The Past

We Were Never in Love, but God, We Could Have Been



We were never in love, but God, we could have been.
A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Loose Ends

Maybe it is the loose ends that keeps me coming back to you. Maybe it is the gap that I thought there could be stories that could fit in, another chapter, another paragraph or just another sentence. Maybe, I would still like you to hold me two seconds longer, or just another second. Maybe I want you to be mad at me, hate me, or love me, which you never did. Maybe, maybe it is all the what ifs. But also maybe, it is just you. Maybe, it's the curiosity if I never leave the city - if I stay. If I stay, would you still hold my hand?


A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Sit Down With You

I would like to sit down with you, perhaps over a cup of hot green tea freshly brewed at the chained coffee shop with the greatest window display, facing the over populated city. They said New York never sleeps, but have they seen Jakarta? It is never still. There is a constant movement of lights, words as if it was earth.

Again, I would like to sit down with you and have a little conversation. We can start with the days that we have missed, separated different densities of ocean. We can start at small - the way your hair naturally changed into two shades lighter, it is now copper black and you returned the mere observation that my cheek looked few ounce heavier. I said, it was probably the tenderloin steak I had two weekends in a row. I had not been home in years, I had to try every new restaurants in town.

You would laughed and even though you lived two hours drive away from the Capital, you said you have not had the chance to try the new places that the hipsters gone to. We both shared alienated feeling when it comes to the place we were taught as home. Not to the certain extent where we were entirely disconnect with the city, but only seen as someone outside the picture as if we were visitors in a gallery and the city were the painting.

Perhaps, it would be one of the reasons why we get along very well as not many people would share the same abstract concept of home. Through the conversation, soon I would notice that you have changed in the best possible way - it seems that you finally able to let go of whatever that shackles you still and weary. The grey cloud, the gloom that follows you has finally disappear, although it is not exactly all-rainbow now, but I could see the traces of joy appear as your lips curls into this kindest smile.

Then we would realize how naive we were and how did we end up talking about fundamental aspects of life, like religion and God. So subtle, we would laugh at ourselves. What we have seen as sins has shifted. Maybe, the subject of marriage would arise, too. We would have the opposite point of view yet we both know we were hopeless romantic at heart. How did we grow up so fast?

The question would linger until we drive ourselves home, realizing that we have left the phase of naivety and youth. We are (un)fortunately, adults now.



A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Terrible, Terrible Feeling

Few years ago, when the boy I once loved moved to the States, I realized how terrible it felt to be left and to be the one who stayed. One thing led to another, I, too decided to leave Jakarta. I moved to England with all the excitement packed in my luggage, sleeves - everywhere, somehow I thought by moving, I was also leaving the awful feeling of being left. I forgot in every meeting, there will always goodbye at some point. I was not aware, when I built my life in England, I built new relationships that do not meant to last - not in the way it is cheap and weak, but more like there is an expiry date depending on the length of the course. We are all travelers here, alongside with the purpose of studying. This is not home, we are all bound to leave - again, although few may be decided to reclaim England as home - but most of them are not.

Two of my favorite people had to move on with their lives a couple days ago while my chapter here has not finished just yet. I do still have other great friends that keep me from falling, but these two were also part of my days, of the life I have built. Then, the feeling I tried to avoid - the hollowness, the void, the weight of something's missing - is back. I am feeling horrible. Of course I tried to run away. To anything, anyone that is possible. But every time, the waves always keep dragging me back to the sea. This feeling affects the way I see the world gleams, it is not as bright, appealing and exciting as before, in addition with the English wet, gloomy weather. The idea of not having them one phone call away is terrifying. Weekend plans now are just wishes. It's funny how aware I am of this, but I am still letting myself sulking in this terrible, terrible feeling.

