Synonym

Depressed
Miserable
Cynical
Unhappy
Senile
Philosophical
Tragic....

Lazy.

I saw stars

My life has the perfect plot, the cast is missing. I have all these stories in my scattered head, the dreams that never came true, the side of the moon I never saw, the faith I couldn't instill, the leap I couldn't take, the life I never made. It's the slip into the beeline of butterfly existence that forever keeps me going. But it's those smiles I'm wary of faking that pull me down. I wait for epiphany to strike and it never comes to me. I seek the company that I can't stand beside to.

Kaali Peeli

This post was quite overdue and owes all allegiance to an assignment meant to discover Mumbai. The un-cut story Meter Down...


" Three months after shifting to Mumbai, I wanted to know more about the city of dreams. I found the perfect guide in Ballu Jadav, a tobacco-chewing taxi driver from Byculla. We start our journey from Lalbaug’s Chiwda Gali, driving towards Pherbunder in Byculla. “This is where I live,” he flaunts, pointing towards a patli gali.

The skinny streets lead into one of Mumbai’s many chawls. Remains from the previous day’s dahi-handi clutter the lanes. The open square laced within vertical pigeon holes houses disparity. Vegetable vendors sit in a corner, barbers in another, children chase hens and a butcher sits proudly at an end overlooking a mandir. Ballu’s voice brings me back from my stupor, “Have you seen Black Friday? The chase was shot here,” he informs, hoping to impress with his vast trivia on Bollywood.

We head back to his beloved taxi and drive over J J Flyover, zipping past Rani Bagh, Victoria Church, Palace Talkies and Motibai Reading Room. I absorb the altering landscape with alerts from the garrulous Ballu. “I slept here for 20 days when I was new in Mumbai, 12 years ago,” he reminisces about the Rajabai Clock Tower. Renting in the suburbs, this was my first intimate acquaintance with South Mumbai, in all its colonial splendour.

Ballu slows down at Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus and introduces me to his friend Rahim who runs the crowded Canon Bhaji Pav stall outside. Licking off the greasy plates, we speed off to the next pit stop. My cabbie’s affinity for storytelling shifts from Bollywood to the macabre. “This is Ajanta Talkies. An encounter took place at the exact spot we’re standing,” he says ominously, hoping to elicit a shudder.

While South Mumbai sprawls, Ballu’s meter hastens and we move to Khushrobaag, a famous Parsi temple. “I get my wife here a lot. She forgets we are Hindu sometimes,” he laughs. Since cinema-hall- hopping is his idea of getting to know Mumbai, he takes me to Minerva next. Driving past Mumbai’s biggest red light district, Kamathipura, Ballu accelerates with concern, “Don’t come here alone”.

He then declares the South Mumbai session complete and we head to the suburbs with little time to spare. Dadar throws up Maratha Mandir, and at Mahim, Ballu points to all the memorable kebab stalls, which feed teeming people who visit the mosque. A ‘townie’ at heart, Ballu has little to sermonise about the suburbs. Skipping Bandra, we halt at Juhu Garden, with a life-size airplane replica mid centre. “You must sit inside and dream that you’re flying,” he philosophises.

Halting at the final destination, also a theatre, Bombay Talkies in Malad, Ballu good naturedly presents a tab of Rs 1,000. He drives of with good tidings, singing Musafir hoon yaroon, na ghar hai na thikana. I ring home and announce, “Mom, I dared.”

Now five days a week, a shared cab takes me down to town each day. Strangers fill the inch space between each other and the touch doesn't feel alien anymore, but alike: Human. The small concave window overlooks the sea and there is that much distance between cramped and vast space. The sudden realisation then dawns as you sit next to new skins each day. There is openess here after all.

Leaky Cauldron

It's been a week of acitvity, fragments of insipid events stictched into a strectehd fabric of sequences. Some of it I wish I had dreamt. You know what they say about reality being stranger than fiction...I seem to be endorsing the metaphor lately.

It started with the dawn break of true-blue monday morning. (disclaimer: this might not read in one sequence, considering my fish-like memory often troubleshoots when too much happens). An enoying drip-drop woke me from my deep slumber in an alien bed. Too many bedrooms in too many days, I realised I hadnt let my back rest on my coir for over a week now. I missed the pokes of the familiar mattress. Tonight, must sleep at home. Right?Hustle out to work. Today's a date with Will Smith in town. Must reach on time. Fell out onto the street straight to colleague's loft. No deo, no hairbrush, luckily managed to find tooth counterpart, no milk (hope I make it through the day sans lactose and coffee. Sigh!). Run to the train station with a sudden realisation. No laptop. Too late to run home. (which with its overload of women, seemed unfamiliar) Borrowed Su's and caught the legend on screen, not before an escape run into rail authorities (no ticket. Right, must get renewed). Lets chant. Havent done for a month now. Works. Reach the legend in the hall. Coffee follows in barista and then off to work. On one of those bad-look days, I with Su make my TV debut. What follows is a half hour of posing as an offline addict on the Marine Drive. Overlooking the Arabian Sea, the brown mucked and oily haired me sat on my very fat day onto the promenade, gazing into the expanse with my laptop. I was the official wannabe. Right? just when I needed the realistaion that I have no LIFE!

Braving through the day, tuesday came and went in a flurry of action. Books, music, movies, phone calls, actors, impending realisation of non-existant love life, visiting a friends exhitbition, dinner. The usual. Met up with fave industry person. I call him the player and we exchanged a dinner. Some more dirty secrets shared and some glasses of lassi later, we were out of Papa Pancho. That night, I slept at home to the sounds of a leaky tap, spurting water.

Wednesday morning, there was a riot in the bathroom. The rusted geyser had broken into a fountain and for the next three nights, sleep eluded us. I woke between nightmares and pleasant dreams of a walk through Johnny Depp's blood spurting From Hell or the foaming stream of Niagra Falls. Scenes from Thr Ring and Dark Water filled me listlessly and I had offiicially been converted to a morning, daylight zombie. Finally I was getting better at the Zombie fights on Facebook. Bite chump! bite! bite! bite!

Finally met up with Vicky Mama and Mutki Bhaiya for dinner. Two sides of the family caught up and we shared nostalgia over dal, keema and phulkas. In those few hours, faith reaffirmed. Blood is thicker than water and beneath it all we all are lonely megalomaniacs. But the best compliment was yet to come. And the same was in the form of a gesture from a TV production house. The big ass films (I'll stick to the name. No need to hurt the sentiments of the real people involved). In those pancakes of face grease paint, vermillion, over decked garb...I read out the part of a vamp finishing with the summation, "I can't take no for an answer."

