Romantic philosophic vagabonding

Letters & Words

2015-01-09T11:45:00.006+05:30

Dear You, 

I have always had a fascination with words and the images, colours, emotions, situations they create and conjure when strung together. And some so beautiful and/or powerful, they do all that just by themselves. Like love. Serendipity. Destiny. Education. Society. Power. Human. God. Woman. Man. Childhood. 

Soon enough understanding them became a major joy in my life. and putting them together to bring to life my mental images, my inner struggles and tornadoes not only brought me happiness when I discovered what I could do with them but also a challenge I look forward to every time I try. A love. Something you can't let go of. Something that pushes you to be better. Something that is constant and engaging. Something that is also comfortable. Something that works on your head, heart and body. Something that is your world. Something akin to what I think love might be. 

Words, I was taught early in life by my mother, are powerful. They convey your emotions and thoughts. But one's words can also affect another's emotions and thoughts. My mother always says that no matter what you do or say, people will always remember how you made them feel. And words have a very strong role to play in that. I have always struggled to affect people positively with my words. However, it was quite shattering to realize that how people feel is not entirely in one's control but one has to try to the best of one's abilities. And I have, hopefully. As the famous Boyzone song goes, "it's only words and words are all I have to take your heart away". If not take someone's heart. .. it is to take away some time and make it meaningful. and I hope to make it worthwhile. For myself and for whoever is listening and reading. 

Amrita

Yes?

2015-01-09T11:40:00.002+05:30

I would say yes.

To being with you.
To understanding you.To knowing you better, however long that may take.To support you in all your endeavours ( because I know your endeavours will be humane)To being brutally honest with you.To giving you as many chances as it takes.To being ecstatic with you.
To taking that risk..every single day. Because love and passion is a risk. One never knows till one dives in and thereafter it is the effort to stay afloat with all of one's might.
To grow old with you.
To dreaming with you.
To be scared and fearless with you.

To loving you - every single day.

To be. With you.

I would say yes.

Would you?

Pack Rat - II

2014-04-23T20:39:00.000+05:30

I have felt the need
To find. Collect. Keep.
Store away.
Anything and everything.
To do with you.
As I sift through it all
I realize,
I've got a Piyushkin complex.
About you.

It is not doing me any good.
If you find out, it'll do me worse.
What can I do?
I hoard you.
If you say something hurtful,
I will probably hoard that too.

Waiting, I am
for when I know
how to throw it all away.
and just have you.
You see,
this is all I have
in your absence.
Stills of you
in the drawers of my mind.
That keep me company
in this abyss of stupidity.
A secret stash of you, I have.
Unshareable, it is.

My memory serves me well, doesn't it?
Does yours?
Do you store and sift?
Do you open drawers of me?
Tell me you do.
Even if only now and then.
Do you indulge
in that occasional daydream?

Greater value perceived than inherent
in a hoarder's items, they say.
How to argue with that?
Memories. Images. Sounds.
What value, hold they?
Immensely important,
Think not you?
I've been told that
I remember
"the important things".

I hoard. To remember you.
To tell you, you are important, still.
As have always been.
I just can't tell you.
Yet.

Pack Rat - I

2014-04-23T20:30:00.003+05:30

I close my eyes
You are looking at me.
So many times.
From so many months ago.
Fresh, however, in my mind.
Slowed it down
To last far longer.

You are saying something.
To me. On so many occasions
The words. Your tone.
Your gaze. Your smirk.
All the while being registered.
Now being recalled.
Replayed. Repetitively.
Reassuringly. Renegade is my mind.

You did something That one time.
Extended your arm.
In my direction.
Everyone around us
blurred till I
joined you.
our eyes never
moving away till then.

You sent me something.
A text. A mail.
A greeting. A wish.
Remembering. Reopening.
Revisiting the moment.
The joy. The anguish.
The embarrassment. The relief.
The comfortable silence.
All from you.

I open my eyes.
I eat something.
I listen to something.
I see something.
All transport me to
some catalogued memory
of you,
Coming alive again.
Stretched, in them, time to the hilt
till it freezes.
And I close my eyes again.
To reach you.

