Podcast
Neurodivergent and proud (poems by Marcella Boccia)
Hosted by Marcella Boccia · IT
In Neurodivergent and Proud, Marcella Boccia, an Italian poet in Srinagar, weaves a lyrical exploration of identity, intensity, and defiance. With echoes of Yeats’ mysticism, Tagore’s spirituality, and Neruda’s raw passion—shrouded in a dark, haunting beauty—this collection delves into the depths of living with borderline personality disorder. Set against the turbulent backdrop of war-torn Kashmir, these poems mirror the fractured landscapes of both place and psyche, capturing the weight of emotions that refuse to be tamed. Through verses that oscillate between tenderness and storm, Boccia embraces the chaos of her mind as both a burden and a gift, rejecting the labels imposed upon her. A thread of longing weaves through the collection—an enduring, platonically charged connection with a Kashmiri poetry professor, a love story written in silence and distance. At once a declaration of selfhood and an act of poetic rebellion, Neurodivergent and Proud is a manifesto for those who feel too much, for those deemed too intense or never enough, for the wild-hearted souls who find solace and strength in words. Boccia’s voice burns like an uncontained fire, a song that will not be silenced.
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Love does not save me, but it holds me (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 12, 202500:02:23Tap to summarizeLove does not save me, but it holds me (Marcella Boccia)Love does not come to rescue mefrom the depths of my soul’s tempest—it does not offer its hands,glowing like stars above the chaos.No, love does not save.But it holds me,tenderly,in the way shadows hold the earthwhen the sun has gone to rest.It does not extinguish the firesthat burn within me,nor still the storm in my chest—it watches,quiet as a ghost,as I spiral into myself,and waitslike a forgotten songthat lingers in the corners of silence.Love does not heal the cracksthat grow with each passing hour,nor fill the emptinessthat stretches out,endlessly,like a barren field under a cold moon.But it holds me,in the way the ocean holdsthe waveseven as they crash against its shore.It is not a savior,not a cure for my wounds,but a soft murmur in the night—a warmth that does not burn,but touches me like a whisperthat speaks in languages I have forgotten.Love does not save mebut it keeps me from falling apartinto the dust of a worldthat has forgotten how to breathe.And in that quiet,in that steady embrace,I find a sliver of peace—not salvation,but something far more fragileand beautiful:the comfort of knowingthat I am held,even when I am lost.
Transcribe →Screams suffocated in pillows (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 12, 202500:02:23Tap to summarizeScreams suffocated in pillows (Marcella Boccia)Beneath the weight of dreams,I scream—a sound swallowed by the hollow night,a cry that never escapes my throat,its edges sharp like broken glass,but muffled, lost in the softness of a lie.In the silence of my room,where the walls are made of shadows,I am crushed by the weight of my own breath,each inhale a struggle,each exhale a surrender to the dark.The pillow beneath my headbecomes a tomb for the words I dare not say,its fabric soaked with the tearsI do not want to cry.I scream for the souls I never saved,for the love I could not give,for the promises I broke in my sleep.My voice shatters,but no one hears it—not the moon,nor the wind,nor the silence that cradles mein its indifferent arms.The scream is a secret,tucked away in the folds of my mind,where it festers,waiting for the moment to break free.But it remains trapped,suffocated by the comfort of false hope,and the pillow,oh, the pillow—it whispers back,telling me that silence is salvation.So I lie,the scream still lodged deep in my chest,a fire smothered by the weight of my own shame.And I breathe in,and out,as the night wraps itself around me,silent and heavy,a reminder that some screams are meant to die in the dark.