Sleepy sunday has me tucked in. Maybe a round of Sex and the City. The geyser has been fixed and all taps replaced by the efficient local plumber, Jaya Ram, whose Mumbaiya held me in wonder (still acquainting self to the spilling lingo). Except for when I sit here, I peek into the kitchen, where a drip-drop threatens to erupt from the water canister. Another week?

Temptations

What does one really do in a state of surreptious drukeness. Fight battles endearing to Ego vs Soul (somehwat like Alien vs Predator. No winner). But composed on a yo-ho-ho Bottle of Rum (old monk please!) over candlelight and Beatles...ergo!

Saturday Night?
No someday right.
Losing Heat?
No losing feat.
Mirror crackling smile?
No scary look, senile.
Washboard abs and together bosom?
No a scene from Floppy, the Sodden Mom.
Roaring Sex life - love, romance, wine, candles
No aphrodesiac nights over plunered waddles.
Casablance?
No a Fish called Wanda?.
Lovely?
No Lonely
Freud?
Yes Freud.
Ha! I win. We agree to the master
The grandmaster of frustrated potency...we do?

Free Fallin'

It's finally time to rant. The gifts of an overactive life have slipped in the demon I went to sleep at nights with, laziness. But free wheelin ghosts seldom rest and there is finally steam flowing from the backburner. The cheer is back and so is the Holiday season. After the lights and crackers burnt out the candles through my first moonless night away from mama's nest. The frost-less winter of Mumbai will give me my first jingles through the grapevine of red, green and mistletoes. It's good to be back and scribbling again!

Spilling Margharittas

Splish, splash the punch goes
Bloody red stains in the botton of the glasss
Cynics yell when the olive dances
Couldn't tell why the stirrer shook out the grime
The bittersweet misery swallowed in whole
The feet began to talk a language of their own
There's only so much one can say or do
When the glass tips over and you say, 'Cheers to you.'
It's a toast to the lines in between
Pack a punch, it hits where it hurts the most
It’s never a blast,
The coyote ugly cocktail of words

Animals in the Attic

“What am I missing? What…is…..hmmm.. what is it that I cannot see?” she wondered as she wailed watching a queer familiarity on the tele this night. She watched her reflection cry and scream. Stunned by the sight, she felt a dampness roll down her cheek. Was it the mirror or the scope – one would never know. . .

It’s the law of nature and an immaculate sense of banishment that sets a fear of loathing and longing. Spider webs seem to trap rattle snakes too, and she was but human. At times like these the line between misfortune and fortune seems to diminish. Lucky to have faculties as a Human or senses as another animal? “Ha! Human – universe’s strangest flawed creature,” she thought as she gazed and cried more.

What pained, she didn’t know.
What was instinct, she had forgotten.
What heart, she had misplaced.
What mind, she had lost.

Is there a salvation – some hope, sugar and a little spice. Is there – where?

“But why do I cry,” she thought, even as her face contorted in agony. Yup, it is at times like these, when you need it the most, Metallica’s symphony, ‘Nothing Else Matters’ is missing too.

Wednesday and a Thursday have come to pass. A Friday is upon…still no answer. To where, to where?

Maybe no rescue, no answers are to come. “Is this a realization?” an exhausted heart objects with one last attempt. Maybe not. Hope is left.

“Ha! Human. She doesn’t know what she wants,” the crow, the pigeon, the beetle and the spider all whisper. The universe will moan, because she moans.

Let it Be...

There are sullen memories that refuse to leave even when they no longer swell your heart and send a flush like they did. With each new moment, the last frame is erased clean. But sometimes, just sometimes...it revisits. They come often, wrapped up in a rhythm of a familiar tune.

Like the soft, mournful moaning of Adam Lavine’s ‘She will be loved’ that turn in the wheels of a 1987 green Maruti on the wide, expansive roads of dry September Chandigarh. 3pm lazy drive to the office, when all thoughts rested on the song and we drove with a heavy heart in memory of the midnight song a someone had once crooned. And another autumn romance that flickered and died in the season of decay. Or a sweetly morbid ‘Autumn Leaves’ that races to a Mohali room, where a friend had serenaded a November sun, while the beta tape captured poetry in motion. Opeth’s ‘Hope Leaves’ is a road-trip to Helsinki’s alleys that never ended in the still of the black night – where the dead played merry and the winds played God.

Kulu-Manali stretch in the summer of mammoth landslides, when we slept out of unpacked suitcases in a friendly neighbourhood picnic in the summer of 1990 that was spent in a 1984 white Maruti with ‘Ram Lakhan’ and the season’s flavour ‘Kabutar Ja.’
Coldplay’s ‘Trouble,’ ‘Yellow’ is a frequent transport to the sterile corridors of a early morning advertising agency that took colour of mental infestation through the day. Then of course is my room, with this very monitor, many heartbreaks, many pages, many tears, many smiles, many flutters, many a touch – the mellifluous melodies have poured words on paper too often. Audioslave, a constant companion on a January Delhi- Noida toll road. Work to deception to deep friendship – all in a day’s work and my first road trip back home with a willing companion – no a dear friend. Or when the mirror danced with me on ‘A Delicate’ and ‘Life’ morning.

And then the reason for all music – the Irish flute, the Danish violin, the Spanish guitar and the English piano – and of course Christmas – a beautiful medley of all things ‘Train,’ ‘Jimi Hendrix,’ ‘Janis,’ ‘Van Halen,’ ‘Led Zeppelin,’ ‘Pearl Jam,’ ‘Neil Diamond,’ ‘Sinatra’ too, ‘Joe Satriani,’ ‘Metallica,’ ‘Megadeth,’ ‘Rage against the Machine,’ ‘Red Hot Chilli Peppers,’ ‘System of a Down,’ ‘Dream Theatre,’ ‘U2’,‘Nirvana’, ‘Oasis’…

There is a new wave that’ll take me back to this moment later maybe – a certain ‘Coloublind’ Dave Mathews questions ‘Where are you going?’ Or could it be ‘beautiful’ Garbage rolling in when the ‘Saints are coming’ on a Greenday. Maybe maybe maybe…

I’ll always have my music*…

Keeping it Ajar

But for how long???