Envelopes

2014-04-23T20:19:00.000+05:30

Somewhere atop

with a helicopter view.

Watching everyone enveloped

in mechanisms of breaking

their tolerance for boredom.

I'm enveloped in mine

by watching them all.

Trying to understand

what ticks in them.

Makes them move,

each in their own

unique way.

Waiting for the time

when we break

our own envelopes.

Be with ourselves,

see how the self moves,

see what makes us tick,

observe larger patterns of

how we contribute to

the 'good' and the 'bad'.

Waiting for the time

when you come and

break my envelope.

See my 'good' and 'bad'

and still stay,

and be enveloped and

together tick and move

in our own ways,

but synchronously.

Together break

everyone else's envelopes.

Make them see 'good'

over the 'bad'

and revamp the way

they tick and move.

Revamp

envelopes, theirs and ours;

them and us.

It is...

2014-04-23T02:07:00.000+05:30

It is dark.

There is only a small sliver of light coming from beneath the closed door from the hall outside.

It is quiet.

There is only the noise of the fan whirring and slicing the air. And me typing this to you.

It is peaceful.

There is only the restlessness inside me to somehow tell you everything I am feeling.

It is heavy.

There is only the lightness in my head as I go high on the rush of expressing this.

It is slow.

There is only my heart that is beating rapidly at the thought of you reading this.

It is cold.

There is only the heat and suffocation everyone is facing and I shiver as I think of you.

It is doubtful.

There is only the certainty that you and I met.

It is now.

There is only the hope of the future. Of a moment. With you.

Just Because

2013-11-30T00:37:00.003+05:30

Just because

forwards are boring.

Just because

it is nice to know what a person is thinking.

Just because

I want to write.

Just because

I want to share.

Just because

I want you to know.

Just because

I am happy.

Just because

I want to put a smile on someone else's face!

Just because

it has been a long time.

Just because

practice apparently makes perfect!

Just because

it is fun!

Just because

we have only this one life!

Just because

there are so many reasons!

Just because

I don't need any reasons

to tell you that I am fond of you! :)

Bus Rides

2013-11-30T00:36:00.001+05:30

I love them.

How there are so many living stories travelling together in seemingly same directions.

I love the pulsating dynamics between people without words being spoken.

I love how i don't feel myself but see myself through another's eyes that are still mine.

I love being watched. I love watching myself.

I love receiving reactions. I love not responding to any reaction.

I love the indifference.

I love how there is solidarity among strangers. A utopia for a fraction of time.

How when a stranger touches me, it creates a plunge in my stomach n then increases my blood flow.

And then i calm down and realise what calm is.

I love to see how people use time. How i do so.

How two strangers talk as if they've known each other for years.

And part as if nothing happened.

The detached attachment.That i want to achieve.

I love meeting people for that short span of time n have some of them etched in my memory for a spectrum of reasons.

I love the colors that go by. In landscapes and on people.

I love the wind. Blowing on everyone.

I love the trees that whoosh by.

And at night they get their two seconds of limelight in the bus headlights,

as each cranes out their branches n then branches back into the darkness.

Symbolic of life. We come,live and go. Like millions of others.

I love watching the distant lights go by.

The various smells.

All telling their own story.

How i can create so many stories on the basis of that one moment.

How it all plays out in my head.

How it all inspires.

How it transpires.

How it makes me perspire.

How i love travel while travelling.

I love them, i do.

Butterfly

2013-11-30T00:34:00.002+05:30

Flitting from one profound collision to next,

all so effortlessly,

Should one not falter for a moment

from the impact of the first?

Or is the second concussion

the fumbling attempt to grasp the first one?

This fumbling, faltering and flitting

seems to make life;

Sometimes oh! so worthwhile.

And sometimes yet, so chaotic.

As I try to unscramble the pandemonium each day,

I chance upon purity and sheer beauty

that can take me from

chaotic comprehension

to planes of sublime emotion like

Songs that move me to tears of joy

Amid all this swooshing and crashing.