Transcribe →Dying and reborn in the same hour (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 12, 202500:02:12Tap to summarizeDying and reborn in the same hour (Marcella Boccia)In the hour when the sky bleeds into the earth,I die—not in the silence of a distant night,but in the trembling breath of dawn,where life and death make love,their bodies woven in the threads of shadows.I die in the arms of a memory,one too fragile to hold,its weight a river that cannot be crossed,its waters too bitter to drink.The past pours over me,its fingers leaving bruises,each one a story I no longer wish to tell.Yet, in the very same moment—I am reborn.A fragile flame stirs in my chest,its flicker weak, but not extinguished.From the ashes of my grief,a new world rises,its edges sharp like the promise of rain,its sky unclouded by the weight of old wounds.I am born of a river I did not choose,its currents dragging me under,and yet, I swim.My body is both broken and whole,a contradiction as old as the wind,as certain as the sun's return after the storm.I am dying and reborn,a cycle too tangled to untie.In this brief, fleeting hour,I am both dust and stars,both prisoner and freedom,both lover and lost.And in the silence that follows,I find myself anew.
Transcribe →In the arms of nothingness (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 12, 202500:02:15Tap to summarizeIn the arms of nothingness (Marcella Boccia)I lay myself down in the arms of nothingness,where shadows breathe like lovers,and silence carves its name into my soul.The void holds me close,its cold fingers trailing along my spine,each touch a whisper of the world undone.No stars hang in the sky,no moon to guide my sorrow,only the weight of empty promisesthat echo through the chambers of my heart.I have forgotten what it means to dreamand yet, I dream in the dark.The earth beneath me is a grave,and I, a wanderer lost within my own skin,searching for a voice in the whispers of ghosts.The night speaks in riddles,its tongue sharp and broken,teaching me the language of the unspoken.In the arms of nothingness,I am both lost and found,drowning in the silence that blooms like a flowerwithout petals, without roots.There is no escape from the hollow inside me,no refuge from the echoes that hunger for release.And yet, I remain—a flicker of somethingcaught between the suffocating breath of the voidand the fading light of the world I left behind.I am not dead, not yet alive—just a heartbeat in the arms of nothingness,waiting for the momentwhen I will be nothing at all.
Transcribe →Poetry keeps me alive (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:01:53Tap to summarizePoetry keeps me alive (Marcella Boccia)Poetry is the breath I stealfrom the silence of the earth,a thief who robs the night of its secrets,and leaves me trembling,naked in the light of unsung stars.It is the fire I drink,its heat turning my veins to flame,until my skin crumbles into ash—and I rise again,reborn in words that echo in the shadows.Poetry keeps me alive,when the world falls silent,when the weight of history crushes my bonesand time, like a shadow,eats away the hours.It is the rhythm of my heartbeat,the pulse that races in my veins,the whispers of a love lost in war,a rebellion against the darknessthat tries to swallow my soul.When I am broken,and the world speaks in curses,poetry is my salvation—a thousand arms that pull me from the abyssand stitch my wounds with ink and fire.It is the laughter of forgotten dreams,the cry of children left behind,the hope that rises from the ashesof a world that has forgotten how to live.Poetry keeps me alive,like the wind that refuses to die,like the ocean that calls to the shore,like the stars that burn even in the darkest skyit is the pulse,the breath,the life that never stops.
Transcribe →The day I got lost (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:01:45Tap to summarizeThe day I got lost (Marcella Boccia)The day I got lost, the sky turnedits face away, no longer blue,the clouds wrapped their bodies in the scent of ash,whispering secrets only the wind could hear.I wandered, not knowing where to go,but feeling each step echo through me,as if my feet were tracing forgotten roadswhere names had been erased long ago.The earth beneath me was a stranger’s touch,cold, unfamiliar, a tremor in the soil,and the trees, once silent companions,wept their leaves into the winds of time.I stood still, waiting for the stars to call,for the moon to cradle me in its silence,but no light reached my eyes,and no sound broke the sorrow that lay heavy on my chest.I got lost in the spaces between heartbeats,where memory fades like distant thunder,and the echoes of my nameare swallowed by the hollow of the universe.It wasn’t the map I lost,but the sense of home—the quiet knowing of where to place my soulamid the ruin of my thoughts.The day I got lost,I found myself in the cracks of time,holding my breath,waiting for the world to remember my name.