Mumbai times

Some people, places, faces need to be written about. And this has been a week of discovery. I finally found my music back. The parasitical beast seems to have spit me out, my back seems a lot freer than it felt. So this is my version of Maximum City, with all apologies to the vastly talented Suketu Mehta.

The week got off to a brilliant start. Monday morning blues took a paling beating. I met a fellow city gal, one who smiles down from one of those massive Mumbai hoardings and is treading deeper in tinsel town. Gul Panag met me with concerned verve and smiled warmly. Abhay Deol for tuesday lunch got me deeper into finding my way back home, as the Punjabi affluent actor spoke to a lost me as a reminder of allgood things back home. Wednesday saw work get crazier, but Thursday morning had me driving around town looking for my Mumbai. And the evening spent with a visitor from home sprucing up streets of Mumbai for me. The weekend that followed brought the music back. I attended I-Rock, met friends, new rock junkies and an ol' someone who rekindered a flame, the same that almost led to fire last night. But a cab drive to Lonavala at 4am in the morning to meet Pardeep Sarkar, made it a lost cause.

Now at work thriteen hours hence, I am getting my lost harmony back

________________

Paper? burnt

Pen? broken

Ink? vanishing

Words? lost

It's been said

The worst is already over

waiting for the rising

I Feel

“Sometimes the emotions becomes too powerful for the mind to control, the unimaginable pain takes over the heart and the body weeps,” Seth, the angel.

And suddenly there is this tremendous patience. The hand pauses, the restlessness is interrupted, there are long shadows pressing to stay, the hours are gliding slower and the only sound I can hear is this vast expanse of silence intermittent with my episodic pulse, my heat beat, my throbbing temples and the jitter in my teeth…

The numbness is being washed away and I spy a heaviness in my throat. Am I going to weep? Are the glands going to overreact? Is there going to be a lost tear resting on my cheek, falling on my dry lip, cascading three inches below my collar bone?...

I don’t need an answer. I’m content with this reassurance that I’m not dead inside. There is life in these veins and this blood rushing through to my brain and flushing down to my toes. There is a tingle…

I’m tied in my freedom. I’m bound to myself from liberation of spirit. I’m in knots and I’m relieved I’m for it.

Wim Wenders always works wonders on a sleeping heart. It did on mine. Thankful for that Utopian City of Angels. There is never a leaving. I feel empowered. I can feel...

Top of a Porcupine Tree

A bubble floating in aimless space
amiss on a grapevine of desire
a guttral broke into a riff of bass
ever wondered the sound of crackling fire?

Broken verses stitch together words
random musings wither away sanity
wash them off like slipping soap suds
the drain - a resting place of vanity

This new city of dreams
promises to set free
but what about silent screams
that inhibits the verb - being from me

All forces must retreat in the still of the night
the unwritten law proclaims full to abide
for a wind and string propel even a liberated kite
it is to break, fall and be brisked to the side...

Post Script

Now that Mumbai local has opened the door, just...

Happy Feet

I finally have things to say and stories to tell. Prompted by K to talk. Maybe I'm finding my music back or probably the melody is sifting back to me. But I'm finally home.

The city of butterflies and big waves has let me sink in one feet under. The tarmac and the rail track has been running smooth and offering me a seat. The unbrella is staying erect and not letting the rain soak me through, well manybe just a little. I have a school of fish that swim with me in the same express aquarium. The waters turn murky sometimes. But they are to, I suppose. For how will the red settle and grapes mature, if they wont turn murky and decay. The wine cellar is open wide, seven days a week.

The toes tap dance too and the sand is escaping beneath.

My feet are firmly planted and now not waving in the wind for now they have company...

Homeless

And it beigns...the period of self loathing.

When all else feels like a dismal dream
the mind refuses to acknowledge
the pen's wielded, but the ink has flown out

and I've lost my music too. There no home.

Warped & Twisted - VI

I picked up my 1100, browsed my contacts, yearning for a cup of coffee...and then I kept browsing. ...
Looking for my window of hope.
Felt loneliness in this big, friendly town.
Have a feeling its a first of many more to come

I hope it pours soon

Just a thought...

There is nothing more tragic than the forced chains, we bind ourselves into. Our - the community's version of contorted realities....
Rules...
Regulations...
Norms...
Traditions...
Will there be no living????

Death in a bowl of sugar - II

She comes again. Only this time it’s a distilled image of a dear friend inched in torment and anguish. It’s a word called pain, the oh so familiar deviant friend that visits us often - the one that lurks behind shut doors, slings onto our backs along clustrophobic corridors, is a constant gardener who mans our seeds of growth. And she comes dressed in finesse whispering th chants of decay and pulling soul hearts all along.

She visited again today at 15.30 and took away someone.

Will we walk again tomorrow - like we day each day closer to the valley of death!!!!

Train of thought

It's been long... since the last and the first.
The last scribble and the first workplace.

Finally have it. My contract letter came in today. I'm now bound. No more freewheelin', no more trips on the wings of fancy to the ends of the World. A legitimate employee of some firm, with some designation and a credited journalist. Press(ed) for all things that were and will follow now on. So what should I write first. About the move? The first day at work? The first byline (again!) The first trainspotting ride (again!) The first gaylord orgy (a definite first view).

This'll read more like a journal, a record of everyday affair. Of course random ramblings including (can't separate the S or the Z from that. The cult of nothingness, a wisdom passed on from a fellow blogger who weaves great tales in dreams :-p)

So the wisdom of dreams culminates into reality and I find myself on a bustling lifeline trasport of Mumbai (the city where I now work in) - the train. The whole of last week, I travelled from M to C and got off the station to walk down to L, where my office resides. The walk takes me a good 30 minutes. The return was in the caring confines of my Uncles Opel Swing for Mum was still around. She left yesterday and today I attempted to take the train thing back home too, a first. The problem with the firsts in Mumbai is that though you may have done the routine many times before, it feels new each time you do it again - for new landmarks formulate as quick as they dissolve. Great transitions, no wonder the film industry resides here. Anyway, the train back home. The routine 30 minute walk after a cancelled coffee plan in the midst of humid sweat breaks, smells of fowl foal that will be someone's meal soon and the maddening traffic...all to the station where I shall finally board my ride home. The only thing separating me from the tarmac is the platform ticket. But where is the darned ticket counter? Where is it? Where is it? Out east? West? No? 'Oh no! It's on the North side Maam. Can't cross the platform. They'll catch you,' a stranger guides. 'And where is the Northern side,' a trying look. 'Near L, on the birdge of course,' guide points. Geography comes back to my head. Northern end of the platform is on the bridge that runs out onto the street adjacent to my workplace. And I walked each day last week to work in pearls of sweat, triumphant in spirit, when in fact it is just a 2 minute sprint across office. 'Brilliant!' I thought to myself. And I smiled, turned back and walked back to work, laughing and smiling all the way to the north end of the station, got myself the Rs4 ticket that would take me home. Got on with the rush hour wave and got off with the same wave
Reached home to David Gray, Garbage and Bridget Jones. And now sinful temptations of course. How I missed thee!!!