That is what I want.

Someone to share all this with.

That is what I want.

To traverse emotions and thoughts together

through an event or a non-event.

That is what I want.

To feel the joy of discovering someone else

who feels as crazily about anything and something.

That is what I want.

To feel fear, insecurity, uncertainty,

and consequently, solidarity.

That is what I want.

To challenge and stimulate

and have that reciprocated.

That is what I want.

To share this chaos in my head

and be in the eye of someone else's tornado.

That is what I want.

To be alive with someone.

That is what I want.

For someone to want with me!

That is what I want.

To have fleets of kairos.

And flit effortlessly

from one profound collision to the next.

Credit for the Title: Arjun Dutta :)

The Fake Magic Trick

2013-04-23T19:34:00.001+05:30

Amidst all the grief and resentment and anger
I see a smile. On a small face.
Eyes filled with wonder and amazement.
And what unspeakable joy that one moment brings.
Makes me forget why i am so unspeakably unhappy
That happy innocent scene etched in my memory forever
Jeegooombaaaaa
Laughter and fake magic tricks
Know what they taught me?
Happiness and faith in the unknown
Springs pleasant surprises in your way
Aah! the unpleasant ones come along too
But the former make up for it a thousandfold
So always remember that feeling
When your eyes are closed and
Your hands are open to the unknown
Excitement and fear all entwined within
And you say jeeegooombaaaaaa!
(or abra kadabra or the equivalent!)
Life is a surprise.
Enjoy it.
Before someone comes and ruins the trick!

Restless rustles

2012-03-19T22:36:00.000+05:30

Rustling under the sheets

Like the restless rustle of leaves at night

My limbs move irritably

One against the other

Manifesting the state of my mind

As memories of you

From yesteryear

And from yesterday

Jarr noisily against each other

Bringing all other thoughts

To a screeching blood curdling halt.

And then,

It all stills.

Stills of you and me

Over and over.

In different places.

Different times.

Different minds.

Slide one after the other.

Like those cheesy shows

Those mundane events gather around.

Caustic as they are,

They seem to me

Such an utter relief

As I break down

Walls of rigmarole

And

Wails of longing

Are let out.

Like eruptions of those dormant magma monsters

Like the proverbial crappy truth that sets you free.

I long for you.

My proverbial crappy truth.

That just doesn't set me free.

I am inevitably chained down.

To conventions. The convenient ones.

Those that you seem to have broken off

In a struggle.

And hiding away, you are,

In your lair

In a universe created by you.

Get your head out

From the opaque clouds it lies in.

And create that galaxy

Down here in the world

Which we creatures struggle with daily

To grasp and live in.

But ignore conveniently.

As we long for bliss.

I long for you.

My bliss.

Shattered. Shredded. Bleeding.

Dried and scabbed permanently.

Come pull it away permanently.

Pull my cowardice away.

Pull my illusions away.

Pull the curtains down, not away.

On this once and for all.

I long for you. To end.

Of me. Of you.

For you. For me.

For us.

I long.

The truth and choice of love

2011-12-27T23:28:00.000+05:30

Truth has no meaning by itself. It is only when you believe something to be true that it becomes your truth. Each one of us chooses our own truth according to our own reality or perception of reality.

Choosing. Being able to choose on your own is such heady power. It is freedom but a freedom that always seems to be tied down somewhere to someone and sometimes to the choices we made in the past and also sometimes even to choices we didn't get to make, like the family, place and religion we are born into.

Choosing between entities of non-choice (entities by birth) and a choice you grew to make, like a friend is like asking me to choose between birth and life that is lived. Each has its own place but so intricately and subtly intertwined that you never know when one would affect the other.

The choices I now make are a result of where I was born and how I was brought up (not a time when I had a choice because, even if one is given a choice at that impressionable age, it is always an influenced decision. Not an independent informed decision) and as a result of the experiences (tangible and intangible) I had and how I understood and perceived them.

Love is a choice. It is said to be freedom. I consider it to be freedom when it is "true". It is my religion. But like most religions today, it is warped and misunderstood, even by its followers. and like religion, is left to the interpretation of its followers/subscribers.

