Evening Walk and Literary Reflections (October 7th, 2026) by Sushant Thapa

I am here again. With this blank screen. Call it sunyata or call it lack of presence, it still is what it is. Time, what do we do with time? We devise, we create, we are empty like the white dot, but a certain white dot can make us feel alive. Why talk about time while talking about the white dot? It is because we want to feel peace and satisfaction in a white dot. The time has dragged us into the whirlpool of busy living, we forget the aesthetics of a white dot painted against blue background. Art is also what consoles the soul.

Minimalism is the new mantra. Information overload, knowing every details of each other is too much to take. Ancient humans were may be too busy in hunting, gathering and even drawing on cave walls. They did not knew everything about almost everyone. Social media headlines, videos and comments, especially the obligation of comments, the rage that is so safely expressed in social media, it is not safe at all.

I went to a walk yesterday in the evening. I saw industrial dust in front of the factories, on the road. I felt some humidity in the air, some voices calling deeply, some unknown and unclear message among the passers-by. Vehicles and machines, green fields and congested housing too. The city is not pure in its underbelly, in its inner mechanisms it keeps on ticking like the clock. I was walking, trying to find out some relief, some freedom from the rush hour. It was the title of my poem that I wrote once, “Freedom from the Rush Hour.” I was walking and I felt my eyes were walking with me too, I was capturing the scenario although I could have simply looked at the road ahead. I thought it would be injustice to the surrounding just to look ahead and not to glance sideways. I was also a visitor, walking like the thinly blowing air. What immortality do I have in front of this city and its architecture? I am a miniature soul.

Should I walk every evening? What will the world say about it? What will the city say about it? Am I allowed to measure its infinity—infinity of lives, of unspoken eyes saying something, in sadness or lightning up with happiness, of desire, of pain. Some truth facing consequences, some lives living in the consequences of their activities, some like fate, out of their hands. Some left for foreign lands to live in different stories at all. The city is hiding its pain, maybe revealing its wounds and wanting for someone to console it, like an old mother who is sick and seeks consolation. Healing is born out of consolation—maybe not scientific outright, but the science of heart.

To spill in pages, to think, to see my city closely. What it carries in the busy traffic, what makes people hurry to reach somewhere. Where are they reaching? Anywhere, beyond themselves? Maybe running away? Just look the view from your back, if you are running away. If the view is beautiful, stay. It is just for you. When I say I travel through my eyes I feel what my eyes see. Traveling through my eyes is my subjective view of the same surrounding. And for that I think man is a cursed being.

I was making some notes as I walked. The view of my back if I am running away is just for me, because I am running away from myself. No other people could feel the same way about the view from my back. Or from your back. I am trying to explain this. When you are running away from something don’t think of future. It depends but look at the view of what you are leaving behind. I was inspired to think this from a movie. I saw the insta reels about it. I find a house of hope in what I am leaving behind. I have this literary mind and there is no cure about it. It feels more, it is thirsty for words to clearly be meaningful. It wants to forget time, and last for eternity.

I am listening to the pulses of speed. How the highway works. Every vehicle has a story to tell, and every walker has a story. The highway speaks in volumes. It wakes up too early to retell news and politics. People who walk in the morning in their morning walk carry the nation in their shoulder. They discuss news too early. I am talking about the highway in Malaya Road and Rani, of Biratnagar. I have already submitted a poem that I wrote about my evening walk to Sahitya Post English. I want to develop a writing habit, and write most of the time. I am not afraid of bad writing, I heard that only bad writers say that they are good. Good writers do not. I have been listening to podcasts on how to write. The host normally invites Pulitzer prize winning authors. I feel I have a lot to learn about writing, and I enjoy about learning it. A mind is its own sanctuary. I imagine a garden with a library. I read a quote that said: I don’t like writing, I like having written. So, here I am with my writing. I want to devote a lot of time to it. And I want to change myself from I like writing to I like having written more.

Today, I wrote a second draft to my poem titled “Evening Walk” the first draft was messy. I enjoyed editing although I think it is a difficult part in writing. I normally finalize my first draft with minor changes, but this poem deserved second draft. It was a calling for me. I wanted to add some music in my verse, I have been writing free verse for seven years now. I added some musicality in this poem “Evening Walk”. I was conscious about musicality. It made my second draft writing experience golden. I had finalized the topic of my poem yesterday when I was walking.

I need to think of characterization in my fiction. I have been telling the story and carrying it forward, but I think description of characters needed to be maintained. This is not my personal inferior weakness about myself, it is what the stories demand. I was writing 1500 words fiction for The Rising Nepal, now they want me to reduce it to 1000. I have figured out that within 1000 words I am able to tighten the plot more, rather than in 1500 words. Tightening the plot that is important. For me, plot is the sequence of events in the story. It is only for precocious school boys, I heard some established writer in the USA say about it. Well, I am trying to learn writing. Hence, this diary writing is part of my exercise. My mind needs a script, and I am the one to write it. I will let the mind flow naturally. It observes, feels, questions, seeks and is on a journey to be its own master. However, I want to rule the mind and not let the mind rule me. Writing is discipline and talent alone cannot make one a writer.

I like one point of view which Ryan Holiday said. He said that he gathers information about any book before reading it. And he does not believe in spoiler alert. I love this idea. I saw a two minute clip that talked about the whole book and that made me more curious about it. I don’t think that now the story is revealed already and I will not read the book. I will read it in a better way than before. The two minute clip arouses my curiosity. And it happens that even after reading a whole book I sometimes do not know what the book is about. So, watching two minutes clip helps me a lot. Like Ryan Holiday, I also do not care about spoiler alert. I want to be near to the book I am reading in every possible way, that makes me ready for being a fastidious reader. I want to be a better reader, not just the one who keeps talking in the house with other family members, I want to be a better reader (devote my time to it) and also be a better writer. Whatever it takes away from me. I am ready to pay the price.

Most importantly, there is a benefit to writing. It does not harm anyone, until it is honest. Writing is a skill and to turn inwards can be rewarding. And not everyone will write in the same way. Some are outdoor writers of non-fiction and travel writings. But in any case, writing is a recollection, it focuses on experiences, internal or of the world. We are subjective too, and that is how we focus inwards. One expects to find answers in the world and turn inside to seek and provide perspective and to make meaning. Life needs meaning to hold on to.