Forgiven wisdom

There is this eternal restlessness of spirit
A sudden sinking of heart
The door is ajar, but quick closing on me
Boxes, bags, rubbish have been emptied out...

"I am leaving...
soon!"

Brand Ho!

Clarity distills, as does a meeting with a self-confessed, honest hyprocrite. Amidst a vacant week and another week to exceeding work load, I found one person who told me whether I like it or not, I too am a brand seeking positioning. Just another pea in a pod, but one with a rim called Z or S.
Or just another window in cyberspace, but one with format that reeks of a 'third dimension to me.'
Anna Bredmeyer, this 'some bits' space I tell the world who you are, not just my city..... Anna's story.

I'm entering contests

So I'm not one to write stories. Heck, never could really carve one out, except for Sounds perhaps and all you readers made me feel encouraged...

So taking a cue from Nothingman, I got myself into the The Moon Topples story contest....

This one was on growth and I wrote something on autumn leaves. Entry #7 check it out.....at moonless to comment on what you guys think, or you could just simply vote :-)

see ya on a writing trip.......

Sounds

There was a silence left from the resonance of a supersonic whistle.
A gap in the cosmic of sound, which lingers till it deafens you to its mere presence.

In the deep, narrow gashes left in the road of freshly laid tar, that fissured with the pressure of a heavy vehicle radial, words spewed out like silent echoes deafening into sound waves.

No one knew how long those whispers had been rising from the deep gash. Just that the gash whispered a constant cosmos of sound and no one heard now. Almost certain, some passers by paused and would swear they heard a sharp twang of painful cry. But it lasted for perhaps a fifth of a second before dissolving into an inaudible decibel. Some even lent their ear to the road. Like I said, no one knew.

And no one told me about it either, when I walked that little street. “Ssss…” I heard, like a passing train. I was almost sure I heard someone pass by, a breath on the nape of my neck. It was the gash. I bent to cover the gash with my hand and felt this surge of sudden heat. I drew back to inspect a burn I was certain would be there. “It must be my mind again,” I thought to myself. The teacher at the institute was always telling me that. I was having one of those psychic moments. Only there was nothing. Odd, I bent again. “Sssaaveeeee…” I felt an eerie tingle of syllables vibrating across my ear. The gash had a crack line above that lead to the end of the street and fell into the man hole.

I don’t know why I did it. Maybe humanity or curiosity. It just made me tumble to the man hole and lift the cover. A geyser of water slushed out and emptied into the green. And suddenly, silence broke like a blimp of a blank TV screen that has been left on and now is suddenly shut. Audio waves crumpled down. I fell and woke up in a sanitised, blue room with doctors wording sentences. And all I could hear was, “ssssssss…” It had been two days since I was out. I frowned and someone held out the newspaper.

Headline: “The mystery in the gash was water trapped in the under belly of the road.” Lead: Movement made the water ripple and the sound was made due to pressure interpreted as hissing. Reports say, a girl opened the cover and let the stream out. The ghost has been set free.

That afternoon I was ready to go home. But first I had to go to school. I’d missed out on two days. The teacher asked me if I was ok. “Sure I said,” in sign language and a cosmic sound. “It helps being deaf. We can hear things no one can,” I smiled and went into my class of ‘Hearing Disability Students.’ I almost heard her hiss out, ‘psychic,’ behind my back. We’re studying Earthquakes and ocean currents these days.

Can-sure

To lose someone is never easy
and to be reminded of the loss is even more distressing.

But...
all the tears
all the pain
all the grief
all the disdain
all the grey
all the decayed butteflies
all the wilted roses
all the santised corridors of blue death

This one photo feature of Pulitzer prize winner, Renee C for her work on a mother and her son battling with cancer speaks to me, whispers shadows in my ear. How can I not listen and tell..... Sure you can hear. Right here.

Things we do

I don't mean to be lovesick
But for S ...

Those bandy words within our locked arms
And lean your restlessness against mine
We go unknotting the web they bestow
As you lay down your history against mine

When they take your name in your absence
Their awed caesura thrown asunder against mine
How you allay your ditzy, dancing moths
To cross your salmon flame against mine

It is in our little battles in the dark
While you lie lost in the moonlight
That I trace ephemeral drops of your displeasure
Slaying them with kisses, their life against mine

You take my hand and touch my face
You’re the only one I notice in the expansive space
We’re now dancing in shadows of flickering light
Holding each other close, holding each other tight
You kiss my neck and then touch my face
Then kiss my lips in a loving embrace
Time stands still whilst we are together
Feels so good, it seems like forever

He was here and now he's gone . . .

Being Indian

or, The truth about why the 21st Century will be India's. This book, published by Penguin, cost me just Rs 250 and the back cover says that it is for sale in the Indian Subcontinent and Singapore only. How odd. Btw, I have not finished this either - I've been distracted by The Argumentative Indian and my rediscovery of my 500+ book collection from which I've extracted a few old favourites.

I'm also still digesting much of what it means to be Indian, something I rejected being, quite honestly, for most of my rebellious life.

Pavan Varma is a diplomat, his biography seems to imply an erudite, well read and well travelled gentleman who evokes a subtle sense of Pico Iyer in his approach and writing. I'm not comparing the two, no one comes close to Iyer in his distinctly global style, but the faint whiff perhaps of mixing Indian with British with a touch of the world feels familiar. I've only completed the first chapter on the relationship that Indians have with power - political or fiscal - rather than charismatic or physical, and it's been a learning exercise for me. I purchased this book for myself, to satisfy my desire to understand what it means to be Indian.