But it so often seems to me that the things we claim to do out of love for a person don't come as a choice. Some loves (yes there is more than one and yet none) are just autocratic. They are anaerobic. And some is just fear wrapped in syrup.

Very few instances of love are just free fresh air that you can take in and let out whenever you want. That is a dream. An ideal. A goal. A state of nirvana one would try to achieve and also never be understood for that.

That is the dream I choose to believe. That which is an illusion, a chemical reaction, a mirage, a fallacy to others, I believe to be my truth. And i choose love each day. In its varied forms and colors and emotions. "Each day I choose the truth I believe in."

Dear You, I wish.

2011-11-30T00:51:00.000+05:30

Dear You,

I don't know how to say this. Amidst this affection, friendship and joy we've shared, there is this deeper affection in me growing for you.

I don't think you've realised it. If you have, then you are afraid to acknowledge it and negate it because you don't feel the same.

Or I hope you've realised it and you're afraid to acknowledge because you feel the same! How I wish it were that way. It is so intense, even I pretend it does not exist. Only sometimes. Most of the times, it rears its fiery head out all the time.

I wish it were only fear of how to move from friendship to love.
I wish it were the fear of betraying your best friend, so long gone.
I wish it were for fear of telling me.
I wish it were the fear of meeting me again, for the first time.
I wish it were the fear of holding my hand again, for the first time.
I wish it were the fear of saying "I love you". But in a completely different plane.
I wish it were the fear of riding with me again, for the first time.

This started as a creative template for someone else. All in an attempt to distract me. But the more I write, the more I find it is all about you. Rather, for you.

I wish I didn't have the fear of showing you.
I wish I didn't fear telling you.
I wish I didn't fear feeling fully.
I wish I didn't fear uncertainty in this.
I wish I didn't fear losing you.
I wish, shockingly, I didn't fear you.

Words or Lines

2011-11-21T18:33:00.000+05:30

Every word that every one says
Creates lines in my mind
An image. Running like a reel.
One that is slipperier than an eel.
Hard to capture.
But one that is just in my nature.

Words. They are what must be weighed.
They are what I have wielded.
Not knowing their power.
To create. To break. To hurt.
They are what I have used.
To hide. To take shelter behind them. To prevent.
In anonymous ways.

Lines. I lose myself in.
Every stroke. Every dot.
Leaves me waking. Hour after hour.
Creates beauty, even if incomprehensible.
Words, if so, are just words.

Words require thought. Rhythm. A wordrobe.
Lines flow. They require emotion. Inclination.
Both require paper and ink!
Both I have utilised.
To love. To create. To energize.
To express. To justify. To entertain.

Both I need to command and control.
To recall whenever and however.
But more importantly.
I need to command and control
What lies within. The source.
Be it
Words or lines.

Musings on the Muse

2011-03-26T01:05:00.000+05:30

Didn't see her face the first time I sat down. Just saw her nimble hands go around her grandfather as he picked her up from the bus seat. They looked like they were about to dance. When she climbed back on to the bus, she was so frail I saw. She'd be around 7 years old. Her pink dress hanging loosely. As were her hands. Barefooted she walked to the seat in front of mine where her grandmother and little brother were awaiting her.

And then she smiled.

There the picture changed immediately. She came alive. Honestly, I came alive. And the smile stayed. On her face and mine. I went on to laugh, unable to take my eyes off her eyes.

She sat on her grandfather's lap, leaning against the seat in front of theirs and her arms caressing her grandfather's face. As I gazed wonderstruck at her movements and expressions, I suddenly realized she might be mildly mentally challenged. But all that was forgotten as we made eye contact. And she smiled.

Uff! I fell in love. Every time she did that!

The most beautiful person I have ever met. None so alive I have seen in a very long time.

She reached out and held the hand of the stranger sitting in the adjacent seat. The picture of the tiny hand on the thumb of that adult. What a photograph it would have made. The picture is going to be etched in my mind for a really long time to come. Apparently that man didn't think so. He smiled very edgily and turned away. And didn't look her way after that. (Or if he did, I didn't notice cos I was too busy scuba diving in her eyes.)

