Oftentimes, I wonder if I’ve been pushed onto a stage, not knowing what lines to read, not knowing what to say–
Right in the middle of a musical, too!
I think it’s called ‘When Life Doesn’t Go Your Way’
Or something to that effect, I can’t recall right now, you know? I’ve just been unceremoniously thrown onto this stage.
You’d think I belong here, with the way I fit right in with all the other artistes, belting out their numbers and other things, moving with grace,
The kind I could never imagine having, but I might as well try! It’s not like I can slink off of this stage I never asked to be on, or take my bows and say goodbye!
One thing they don’t know about me, though–
Oh, yes, the one trick up my sleeve I hide, is my ability to fake it till I make it, I couldn’t lose it if I ever tried!
And when I’m under that spotlight, you’ll never see me stutter; no, sir! Not today!
I’m so used to this by now, so used to winging it as long as I can get away.
You can try to find my tells, but you’ll never see them on my face, because life’s just a stage, honey,
And I’m just another somebody who has been winging it;
Oh you think I can’t keep getting away?
Guess what? I just did.
And you read every last word of it.
So, have a good day!
~© Shubhangi Srinivasan
I am back to writing nonsensical things in the name of poetry and somehow getting away with it! And I am so proud of myself for that. This hardly took me half an hour to write and I have to say, it’s impressive to me how all my best works this NaPoWriMo season are the ones that I barely put any thought into. It was like my brain wrote this on autopilot and I love that feeling! Today’s prompt via napowrimo.net was to write a prose-poem about a musical set that carries on in an unmusical fashion, like a recital that’s gone haywire! You know what that reminded me of? Life. How life is like a stage and we’re just winging it. At least, I am.
Maybe that’s why writing this poem today was so easy to me. So many of us adopt the ‘fake it till you make it’ metality and we get away with it too because we know how to adapt to our environment quickly. If I’ve ever seen one, it’s as useful a skill as anything else. Improvisation is dead useful. Just wait till you’re in a pickle and see how quickly you’re able to bullshit your way out of it. I know I have. I know everyone has, at some point. And that’s just the point of the poem.
None of us really know what life is supposed to be about. Things can be figured out along the way, and that’s okay. When I was a child, I used to think all the adults and older cousins around me had their life figured out because of how decisive they were about everything. Cut to adulthood, after losing my early twenties to the pandemic– I feel like a twenty-three-year-old masquerading around as a twenty-seven-year-old. What else can I do except wing it all the time?
It’s one thing to be confident about the things that we do know. But to confidently present facts that you didn’t even know existed until about an hour ago? Yeah, I find myself doing that a lot, lately. I am not even sorry about it. It’s the funniest thing ever. People think I know a lot, but this is me coming clean that I don’t know what I am talking about, for the majority of the part.
And if you’re winging it through life, too, that is completely okay. You’re not a fraudster.
See you tomorrow with another poem?
Yours truly,
The Shubhster.
If you like my poem, please do leave a comment or follow my blog! I write a lot of random but interesting stuff, and I try to keep it real. I’d love it if you went ahead and checked out more of my work, while you’re still here. If you think someone you know would appreciate the things I write, feel free to share my page with them! You can also reach out to me on my Twitter or Instagram handles. I always appreciate seeing new people come up to me and tell me they like what I write! It doesn’t happen as often as I would like for it to, but let’s change that, maybe?
This has been day 21 of 30!
See you tomorrow?
Cheerio! Xx
~Featured Image by Richard Ciraulo on Unsplash
The Shubhster Diaries 
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