Being Indian - the title itself is so evocative of the complexity of any nationality, race and culture. I carry an Indian passport, of this I am sure, and my skin is brown, my hair black (let's ignore that occasional colours, shall we?) and my eyes brown. Yes, that means I'm Indian. Ethnically. But what about culturally?

What has changed ? Is it the author's perception of things or is it a more fundamental change in ground realities? Or is Varma saying that the take-off stage has been achieved not because of the middle classes he censured earlier but in spite of them? Varma's book makes for good reading.

But should it also make the Indian in you feel good? It depends. Depends on whether you believe ends justify the means. Depends on whether you accept hypocrisy as a way of life. For Varma's evaluation of the forces that fuel India's launch into the new century makes it clear that there is a lot that is unscrupulous and hypocritical in the Indian's way of life that has served him well. This, a friend, has echoed to me time and again. The one, who has grown up in a literal global village.

But while Varma does draw our attention to the gross inequities and prejudices that are still prevalent in every walk of Indian life, the fire in the belly seems to have burnt out somewhere along the way, the sense of outrage dimmed. The result: the Indian middle class that he urged to introspect or perish may actually feel great on reading his new book.

As the book suggests, India is bigger than the sum of its parts. But the "big thing" that emerges is neither scary nor unstable.

And best of all, I found the book listed on this wonderful website online called Khazana (Treasure trove) - that calls itself a source for hard to get books from India and South East Asia. Just $27 - smiles - only a few dollars more than my Rs 250.

Criminal Intentions

I refuse to be a victim
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To all those who've been victims of abuse of any kind, remember your offender i some, scared little kid. Never show fear and play safe!

Story so far

Things that can’t be mine.

I tell I do not want.

That which is not meant,

I reckon I did not hear.

Those who don’t see me,

I never saw in the first place.

I keep myself pleased and stupid,

As though all one needs is - to believe.

Almost there is not enough.

Fallen Angel

Some days I wake up in a daze.

A view from a window, which is still misty with cold breath. I was watched all night? Is that a form I steal? Or was it the air conditioner? I prefer the former. More mystery, more intrigue.

Today is one of those days, the one when I float on air two inches above the ground. The one that holds me in suspended animation. I walk more slowly, almost gliding. I hear less, as if catching whispers from a distance. Voices seem heavier, as if spoken through a static delusion. My frame of vision is blurry on the edges, as if my producer added noise to the bitmap in adobe. I am there. It is me, walking there. But I watch me from an arms length behind my shadow that trails my walk.

A bride walking to her aisle, I hold onto her trailing veil. Only this is no wedding, there is no veil, there is no aisle, there is no man.

He shows, I watch myself, detached from my own self. I fall and jerk back into my body. I feel pain and I cry.

I cried for all those times I should’ve but didn’t.

I cried because I was no longer viewing from where he stood. But watching through the globes of my own iris.

I cried because I had plunged and was now walking, not floating in space.

I cried because I had fallen.

Wounded

"To be in love," he says, "is to be a constant state of anasthesia."

Explains it all... explains me...

But I love to be hungover and drousy...

The numbness with the alive...

I might be falling again!

Grief and love

I too know power deep in the limbo of dreams.
I too watch a ship and want, an eagle and want.
I'll never be a princess feeding swans.
No golden bird is singing in my fingers.

My joy, like yours, is snatched from tenement mornings
and wrung till it cracks in my hands,
a pitiful rejoicing in a sand box, a sun-patch more.
Yes, I stand in hallways gathering valleys in my apron,
yet, scarcely daring another spring.

O honey, I hoped to be a butterfly fluttering in your pocket,
but now you flood just one cell of my mind,
still hating your walls, still half-dreaming
of my bringing you a brother, a young son.

Yesterday I passed your stoop.
I saw an old woman tousling children's hair
with a drifting, mechanical hand.
An old woman already dreading the final apples,
the last rain.

and while we work on the dissertation...some stolen winks

You'll understand this better if you have
felt how it is, waking from a dream
certain you can fly or that someone dear
lost long ago, has returned (to you).
When you wake up, no one will believe
that you can shut gravity off, that you
owned a tomahawk in your past-life and it's buried
and still calling for you. You dive to reach the bottom;
rock by wet rock, piecemeal, collecting the dream.
At the window, moon rests her elbows,
watching the snow on your bed. Outside, jaundiced streetlamps
struggle against the dawn. Loose dogs, crickets, whose sad voices
fill the plains with longing,
(of which), for a brief moment, you are filled with your own.
Next to you, your lover, in his restless sleep,
jerks his arms and legs.
You smile, not knowing he was flying north chasing the moon to Alaska.
When up, he'll never tell you. You won't believe. You don't want to.
Perhaps one day, brushing your teeth, hair or writing his name
on the fog of your bath, you'll realise
how much of your life you've spent, doing this and
trying not to believe in what you do, when asleep.
In this in-between hour, this suspended limbo, solitary, just for a brief moment
you'll feel the stab of truth: It is real.
but before it singes your mind forever, your thoughts will disperse
and go the way your breath does, when you walk out into the snow.
The day will begin, and the world will crack open
gradually reappearing phlegmatically car by mocking car.

Marching times

Historically, March has been the month of obsession all my life. Through school, college and now in its final circle in my student life, exams have been thrashing the daylights out of me. Now the March when all I wanted to do is to complete- my-darned- dissertation. Mercifully, this one is being intermediated by a jolly March spent obsessing over too much wine, cheese and good things.

This time is no less eventful. I am alternating between ecstasy and sorrow with tiring frequency. I have never explained myself as much as I am doing now. I almost gave in to the tyranny of tradition yet again. I am close to leaving the city where I grew up. I've declined job offers after pursuing them to the end. I have cried in the department washroom. I have walked on the wrong side of protocol. I have counted my money two thousand times. No cell phone this month as well. Almost ended. Almost started again.

All nags, by way of time, reach their fitting conclusion. Or fade. I held my camera this afternoon, and saw it to its end. I go to a park every morning. I’ve been wanting to write about it for sometime, but that should be another post. As one enters from the gate that I take, theres a semi-largish tree which burst into soft pink blossoms a month back. It is an ice-pack for burning eyes. It has a smaller cousin on another street in the neighbourhood and one near my department.

Basically, I have been wanting to know what its called. So spent an hour this afternoon at the Oxford bookstore, reading Pradip Krishen’s immense labour of love - Trees. What a treat!