Love is so powerful, no? It can make you very uncomfortable if you are unaccustomed to it.

Love is amazing. How it springs from just anywhere and anybody. This little girl, fearlessly held out her hand and I held those tiny soft fingers. And such joy exploded on her face at that touch. Takes such courage to reach out and love. Express love. I was envious of her for being able to do that with such ease and grace. And win a person's heart instantly. Any person's. To be able to love all, in spite of everything, despite everything is such a beautiful thing and easier said than done.

It's been two days since I saw her and she reminded me of the wonder of love. And her face and her eyes keep flashing in my mind and all I can do is smile and feel a strange peace settle in. It is strangely, peacefully unsettling!

There are days I have when I just ooze love for just about everything and everyone in the entire world. Those are rare and wondrous occasions. She has taught me how lovely it is to be that way all the time. Atleast strive to be so. No doubt will be met by pessimism and negativity on the way. But it's love we are talking about here. Love. Just pure joy within. That is when it happens. Clichéd as all this sounds, it is true. And is wonderfully exhilarating. Makes you feel nothing can stop you. Everything then becomes a joy and not routine at all. Spontaneity comes along with it.

I'm back in love. And it is great.

(Dedicated with gratitude to the anonymous lovely Muse.)

Them.

2010-11-25T18:26:00.000+05:30

That one digit. The one number.

The one missed mouse click .

That letter of the alphabet.

All those commas, full-stops and semicolons.

That letter you forgot.

The phone call you missed.

That awful note that was writ.

The phone call you made.

That song. That trip. That meeting.

The person you befriended.

The person you loved. And the person you gave your heart to.

That question. And that regrettable answer.

The indicator you didn't put on.

Worse still, the helmet that you didn't.

The wrong turn on the road.

Worse still in life.

That step in the rain. Leading to immense pain.

The talk you had. The words said and those left unsaid.

That one hour.

The innocent nap. That fib.

That night. That extra shot.

The look. Oh that smooth drag.

The smile. the touch.

The decision. That surrender.

The non belief. The trust. The mistrust.

Him. Her. It.

Them. They.

Is and was. If's n but's.

Mistakes! Mistakes! Mistakes!

There's another one.

That thought.

They're lessons learnt

Never to be forgotten.

Make them. Learn from them.

Forget them. Ignore them.

Build on them. Correct them.

Take advantage of them.

Do anything.

But don’t regret them.

Certainly Uncertain

2010-10-03T16:35:00.001+05:30

Oh! the Tugging!

How it pulls me forward.

while leaving a piece of me behind.

like the cloth stuck on a nail
while the rest rips ahead.

The uncertainty of it all

causing chaos and havoc

in the now.
in the mind.

Not knowing what to do.

stranded at a crossroads

uncertain which way to go.

no signal or signboards.

Breathless and heavy.

angry and of everything, wary.

suddenly it all seems scary.
trying to find my bearings.
as the needle
of the compass of my life
sways to and fro.
like
a crazy pendulum.

While I wait
for equilibrium,
I travel the corners.
The extremities.
The middle paths.
See it all.
See myself.
Feel every sinew.
blown to smithereens.
under this uncertainty,
that is always certain.

This uncertainty, so erratic.
yet paradoxically systematic.
Making you feel infinitesimally small.
and frightened.
Rips through your confident demeanour.
breaks you down.
bit by bit.

Yet,
Some other times,
it takes you on a high
from where you can see
the entire world.
the entire direction.
and you begin
to think you Know.

Then, the entire ground
and the world you saw
slip from beneath your feet
and you just keep falling.
All the direction gone.
all the Knowing gone.
in the blink of an eye.
it all vanished.

I vanished.
In between all the falling,
I became someone else.
I am somewhere else.
From where,
there is a new world.
A new direction.

Yet again,
slapping it on my face,
there is no such thing as
Being Certain.