Transcribe →Drinking darkness in small sips (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:01:44Tap to summarizeDrinking darkness in small sips (Marcella Boccia)I drink the darkness in small sips,savored like wine from a shattered glass,its bitter taste a quiet kissupon the lips of a haunted past.The moon bleeds a pale, tired light,casting shadows that twist and crawl,whispering secrets to the night,secrets I cannot recall.In the hollow of my chest,a storm brews, silent and fierce,I cradle my soul in its unrest,swallowing sorrow with every tear.I drink the night, like I drink my rage,slowly, savoring each drop of pain,as if to taste the poison’s wageand find some comfort in the strain.The world is a blur of fading stars,a canvas smeared with ash and grief,and I, a wanderer behind the barsof my own mind, searching for relief.But I drink, for in the dark,I am not afraid to feel the weight,to taste the poison, bite the bark,of this heavy world, this broken fate.Drinking darkness in small sips—I find my solace in the sting,as each swallow burns my lips,and yet I ask for one more drink.
Transcribe →Invisible scars (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:01:44Tap to summarizeInvisible scars (Marcella Boccia)The silence hums beneath my skin,a thousand whispers stitched to bone,echoes of wars only I have fought,blades of memories I have not known.I carry scars that no one sees,etched not in flesh, but in the mind,where shadows paint with tender easethe stories that were left behind.The world looks at me and wonders whymy smile trembles like the autumn leaves,but it does not know the weight I hide—the tears that never fall, but grieve.Invisible scars, they cut so deep,not with steel, but with unspoken pleas,the kind of pain that never sleeps,the kind that blooms and never leaves.I am the phantom in the mirror’s gaze,not a victim, but a warrior, still,my wounds are invisible, yet they blazewith the fire of an iron will.So I walk through this world unseen,holding my scars, and holding my crown—for every wound that lies betweenis the strength that will never drown.
Transcribe →I am not my pain (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:02:48Tap to summarizeI am not my pain (Marcella Boccia)I am not my pain,though it has worn me like a second skin,etched in the deep lines of my face,woven through the silence between my breaths.It has touched my bones,taught my heart to breakwith the precision of a forgotten lover's kiss,but I am not its prisoner.I am not the scarsthat mark my flesh like a mapof every war I’ve fought within—each one a victory,each one a woundthat whispers its story in the dark,but they do not define me.I am more than what was takenor what was lost.I am the wind that risesand tears through the dust of the past,carrying with it the scent of a worldnot yet ruined,not yet broken.I am the voice that risesfrom the ashes of my own despair,shaking the earth beneath my feetwith the roar of somethingthat will not be silenced.I am not the tears that falllike fragile promises forgotten in the rain,nor the hollow nights when the moon is just a ghost,its light a whisper of what could have been.I am not the darkness,though I have danced in its embrace,nor the shadows that follow melike unwanted memories.I am the pulse of lifethat refuses to die,the flicker of lightthat refuses to dim.I am the silence that speaks louder than words,the breath that fills the spaces between the beats of a broken heart.I am not my pain,though it has walked beside melike an old friend.I am the one who rises—the one who survives.
Transcribe →Hands that shake, mind that screams (Marcella Boccia) 🎧 English
Feb 11, 202500:02:22Tap to summarizeHands that shake, mind that screams (Marcella Boccia)My hands tremble,as though they hold the weight of the worldin their bones,a tremor passed downfrom the shadows of my ancestors,their silence echoing in the pulse of my skin.They shake in rhythms I cannot break,as if the air itself conspires to pull them apart,to scatter my soul like dust to the winds.The mind,oh the mind,it screams,a fire that cannot be tamed,a beast clawing at the cage of thought.It whispers of forgotten dreams,of untold stories wrapped in chains,drenched in the blood of the unsaid.It fights against the silence,against the stillness that demandsI stay quiet,but I cannot—I will not.There are nights when the world presses down,when the weight of the moon feels too much to carry,and the darkness grows heavywith the weight of things left unsaid.In those hours,my mind is a battlefield,a storm that howls with the fury of a thousand lost souls,and my hands—they shake.I reach for the fragments of peace,those fragile, fleeting moments when the silence is soft,but they slip through my fingerslike sand in a storm,leaving nothing but the screamof my own nametorn in two.Hands that shake,mind that screams—they are bound in a dancethat cannot be broken,two parts of a soulthat cannot rest.
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