Anyhow, my tree goes by the name ‘Sandan’. Botanically and rather sensously, ‘Desmodium Oojeinense’. Other local names are ‘Asainda’, ‘Tinsa’ and ‘Tiwas’. It comes from the lower Himalayan ranges. And is undeservedly rare in Chandigarh.

As are the boys with silly walks. Oh dear!

I will - will...

I am the sun and moon.
I am the air and sea.
I am the glory of God,
and the decadence of Satan.
I am the power of the universe,
and the fragility of life.
I am the flesh that gives form,
and the thought that gives substance.
I am the beauty of love eternal,
and the filth of hatred everlasting.
I am the divinity of birth,
and the repugnance of death.
I am the embodiment of pleasure,
and the exquisiteness of pain.
I am all that has been,
and all that will ever be.
I am deity
I am humanity
I am...

I am a final year Mass Comm student, about to walk out of school for the first time in 24 years.
And being the vain being that I am...I will walk with my nose in the air and muck at my feet...

There'll be 38 others joining me and no one wants to leave!!!!

Such is the paradox of the 'I',
Freud do I hear you barfing in the corner there???

of the sort

What comes but poesies

for all the drinks refused

for the holes made in pretty heads

for over-baked bodies in bakeries

for almond-eyes bought by terror

for planting holy bombs by the river

for the arms' alms in the name of salwa judum

what grows but poesies

for today you can only wear cotton

for today you can only eat wheat

for today you can only sleep on earth

for after you get tired of gunning

(which you will)

you will come home

to my gossamer love lines
we all have battles to go to

what will remain but poesies?

Some rain, some shine...

What does it take to want again?

To want a pedicure, an inhale, a good day, a friend, an appetite, a workout, a holiday, a pay cheque, an audience.

What does it take to be happy?

A tree every window, a desk, a computer, a new song, a first line, a remembered word, a water bottle, free telephone, box of crayons, loose sheets.

What does it take to be addicted?
Cluelessness.
And of course, some pretending.

Some notes of mine I took down while I attending presentations, saw movie clips, shared mind conspiracies, read some writing on the wall...all between 3to 5 on all weekdays.

And today as it hailed outside and me trying to hold on to all those little ones who contained that space in Mass Comm department room...I addressed an exhausted lot.

It dawned! It's been two years and it'll be time to say bye soon. I've waited for the moment, but today I want it to pause a bit.

Maybe, could be, possibly...the place has grown on me.

Dreaming about that tree every window, a desk, a computer, a new song, a first line, a remembered word, a water bottle, free telephone, box of crayons, loose sheets...

Photo Bucket

It's simple really...We are the stories we tell!!!

Meanwhile

A most joyous event. Mehndi, dholki, sangeet, friends, relatives, mithai, wine, lots of prayers, lots of wishes and a whole lot of goodness for the high-school sweethearts finally uniting after eight long years. She is very happy. So am I. And yet something clutched inside when I saw her dressed in bridal orange and red on a winter morning taking deep breaths, saying silent prayers, waiting for him. She looked like an angel - so serene, so beautiful, so lovable. Her Mum caught my cloudy eyes, as I casually strolled outside taking deep breaths myself. We hugged and cried. Just a little. Tears fell inside. For the little girls who fought over Barissta coffee and cheese toast not so long ago. Really, not such a long time ago.God bless her.
A day later and yet another bridal blush down, was dying for a whisper, a hiss from Gudia and the netizens of connectivity saw my browsing her profile on orkut. And queer, how you never look for the online counterparts, but found a picture with a footnote, "Blessed are those who have friends like these." It hit home then, she might have gone forever. Taking stock on some gigabytes and microchips away, I hope she reads this someday.
Love you babe........
For my Harpriya...

Confession

Shh... I have a new muse

Inspiration? yes, maybe

Lasting? how can it. It's but a fleeting sensation

The stars had warned about this one, the coming that is

Will I go hysterical? Hell yeah!

Sharin always does.

Remains of tarot

and none of you have reason to object

on that note **Happy Valentine's Day**

A pledge of chaos

Blurred lines of shapeless forms,

Chatting in the background over loud vibrations.

Sounds made with formless lips and tongues, indecipherable.

Breathless winds weaving patterns in the sky.

My head is on backward,

My throat is parched with heat.

I am dancing in your eye,

But all I am seeing is swirling sensations.

They overwhelm like bees.

I had it all figured out,

Each piece had a place in the puzzle.

So close to finding the message here,

My bottle's broken under all the rubble.

Oh! it's not all that bad

Life is a complexity of self-created mess

I'll figure it out,

I'll wade the nearly as silent storm.

But I must object, this day I must.

My few moments of self loathing!

Locked eyes

The last few days
I have been beating the alarm,
waking up much before it goes off.

If you wake up really, really early, is it insomnia still?

I pick up last night’s unfinished story from the bed-side
for tonight there might be a different side, a different bed, a different room, house, city, scape.

As I turn on the radio at dawn,
the jockeys talk less and play better music‘cause no one’s listening,
I wish
time retards
so I can gorge on unfinished tales.

But the morning comes
sun shines
horns honk
the music is suffused with coffee-smells and cat-calls.

I negotiate a quick, shower
a cool lift in a cold car to a cool corridor – that happens to be my workplace.

Too much air-conditioning condensing cerebral cells.
I actually, really, honestly spent an hour yesterday lying on concrete behind the parking lot,

looking at the city-sky-dwellers.
This peripatetic rhythm is becoming a habit.
There is a hint of a speck of dust -the kind that speak of passage of time.

Skull & Bones?
Longing for
open greens,
spatial freedom,
falling rain and
un-interrupted access to the internet.

Or wait...don't I have all of these already...

Then maybe I'm making stories in my head,
because I know I long for that
clustrophobic lack of space,
of no green spaces,
of falling rain and
interrupted access to the internet.

"Such is life," He said

This one's about Parzania.
Of utter helplessness, life framed in tattered posters of what is an imitation of life.
Of being appraised of our senses – pain, hazy vision through tatters, foul sting of dead love, taste of salt laden tears and noise of fearful cries that wake you from your troubled slumber.
It was a myth for movies to well out sorrow from the deepest pores of a girl called Sharin.
She was wrong.
Godhra, Gujarat, RSS, Hindu, Muslim, Parsi… Human?
Religion – genocide?
Faith – carnage?