Caveat

2010-09-28T01:27:00.001+05:30

Cigarette butts.
Strewn across the ground.
Symbolic.
of how much closer
you're moving to that state.
of burning out
and becoming ash.
First inside.Slowly corroding.
Then all too soon,
smoke billows
as they burn you.
Your corpse.

Tree stumps.
dotting the earth.
till the horizon.
Making the beauty
look sickly, ugly.
as you rape off
all her ornaments
to anoint your home.
Symbolic the sight is,
of what is happening
to you. your body.
As it creeps in.
your blood and skin,
defiled and polluted.
succumbing to disease.
despair and death.

Black serpents.
winding their way
through crumbling land.
poison made by you.
Blue, Life-giving compassion,
provoked into
dark, outraged curses.
As negativity creeps into others,
these once rivers,
today pollute the ocean as well.
increasing their poisonous prevalence.
As you carry on
blissfully unaware.

They can sew. they can cook.
they can love and they can heal.
These very hands can
also hit and kill.
Don't challenge them.
You will start a war
which you are intended to lose.
Embrace them instead
and get enriched.
with diversity.
that difference adding
all the spice in life you need.

All analogies, good and bad
From nature.
She gives us all,
from life to language.
She will also take away all.
Heed her.
Don't test her tolerance.
Don't test those who love her.
They will give their lives for her
but
not before they take you
down a few pegs
give you a taste
of your own medicine.
You will not like it.

Now, You are warned.
Beware.

He

2010-09-28T01:05:00.000+05:30

He aPPeaRs. He diSaPPeaRs
hE sEEs. He IgNoReS
He sMiLeS. hE fRoWnS
He TaLkS. He is SiLeNt
he LOveS. he hATEs
He'S IntEREsted. he's bOrEd
hE's duLL. HE's ExCiTeD
he's straight. He's TwIsTEd
He is NOTHING!
he is everything.

Encounter

2010-09-28T00:52:00.001+05:30

A corner in the dark

Away from the nocturnal hustle bustle

Groping for each other

He pulls her hip towards him

She inhales his fragrance

Searches for something

beyond the lust in his eyes

kissing and feeling

orifices galore.

Stars and moon as witness.

Something is set off.

More base than she

ever cared to imagine.

And they played out

their carnal fantasies

and lost themselves

in the midnight blue,

Ah! what an orgasmic hue!

Under the stars

deaf to the wind

that whistles in their ears.

Lost time and space

as they lived out an eternity.

In a moment.

A fraction of a moment.

A blank one.

Nothing except,

the highest pleasure.

And as quickly as it began,

it ended.

The pleasure, as well as,

the pain that accompanies it.

Lingering and tingling, all over.

Until the next time,

their urges pull them

to another dark corner.

Somewhere. Somehow.

The Theory of Disempowerment

2010-08-25T23:24:00.001+05:30

He is oblivious of the entire world, he is so into her. That is because he is in her. He’s been there since a few months and has a few more to go. But he is the king. Nay, he is god. He thinks and everything around adjusts to suit him. He feels cold. The mother’s body temperature increases to warm him. If he is hungry, food rushes through that tube straight to his mouth. He needn’t lift a finger! This is god state.

A few months later, he is welcomed to the world with great pomp and joy. But it seems not so simple anymore to get his simple needs fulfilled. He has to cry and coo to make his wants known. A little less godly now aren’t you?

A few more years later, even the cooing and crying isn’t understood. He requires picking up the words and sentences being spoken around him by others so he can know how to tell them what it is that he desires. Even less divine now.

And so on, life goes. He begins to negotiate with all those around him in order to get his things done.

This means the power is no longer within his hands but is dependent on others. Becoming more and more ordinary, less and less divine as each day, week, month and year proceeds, he learns Co-operate & compromise.

This is the theory of disempowerment.

This is the story of us all.

We grow to accept the ordinary self, not realising that we are within. Superior to everything. With the power to create. We need only visualise. We are so scared to even visualise a reality different from what we see around us each day.

We can create another life. How powerful are we then? Why need we hesitate? Only realise that inside is where we are and proceed with the confidence of divinity that will come from building your inner confidence and courage.

