This is Oce.

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 By: Riya Bindlish 

 

 

Her chubby little hands clinged on to her grandmother as she walked down Thames Street and headed home. She had just finished another day at Queens School in London. Once she came  home, she saw her mom, who handed her a little card with a pig on it. This was a peculiar ritual between them- her mother would give her a card with some sort of animal face on it, and up she would go to her room to write a story in them. She eagerly grabbed the card and scribbled away a story of a princess in a faraway land.

This is Oce: six-year old fairy tale writer. Her imagination, wild as it was, put her heart and soul into writing these stories. But twenty happy endings later, Oce discovered a new beginning in a land far far away. One she thought would be full of beach gals and sunshine- California.

An eight hour flight and there she stood in a whole other world. She didn’t think too much of it, though she was sad that she had to leave her best friend, Ashley, behind. But, oh, she was in California now! She was a beach gal.

It didn’t turn out to be as beachy as she expected, but nonetheless she enjoyed it. In fact, this was where Oce’s real childhood began. She spent the long summer days spent talking to her neighbor near the white fence next door in the tiny, tiny parking lot by the plum tree. Five years breezed by, and once again she moved-this time to a small suburban town called San Ramon. This goodbye to the first place she had ever truly been attached to inspired her to say goodbye to fairy tales and turn to a different chapter of writing.

This is Oce: evocative, cynical, philosophical, “woke” poet.

Reminiscing about the five years she spent in Fremont, Oce says, “All the kids in the neighborhood used to play there...we were all really close...That plum tree was there for the five years that i was there. I just think about all of the different interactions I’ve had in that one location …That’s what inspired me to write this poem.”

Oce has always used writing as an outlet, and despite it being a way to get all of her creative energy onto paper, it slowly became a way for her to express her emotions. As insignificant as it may seem, the plum tree made her realize how much she had changed as a person, because although it was always there, like her, it had blossomed. Here’s an excerpt:

 

“Seven years ago

You christened your very own parking lot post

With hand-picked flowers that

Hadn’t fully blossomed

You assured me that faeries

Wouldn’t be able to resist

The jasmine

That had once curled around the beams of your house

 

……

 

This year

I finally asked why we wore those pearls

If their only purpose

Was to choke you in a way

That life couldn’t flow in your lungs

More plain old oxygen and less magic

If that was even a term you understood

 

You stared and told me to grow up

And finally I realized

That you had been my parking lot faerie

And you were gone

A girl left in her place

A cruel joke

I accused you

But you said I was one to talk

Because my wings had disappeared

Even before I knew I had them

 

This poem, in a way, represents Oce's awakening and transformation. No longer was she that little girl who was locked up in her room all day writing make-believe stories. This tree told her to grow up, just as it had, and the poem itself is listening to the tree, because it itself represents Oce’s reality- it is no fairy tale.

She was just about to enter middle school, and indeed, she heeded the plum tree’s advice. But no longer were they soft poems of remembrance.

This is Oce: soft-turned angsty poet. At first, the poems she wrote were for her own humor, but her passion for writing caused her to truly delve into it. Though the poetry did become much more somber, she believes she got to the heart of her emotions and produced pieces she was proud of.

Her hands vivid with gestures, Oce looked me in the eye and said, “ I actually started making something that was like, creative and something that I hadn't seen before. I felt really really good about that...everything else in my life was something that everything else did..it was just this very beautiful thing.”

 

More than anything, Oce values her poetry because it is something only she can own. Poetry itself is so subjective, tangible,  and raw, that it is virtually impossible to compare it to something, such as winning a math competition or a science bowl.

Her relationship to poetry was almost a form of mutualism. While she supplied the words, the poem gave her the emotional support and comfort needed to be in her happy place.

This relationship was tested on her trip to India, where she discovered some unpleasant family secrets. The conservative values of her family shocked her, and she was utterly perplexed: “I realized that sometimes the people we love aren’t good people.”

Poetry was her coping mechanism. This act of betrayal by those she had loved, and still wanted to love, confounded her: “I kind of wrote a lot about that. And I mean, I didn't really put it out or published it because it was just very private. But it was better to write about it than just kind of feeling angry, and betrayed by everyone.”

But she gradually fell into a slump. She wasn’t as happy, and didn’t find as much pleasure in the things she used to do. She spent her nights deep under the covers with an ounce of light brimming from her phone while she furiously poured herself out in ink.

In a way, it may have harmed her. But ultimately, it helped her process and admit that she had depression; it was cathartic for her, and helped her recover.  

Sitting in the classroom, she appears to be like every other DV girl. Nose in a book, laptop on desk, bags under eyes. But if you dig a little deeper, you’ll find a sort of self awareness that I find to be quite lacking on campus. Her dedication to her poetry represents her desire to remain connected to herself, despite being very hesitant and confused about her feelings at first, and with it she has blossomed into the plum tree. This is Oce.