Sachar committee - Varanasi's 'Water'?

Real life, real people…Naseeruddin Shah and Sarika – all heads down!!!

Rahul Dholakia...all praise, all faith, all respect, all courage!!!

A lover's tragedy

They somehow managed to wade the night in a series of endless passions, breaking the four poster bed of the inn their liove took refuge in. With the light of day, they returned to their cottage in a cart.

After what seemed to be an age of endless bliss, the cart came to a halt, and they were woken from their love enriched slumbers by a polite coughing, from the landlord who had led the cart to their cottage. Getting out of the straw, and laughingly pulling stray wisps out of each other s hair, they thanked the landlord, with beaming smiles, then hand in hand walked down the path. As they got to the door of their own little world, he whisked her up in his arms, and carried her into the room. He was just about to put her down, when a voice from around his neck filled with the huskiness of wanton sex said "Darling, not here, put me down in the bedroom." God, was there no end, he gratefully thought, feeling himself too, ready for their love to show itself again. He carried her to the bedroom, and after lowering her gently to the floor, she flung her arms around his neck and started a kiss that would never end. They slowly peeled the loathed clothes off each other, like people peeling an orange, helping each other, until both stood naked before each other. He looked again and marveled at how lucky he was to given such a heavenly body full of so much love. She looked at him, and thought how she could never want for more, this man, so gentle, yet so powerful, who lived to give her pleasure. They sank onto the bed, finding each other, animal-like groans were soon lost in endless kisses, and the evening sun went down and filled the cottage windows with it’s red halo, surrounding the lovers with its soft beams as they gave each other every part of themselves. They spent that evening in the cottage, lost in each other, lost to world, lost, just lost, happiness seemed to shine from every room.

No body knew what happened, some say it was a faulty electric current, some a spark from somewhere caught in the thatched roof, but the cottage was found in a blazing inferno when the fire brigade arrived. Many strange stories are told about that night, and many strange things were seen.

Some say that at the height of the blaze, a couple wrapped in each other s arms were seen standing in the middle of the fire, just lost in each others eyes.

Others swore they heard a boat go by on the river, the gentle sound of laughter filling the night air.
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For what is a love story without a tragic ending! What did you guys think? Do I have the perfect formulae here??

In a pub up the river, the big old four poster bed split in two, and was never able to be used again. The landlord and landlady found the love they thought they had lost.

An old rough boatman was seen to be sobbing his heart out down by the river bank, and would never go near the river again, some say he went to find a love that he had lost, never to return.

Sigh.we have more....

They lay in each others arms for some time afterwards, hidden in their own green umbrella, just the two of them, locked away from the world by the whispering leaves of the tree. The sound seemed to echo the whispered words of love that had passed between the two. They lay locked close, lost in each other’s arms, oblivious to the world, then as if by mutual consent, they found each other again, their final cries as they both reached the pinnacle lost in nature’s sounds. Later, much later, walking back along the path to the cottage, picking willow twigs out of each other’s hair, he suddenly stopped, turned to her, then looking deep into her eyes said "You know, I just can’t find the words to tell you how much I love you." She sensed his struggle and kissed him gently on the lips before skipping out of his arms. "Ditto" she replied, breaking the spell that had held his speech. He raced after her, and they fell onto the soft grass, which lead to equally soft kisses. He propped himself up on one elbow, gazed into the brown pools that were her eyes "Tomorrow, would you like to take up the offer of the boatsman, and for me to row you up the river, you’ll have to act the lady and make a picnic, cucumber sandwiches etc., or perhaps we could stop at some river side pub." "The latter please, my love, after another night with you" she said with an impish giggle "I don’t think I can be called a lady." He cleared his throat, the question he had to ask. "Err, mm, perhaps in the evening we might..??"


Once they had finished and had something to eat he set off down to the boat she’d with the picnic basket packed last night. It was a long time since he had last rowed a boat, he hoped he would not show himself up too much. When he opened the boat shed, he saw the boat keeper was not the rough old man he liked others to believe. In the stern of the boat he had placed several cushions for the love of his life to rest on, above which was the most dainty sun shade.


As he put the basket in the boat and pulled it out onto the river, he noticed a bottle and two glasses hidden under one of the seats. The note said "I too was in love once." Soft old sod, he laughed. He was just getting the oars sorted when she came down the pathway, laughing as she watched his attempts to stand up in the boat to greet her. God, how he loved her, she was wearing a voluminous dress that with the sun behind her, did little to hide the body he loved and desired, her hair hung loose and her eyes shone and sparkled with love and desire. She, with his help, lowered herself into the boat. "I feel like a queen" she said. "You are. My queen" he replied, picking up the oars, he started slowly, but powerfully rowing the boat upstream.


They drifted up the river, she watched from half closed eyelids as his strong arms seemed to propel the boat like a silent swan along the river. Her beautiful Englishman, those arms which could be so soft to hold her in their love, but strong to protect her from any harm. She let her hand drop into the water making ripples as the early morning chill sent tingling up her arm. Was this a dream, would she suddenly wake up and find herself back in Boston? She looked again, no, no dream could be as wonderful as this. He rested and they drifted into the river bank, under the welcoming shade of the river side willows. "Willow trees again" he laughed, she blushed remembering with pleasure their joining under the willow tree the previous day. He saw her blush and grinned. "I’ll crack open the champers, pass it here." She leant across, their hands touching as she passed the bottle to him. Electricity passed between them and for a few minutes the drink was forgotten. How can I ever leave this woman, I can’t let her go, this is my life, he thought and so did she.


After they had both had their fill, of each other and the picnic, laying back held in each other’s arms, she tickling him under his chin with a buttercup. "Do you know, if the flower reflects on your chin, you like butter?" He twisted her over onto her back "And if you kiss my lips you love me." Seconds later there was silence as two lips proved the truth of the comment. A little while later they started to clear the picnic away, they wrote a love letter to each other on a scrap of paper, put it in the champagne bottle and sent it slowly swirling down the river. "I hope whoever finds that will be as happy as we are" she said, and his heart skipped a beat, nobody could be as happy as they were. They carried on rowing up the river until the sun started to set, and they found they were a long way from home, and no matter how much he tried not to admit it, he was tired. As the light was fading, they moored the boat outside the small river side pub, and ran for the door as a summer storm split the sky with a flash of lightning, by the time they made the door, they were both like drowned rats.
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We'll sigh some more at 10.34 hrs. tomorrow

Some more...