Being brave and seeing a future like none other. If need be, for another.

This is the reversing of the disempowerment.

There will always be pulls and tugs and powerful ones at that, to bring us back to the ordinary, disempowered state. Because it makes others uneasy to see another excel and overcome the ordinary state they are wallowing in. This is the same reason why many a time we don’t reveal our knowledge as it makes others uncomfortable. Everybody is out to just make everybody else remain where they are, in the same old rut!

We are beyond that! We are power. We are supremo! We are divine. All within. Realise it. . Harness it. Be not afraid.

We can reverse the long process of disempowerment, if we just awaken our inner eye to our self.

Now.

(Dedicated to Rajendra Jani, my boss for introducing this to me!)

Eye of the Tornado

2010-08-17T23:33:00.000+05:30

Tears thrashing down like waterfalls/ unknown is the reason/ and so ending there is none/ fear of self awakens/ fear of the consequences of the self awakening/ fear of the unknown/ fear of sitting still and knowing the enigma that is the self/ fear of the self alone/ discomfort with the mundane/ pushing towards the esoteric/ repulsion oozing out/for the self/for the other within the self/for the wants/for the desires/for the feeling/for the existence/for the monotony/for the expectation/then/a crack/right across the centre/the last straw/Reeling under the pressure/of keeping it all together/to seem normal/to conform to the non-conformity/to stay stable/to stay unaware of the extreme awareness/ of the excruciating feeling & emotion/in order to remain sane/to find the sanity in the insanity/to continue without knowing why and yet knowing/to visualise and realise what is at the depths/to be satisfied and content/to develop and find the simplicity amidst the complexity/oh profound simplicity/you are but a chimera/

The Tornado explained.

2010-07-28T00:54:00.000+05:30

I enter the bathroom. I see the tap. For the Nth time.Water trickling away.I turn it off. For the Nth time. Every single time i enter and leave this noxious place. The speed of the trickle isn't enough to even move away the strands of hair that lie around, the black standing out starkly against the white. But the speed is enough to set off a train of nervous thoughts in my head. The scale of the situation across the world opens up in my head like an excel spreadsheet that i am so tired of seeing in the techno-crazy classes. How in a million places across this globe that is our home, people are dying of thirst. Those images of people surviving on water that has been drawn and filtered from the gutters around them. How they are denied water on the grounds of something as illogical as caste and occupation by another group of people who seem to think they rule their world (which is so minuscule, their well.)

Children. Younger, livelier, healthier. Better off than millions. Privileged. Educated. And yet, what do i see? they are throwing covers and wrappers strewn across a beautiful campus that is supposed to be one of the temples of knowledge. That is supposed to be shaping the future minds that will direct our country in a better direction. If they are like this. what education are we giving. And what I am seeing is a minute fraction of this kind of population. And then images of the millions of schools across the world pop up in my head where the kind of factory schooling is taking place where children are being brainwashed so badly they will never be able to unlearn the silent atrocities. How they are inducted into the Culture of Silence. For life. How it will take an eternity for them to realise it and try and come out of the conditioning and how millions will not. They will just float on in life thinking it is the way and the only way at that. Not realising how much damage has been done to them and how much more damage they will do, all unknowingly.

Bang! Whoosh! Zoop! Firecrackers. It's festival time all around. Beautiful rockets bursting into a riot of colors across the black sky lighting up the faces of many. Many just stop, watch and enjoy the beauty of the rockets - some zipping through the night sky and some sprinkling down in purple red and yellow. I see neither colors nor beauty this time. I see the smoke rising up through the air and adding onto the global warming. Increasing carbon dioxide levels. increasing heat. increasing melting of glaciers. More floods. More tornadoes. more droughts. tsunamis. Earthquakes. The scale of it not allowing enjoyment or appreciation. Just smoke billowing into the atmosphere. And a vision of this planet going up in smoke as well in the near future. time running out and at crazy speeds that maybe impossible to catch up with if we are to save the day, our life, our planet, our home.