A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Poetry Baffles Us Both

Today, I learnt that you are the only source of your happiness -

Image: Keaton Henson
A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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A Letter to Love

Dear Love,

I haven’t seen you in a very long while so I’m thinking I might send you a little letter. I hope you are doing well wherever you are. I could not stop thinking about you. I have missed you terribly. We both know I cannot help to stay far as I would always put you on the pedestal. I always speak highly of you – that you are the best kind and everybody has to meet you, at least once because I don’t think they have lived if they haven’t met you yet, even if someone has ever been hurt, I would still insist to tell them to try again and say the only thing that can heal them is you, and only you. 

You have the charm of every opposites, always different – sometimes you can be very warm like the spring sunshine that melts on my skin, but you can be as sharp as shards of glass that cause one to bleed.

That is why sometimes I am terrified of you, because I know that you have the capability to expose me bare to the very core of my vulnerability, as if I was a vampire and you were the sun that agonisingly burns me through my skin onto my bones, unlike the cosmic objects that burn bright and beautifully. You could easily undress me, putting my armour into bed, asleep. That soon I would feel defenceless, helpless and dependent. I am no longer in control nor a whole, to perhaps as if I am a half or a part of something else, a great inexplicable phenomenon – a natural disaster.

Another time, you’d make me feel bulletproof. You can make me come clean with my biggest fear and be the best version of myself. When you're around, I am in peace, content. I don't want to ever leave. You're all everything I wanted to believe in. With your touch, you can turn foolish actions into the only thing that makes sense. You can be incredibly beautiful, too. Have you seen yourself? Your presence enchants the fairest charm as you breathe hope to the melted snow and wilted flowers. You have the scent of the ocean just before the dawn, embodies everyone’s favourite dream.

You can be dangerous – a thief of fragile hearts, addictive as drugs, a spell. You are always a home to the losts, the place where everyone’s keep running back to even if they are trying to run away. You can be a strength and weakness. You can build and you can break. You can grow wings to fly and an anchor to sink. You are blinding, binding – you are everything all at once. To me, you are compass, without you, I would have been lost, perhaps like I am now, turning everything into dust. You are everything I ever talk about.

I’d write a prose of poems, an album of songs about you. I’d put you in the centre of my universe and circle my life around you – but even though I know you can be all the above, I don’t think I know you enough. I would like to know you more, I would like to know you better. Maybe I would be able to figure you out soon, your mysterious, tangled webs of self, and maybe just a little maybe, from there I can let go of the fear that I can’t always have you.


Yours truly,


Your Petite Friend

A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Even After What Had Happened

I want you to walk in to this restaurant right now, where I am having a meal with few of my friends on a rainy Thursday noon. I know this is the place where you like to order Chinese food from when we were together and being lazy under the warm dolphin-patterned blanket that you got from your mum two Christmas ago. 

And when you walk in, I would avert my face away, pretending not to see you while my heart raced so fast it almost fall from my ribcage.

I will hold on for five minutes, pep-talking myself to be harsh. "Fiya, be mean. You can do this." It wasn't a tough break up but I have to be more assertive unlike jellyfish without spine. Over the past months, I have been trying to build this fortress to keep me away from you. Just because I needed to, just because you are still ever so inviting even after what had happened.

But soon I couldn't help to look at you and as our eyes accidentally met, I would melt like lava that slurred down the curves of an exploded mountain to your feet.

And then, I would have to say hi - with the utmost nervous, shivering voice. Right there, with all the failing plans of being stern, I would find myself back to ground zero. And I have to start to forget you all over again.

That's what's going to happen if you walk in to this restaurant now.

I would be a mess but I do still want to see you.

A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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Like Everything is Alright


I love the way you make me feel  like I was in love. Like this is how I want love to feel like. Tomorrow does not seem so scary, the past does not feel as bad and now is good. Like I don't need more. Everything is enough. The sound of your voice is the safest haven, where all my worries are flushed, melt to the ground, non-existent. My sins are forgiven and all the bad choices are amendable. Like lone wolf that has finally found its home. Like the night for fireflies. Like,

everything is alright.



A piece by : Fiya Muiz
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