He drank his tea, watching as she moved like some lithe animal around the room, collecting up the hastily discarded clothing from last night’s rush to prove their love to each other. "Has this quaint place got a shower room?" she said in that accent that still sent tremors down his every fibre. Oh God, the shower room, the one place that didn’t fit in to angelic cottage. "Yes darling, it’s the third door on your left, but I should warn you" his words were lost in her kiss "Doesn’t matter" she smiled "will call you when I’m ready for you to come and scrub my back."


She left him open-mouthed, and headed for the room, sure enough there was a short scream followed by fits of laughter. He hurried to the shower room door, there she was, laughing with tears running down her face, and that look of gentle mocking, yet sure love said it all. "I tried to warn you," he said "It just doesn’t fit, does it? This lovely cottage and a bright luminous yellow shower room." He tried to keep a straight face, but soon joined her in happy peals of laughter. They fell into each other’s arms, and for a long, long moment their laughter, shower and the yellow glow were forgotten. Their love was stopped by the violent knocking on the cottage door.


He slowly released the still laughing brown eyed angel, and headed towards the front door, ready for anything.


He looked through the door, only being able to make out the dim outline of a man, what the hell, he said to himself and opened the door. "Good day sir" asked a very hard looking man "Are you the Mr. Grant who has rented this here cottage?" A wave of relief swept over him as he realized it was the boat keeper who he had first met when trying to rent the cottage. "I have the keys to the boat house, in case you and your good lady (producing the most ordacious wink) might want to take a trip out on the river." Stuttering his thanks, he took the key from the man and closed the door. As he turned, she was there, he could smell the sweetness of her and the softness of her touch, long before the softness of her lips stopped his from talking.


When they had stopped, and finally made ready, they set off together, and in hand to walk along the bank of the river. "You know" she said gently nibbling his ear "this reminds me of a certain song somebody wrote me once, about walking on a bank, and watching the sun go down." He blushed, had she seen it was a plan all the time, but her laugh soon broke his embarrassment. They stopped, resting under the spreading branches of a willow tree, hid from the world, lost in each other. And as the sun slowly started to sink in the direction of her homeland, they made love, not now as strangers, or with that urgency of their first meeting, but with the certainty that this was them, their world, and their love, that could never be beaten or hurt, it was that two were one.
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and some more, tomorrow at 10.34 am

And then....

He picked up her case, his hand not really wanting to leave hers. "Come on" he said "We’ll get a taxi, I have the loan of a friend’s cottage down by the Thames". Liar, he thought, he had spent the last two months scouring every newspaper and estate agents to find the perfect place to rent for her stay, it had cost him an arm and a leg, but for her it was worth it.


They spent the time in the taxi lost in each other. Never noticing the passing bustling London streets, until the voice of the driver announcing their arrival brought them out of their own world. She stopped and looked in wonder, it was a real picture book English cottage complete with roses round the door, through the back garden, the distant shimmer of water showed the closeness of the river.


"It’s perfect" she said, flinging her arms once more around his neck, with a kiss that made the cost and problems of finding the place all worth while. They entered through the rose shrouded door, into something straight out of wonderland. "Place your case in the end room, while I get on with the dinner" he smiled, thank goodness for his mum teaching him to cook all those years ago.


"It’s roast beef with all the trimmings, but I’m not doing Brussels sprouts, don’t want to miss those lips of yours." She laughed, the sound ran like a tinkle of bells around the room, she picked up her case and headed for the end room. He watched her move away, my God, how he loved her every move.


The last dregs of the bottle were drained, the candles splashed wax across the old table, their light ever dimming, both leaned back, content, happy to be here, together. He cleared his throat, suddenly his mouth seemed unable to work, partly due to embarrassment, partly with expectation. "Um, we’ll leave the dishes until the morning, if you like, we’ve both had a long day my love. By the way, do you want to wash or wipe?" He added as an afterthought and wished immediately he hadn’t said it. She sensed his embarrassment, and without saying a word, leant across and lightly kissed him on the lips, then taking him by the hand like a lost schoolboy, led him down the corridor into the bedroom.


"But I thought" he started to say, but his words were lost as his lips were sealed by another pair. Not a lot was said after that, well, not that can be repeated here, lovers’ words are meant for each other’s ears only.

He awoke from his sleep slowly coming to, trying to savour each last minute of what had gone on through the night, not wanting the shreds of tattered dreams to end. He reached out; the bed was still warm from her body, the sheets still crumpled from their lovemaking, his body sweetly aching from the night before.


As if in a dream, she had gently kissed his lips during his half walking period, and said she would be back soon. He rolled over onto one arm, shielding his eyes from the early morning light as it shone through the small cottage windows, dancing over the scattered clothing discarded in their haste. "Morning, darling" came a voice from the door, "I believe you English have tea in the morning?" He looked at her standing in the doorway, with the sunlight showing her outline through the dressing gown she now wore. He smiled and thought, if I die now, I’ll have never been happier.


God, he said to himself, how I love her.
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next chapter, tomorrow at 10.34 hrs.

Just another Love Story - I

He waited under the clock in that cold, damp railway station. The ticking seemed to grow louder and louder, until the very seconds seemed to boom in his head like a hundred-gun salute. The hands slowly climbed to the appointed hour, when once more the love of his life would be in his arms. Suddenly a movement down the platform caught his eye, the next minute he was rushing towards her, not wanting to miss one second of being with her again. They met, fingers touched, lips trying to find a matching pair, searching finding and remembering.

They slowly separated, and started to move down the platform to the exit, their steps matching the rhythm of their hearts. Both knew that time was passing them by, and all too soon, they must part, both knew that every second together was theirs to be enjoyed and enveloped in their love. They gave in the train ticket not even noticing the look from the inspector, each eye filled the other’s visage, hands never wanting to leave the safety of the each other’s clasp.

He remembered the last time as they had to say goodbye. The train slowly starting to move out of the station as the life blood seemed to slowly slip from his view with the movement of the carriage further and further along the platform. The face etched in his mind becoming a blur then a faint spot in the distance. He’d stood, not wanting to move, still feeling the warmth of her kiss on his lips, and his face still wet, whether for her tears or his own.

But that was last time, this was now.

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Part - II at 10.34hrs. tomorrow