Persons on the street. Small children narrowly escaping death as they move away empty-handed after begging from the vehicles when the signal changes at the crossroads. Some see a huge nexus and mafia behind these children. I see the innocence lost and the childhood ripped apart. I see a wish developing in me to take care of them. People dying of hunger and diseases so very preventable in today's age of advanced technology. People in remote areas never even heard of, living a life from another era of sparse and less, unaware of the single or two digit "growth and development" taking place elsewhere that is also supposed to reach them. People in power using, rather abusing, this situation and completely raping the iota of trust that people still have in them to get them out of this quicksand called life they lead. People unaware continuing to lead lives they have without moving up the need hierarchy! People who become aware being put down by the criminals.

Wake up each morning. Go to work. See so many more things that tug at my heart & soul that i ignore and push away some where so deep that some days it erupts from those depths with such a force that it leaves me thoroughly drained for a long time to come.

I open the newspaper at work. Murders. cold-blooded ones. motives? for shedding light on reality of the so-called visionaries and leaders and administrators of the nation. for going beyond themselves and thinking of something higher. for interfering in matters that are none of his business it seems! Anger. Sadness. Boiling and simmering. Thoughts racing in my head to abandon everything and go out and fight. but practicality and 'sense' return. Patience they tell me. Is it seriously needed or is it just another excuse to postpone?

And then i see and hear people claiming to be educated leading a life so selfish and so self-involved and blissfully ignorant of life at its zenith, of the deeper meaning of waves around them ( not that i am completely aware) that they just refuse to see another's side to the story. Leading me to wonder, how many sides to each story there are? which one am I believing? Am i being judgemental? When am i going to reach the end of this seemingly bottomless pit? Am i doing whatever I am doing just for myself? to hush my guilt pangs? Why do I do what i do and feel so strongly?

And how we, who have everything, seem to be throwing it away and wasting every minute mongering over the most materialistic mundane items when we should be trying to help others achieve at least a fraction of what we have gotten out of life's circumstances. So they can also enjoy some comfort and joy.

You may ask why one should. We haven't taken on the responsibility of the entire world. Thankfully you haven't or else this world would be in worse shambles. This human life is so ephemeral and so short. And when i look at myself (and the millions around me) i find that so many of us, including cowardly me, seem to be using our time effectively on nothing productive. We all seem to be constantly wondering on how we can take the most out of this place before becoming the manure for the cattle. And not on how we can give back what we have got which we take completely for granted. And it is not just a matter of giving back but about a basic concern for another life. And as someone rightly once said, if we cannot give life, what right do we have to take life?

it takes everything to remain positive and keep thinking every single day that something good is possible. Some days it's harder than usual and i succumb to the tornado. Yet i wake up and gather what is left of my hope that was shattered yesterday and piece it together. Just so I can move on in life. To collect the strength to remain & Be. To be something better and thus hopefully be part of the creation of something better.

The hardest part

2010-07-27T15:57:00.001+05:30

The hard part is being away from you
The hard part is this restlessness within
The hard part is this craving to touch you
The hard part is still feeling you like a protective shield all around
The hard part is the memories running like movie reel
The hard part is not being able to see you
The hard part is seeing you in everything around
The hard part is stopping the tears of loneliness
The hard part is experiencing life without you around
The hard part is experiencing life only in you
The hard part is knowing you are my life
The hard part is the inability to show my intensity
The hard part is knowing there is no going back
The hard part is knowing there is no undo-ing this
The hard part is knowing you feel the same way and Me not being able to do anything.
The hard part is the gnawing feeling that says this is going to disappear.
The hardest part.....
is just too hard to express.

So close

2010-05-22T17:01:00.000+05:30

I want to be so close to you
Like there is no beginning or end.

I want to be so close to you
I can feel your heart beating.

I want to be so close to you
That i wont know whether
Its's your heart that's beating or mine.

I want to be so close to you
our chests move together
as we breathe as one.

I want to be so close to you
that when you think, I do it
when I think, you do it.

I want to be so close to you,
there is no you and me.
There is just us.

I want to be so close to you
that there is not two
but One.