I was eight when I breathed in my first poem.

I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:

I was just blown away with the beautiful use of language. I admit, in the beginning, I struggled with vocabulary and style, but with time, I understood fragments and found the process of decoding their meaning almost addictive. Eventually, I started penning my own thoughts.

And through that experience, I learned how important a single thought can be. So, I made an app to encourage other people to read or write poetry. This app provides a platform where you can type and store your thoughts safely.

An inspiring tutor provided me the encouragement and guidance to read and discuss great poets like Emily Dickinson, William Wordsworth, Petrarch, Judy Grahn, and Warsan Shire. Whether reading about nature, feminism, or mythology, I get ideas for topics and learn literary devices to better express myself (e.g. metaphors, personification, enjambment).

I’ve spent five years since using poetry to capture my life journey
When my mom turned 40, I wrote poetry to share my love for her.
When my little sister was born, I wrote to celebrate the arrival of an angel.
When the sight of a kingfisher diving into water mesmerized me, I expressed it in a poem.
When Indian and Pakistani soldiers were engaged in a proxy-war, I wrote to promote peace.

Several of my own poems have been published in KidSpirit and other publications. I’ve also participated in many discussions to critique poems and essays. Last year, my poems (and paintings) were featured at a solo exhibition, “For the Love of Nature and Peace.”

Writing poetry converts my emotions into something with which others can connect. Good poetry can bridge spaces between people, even enemies. To me, poetry is one of the best ways to understand each other and push humanity further.

Here is one of my poems about the theme of fulfillment:

What is fulfillment? Ever asked yourself,
Does happiness define fulfillment?
Or is it the game of money?
We humans are miles away from fulfillment,
We are running toward money,
And day by day we keep forgetting about joy,
Joy is all around us.
We just have to keep our heads up and see,
Money is something that won’t give us satisfaction,
Ever,
Because the want for money is limitless.
But once you start looking for happiness,
Under the rocks,
Over the clouds,
Between the trees,
You will find the satisfaction you desire.
Fulfillment is leaving the game of money,
And discovering the joy of life.

Before writing this poem, I had to understand what fulfillment meant to me. Was it just the satisfaction of completing all my homework, or was it much more than that? I looked outside the window and gazed into the deep blue sky. I wondered and wrote whatever I thought of. I realized fulfillment is the little sense of joy you feel every day. To me, it’s something that is hidden in nature, and it can only be found when you aim to explore nature and find happiness.

I combined my love for poetry with my passion for computer science when I decided to develop an app called The Power of Poetry. The reason I wanted to make this app was that I tend to forget my ideas that I have while wallowing, in class, while having lunch. The app allows one an opportunity to type down their thoughts wherever and whenever they want. This app is very “portable,” and you can store your thoughts in a safe place.

Some features of my app include the login/signup page, inspiring ink, activity log, and thought tracker. Inspiring ink is a place where you can read others’ poems and get inspired to write your own. A place where you can post your poems and inspire different people, too. And readers can appreciate and give you feedback on that poem through comments. The activity log helps you track the number of thoughts you have written and poems you have read. It has an interesting graphic, too! And finally, the thought tracker is a place where your thoughts can peacefully and safely rest. Like the activity log, the thought tracker also has a bright graphic, which hopes to put the user in a good mood. The app is in beta version and will be rolled out once all the features have been tested successfully. The target date to roll out the app is the last week of March 2021.

I hope to keep writing poetry and express it through different media till I am eighty. I hope to keep encouraging people, just like I am doing today, through my app, where people can get inspired by reading poems and comments, and create their own poetry. Hopefully, by the time I am eighty, I will have contributed my bit to transforming the artistic world for a few others.