टूटे,
कितने इसके प्यारे छूटे,
जो छूट गए फिर कहाँ मिले;
पर बोलो टूटे तारों पर
कब अंबर शोक मनाता है!

जो बीत गई सो बात गई।

I have questions. Meri rai mein amber toh shokh manaata hai, apne ghane baadalon mein, apne garajte bijle se, wo ussi tarron ke sadme mein jeeta hai.

So I just want to say, moving on does not entail not feeling. It never means that. Sometimes it means crying it out when the world gets too much or when everyone tells you to move past it. Sometimes the only way past is through.

Sometimes moving on means feeling every single emotion and every memory, every laugh, every time you basked in love. This feeling transcends that for just a person - think about a dream you had and wished for, but didn't get. Imagine the feeling of working so hard, wishing on every lost eyelash, every night star, just to deal with the fact that its not going to work out. So when you're in the throes of that darkness, as someone who has loved and lost, I just want to say - feel all the feels. Cry out the tears. Its not worth bottling your love. That's never what it was for.

On the contrary, feel gratitude. Feel privilege. You had the opportunity to love. To love passionately. Somebody, something, even if abstract, even if fleetingly. Lord Tennyson says it best - "It is better to have loved and lost than to have not loved at all." Understand that love is a privilege.

Imagine, for a second, not knowing love. Sucks, wouldn't it? Life would be empty, a bottomless pit. Living without love is not living at all, it makes you hollow. 

So smile, and move on not with regret but with the joy at the chance you got love. 

This is what life is about for me. It's very simple. Love, Loss, and moving on.

- 24th March, 2026