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Shivani Kundu Poem
The more you say, the less I hear,
The path ahead remains unclear.
The same old cycle, round and round,
I watch your lips move, without sound —
Lips that only speak in comparison,
Counting stars instead of choosing one.
The moon is whole in every shape it wears,
No one measures it, no one compares —
But I was counted, weighed, and set aside,
A star among stars, never the moon in your eyes.
You saw me at my best, my worst,
Couldn't tell the difference, either way —
'Cause you never took a glance,
And for that, I never stood a chance.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
Maybe the moon was never the goal.
I wanted love without earning it. I forgot-love was never supposed to be earned.
External validation is borrowed light. It's not yours to keep. When it's gone, you're in the dark again - and worse, you've forgotten how to shine on your own.
That's not because I was broken. It's because I was waiting for someone else to remind me of my light-in my highs, and in my lows.
A star doesn't need permission to burn. It doesn't need an audience. It just burns-and the sky holds it anyway.
Likewise, I want someone to hold me the way the sky holds all its stars not to light me, just to hold me.
I still want the hug. The understanding. Someone who stays without needing a reason. That's not weakness. We were never meant to hold ourselves up alone.
But I don't want to earn it anymore. I want to already be lit, so love isn't the thing that switches me on-just the thing that gets to sit beside my light.
The herd was never waiting on me to be whole. It was whole with me, and it would have stayed whole without me- because that was never my job to complete it. I wasn't missing. I was just looking for myself in the wrong place- whether they needed me, instead of whether I needed myself.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
Your love makes me feel like a cactus in a pond —
out of place, unsure I belong.
Your love makes me feel you deserve so much more
than what I have to give.
Why are you being nice to me?
asks the cactus, to the pond —
I only know how to survive,
not how to live.
I'm not asking you to bloom,
let me show you —
stay a while, and find out
water was never your enemy.
You are loving me again,
says the cactus —
and this time, I let it.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
PART TWO
The moon is always perfect, no matter what shape it wears. You can't blame the moon for never letting the star shine. Even the star was busy gazing at that beauty, burning itself just to glow. Maybe it's because you are the side dish, and not the main.
Nothing compares to the evolution of trying - every person hoping to shine like the moon - and still, in the end, losing even the chance to be a star.
Even time doesn't change you. You just learn to live with it.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
Part Three
Some people love you so much that you feel you don't deserve them - that they deserve better. Will I ever be the person someone thinks of that way? Thought of as a blooming flower of happiness in a desert of melancholy?
Do the things that make you happy, they say, so you can sleep tight. But you mean keeping up with others' expectations, making them happy, so you can sleep tight. Yeah. That's why I sleep tight.
No matter how much one cries for love, it's never enough. Your eyes may grow tired and stop crying, but the heart never will. It will beg for water, like flowers do in a hopeless desert.
Some things are perfect even in their imperfection. I'm sure I'm jealous of that kind of luck.
Have you ever worn your silence like an after-effect - the bruise left by someone's hurtful words?
If yes, then
Congratulations. You are a brave soul. There are people who never do that, because they don't want to lose even the hurtful words. It's the only undivided attention they've ever gotten. They're not afraid of the words. They're afraid of the silence that follows - the silence where no one is comparing them to anyone at all.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
I thought I already had someone who admired me - who valued me exactly as I am. But it was all just a blurry cloud.
Being empathetic is a vulnerable choice. You don't have to make yourself into armor, or into light, for someone else. In the end, you'll be drained, destroyed, devastated - only to learn you were never more than a backup plan, a pit stop along the way.
You'll drain your own light just to guide them, even while you're the one who's lost. Funny - you knew it from the very start, that they would never even look back to see if you were doing fine.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
I realized I loved you when you weren't here —
Glad that I realized, but never free
Of the regret that I never let you know,
Never made my love a certainty.
I was merely a ship to your heart,
Passing, unnoticed, drifting apart —
I wish I'd been the traveler all along,
Walking your journey, not watching from afar.
When the nights grow cold,
Do you miss me the way I miss you?
Do you hope I was still by your side,
Or has that hope grown cold too?
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
Part Four
One day, I want to be someone's moon - just not one of the stars. No matter how much a star shines, it's never enough. There is only ever a moon, stealing the stars' beloved gaze. Stars are compared and counted. The moon is simply worshipped. Stars ache to outshine, to overcompensate.
But for what? Being a star was always enough. It just needed to be reminded. It just needed to be loved.
Even something remarkable starts to feel invisible next to something that doesn't compete - that simply exists differently. It sits like discomfort, like a jigsaw piece forced into the wrong spot.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
I want to be someone's moon,
Glowing bright through night or noon,
No matter how incomplete I seem,
Still beautiful inside their dream.
So many shining stars above,
So many gazes lost in love,
I'm just a soul lost in phases,
Lost among their brighter faces.
So I'll keep shouting into void,
Even if the sound gets void,
For somewhere, someone still might see
The moon that no one thought could be.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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Shivani Kundu Poem
I thought we'd be each other's home,
but you decided to roam.
But it was all your blame game,
I wish I'd known the same.
You said you looked me in the eyes-
can you tell me how many goodbyes?
Can you see the signs in my cries?
All wasted now, my tries.
I hope God lets you sit in this ache,
that you caused, this heart to break.
But I hope you recover in the end,
and may you never receive the love I send.
Copyright © Shivani Kundu | Year Posted 2026
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