A ride to countryside

Returned from a trip to madar lake. Badi. Started out comfortably from home relying on google to drop off sure footed. But suddenly the roads got narrower, not enough to fit our car, the turns got impossibly T shaped and we drove with none of the relaxedness and leisure of the start. Stopped twice only to become aware of the fact that is to be traversed on foot, dipped in stream water. Put the car in reverse gear, hoping that the fact cannot be true and somewhere around is a path which ends in to the lake and there we will get to open our sandwiches, as planned. Started asking around for the right road and came to know that the place we should have gone to was choti madar lake. Not the badi one. The choti one has perfect accessibility. Mourned on our lack of proper research and kept on to reach the wrong place. Reached finally. Also got to see a few other faces besides ours. Straightaway got warned that the place is going to be flooded in a few hours. Opened our sandwiches and clicked some photographs simultaneously. Always kept an eye on the exit and soon started walking towards it. Made a video of us walking through a dense canopy of trees, amongst the shrubs, nearing the end of the shortest picnic ever. Started back the car, drove again through the miniature road-art before emerging on the way back home. 

Welcome home!

Battle

I once saw a battlefield 

with none of the artilleries' din.

It was quiet as a sleeping baby

and mercy was not wished for

at the sharp end of the sword.

But the warriors were a multitude,

each stranded with his own battle before him.

No warrior is a match to the affronted power

and all are in search of the slaying weapon.

Some have chosen 

love,

faith,

will,

but what is secretly given to them all

is a brave face.

Sea

O how guilty it feels 

to choose a favorite out of a 

rippling, exuberant sea

and a quiet, pensive one.

But the sea of my mind,

hiding more questions than answers, 

more doubts than impulse

more tunnels than wide fields,

more me than the world,

that sea is a fire on some days

refusing to quell 

and on other days, 

it is a gentle, cool, insouciant breeze.

And I know not who has the power over it

but I(or Time already has?) am vying for control

to douse the fire.

Bird

 Ho bird! how still you sit,

perched on my window sill

while below a carnival progresses.

For once, I would like to take your place,

not to soar high in the blue

but to nestle up away and aloof,

absorbed in my thoughts, 

without any urgency of prudent action.

For in actions, the grand no more exists

and is turned to ruins of a diminished value,

of which the actual hides in thoughts, out of view.

fourth birthday

She was only three, 
the most beautiful of god’s gifts
when she lost the shade of her father
and the tender touch of her mother.
Alone she cried for days,
wanting her mother to listen to her
and to curl her up into her gossamer arms,
her face drooped down more everyday and
everyday, her cries drowned meeker
when she was taken into an orphanage.

Betwixt the arms of lady, she came in,
her gaze walked over different new faces,
the children there poked her cheeks and kissed her fingers while
she just kept staring them in such amazement
that her tiny ogling eyes forgot to cry, for the first time.

* -- *

Tomorrow arrives her fourth birthday
and today a couple is seated before the lady.
A girl they wish to take home,

like the sun stretches its yellow cover
a girl they desire to spill their love over.
So, depart she will today
and my eyes will not meet hers on her fourth birthday.

She would be 9 or 10 years old. Sitting outside her makeshift house, her elbows slept on her arched haggard legs and her head topped her crouched self. She was lost in her own ruminations, held to the deepest of them and I couldn't pursue any of my thoughts that trooped inside my head to read her mind. But I could see clearly that she was devotedly mulling over something intense, something far older than her age and far gloomier than her face and that she was troubled.

A woman falls out of the gate to the house, down to the floor close to where the girl is sitting.

Her mother, she is wounded but crawls in no time over to her daughter to immune her betwixt her bangle clad hands. Scared, she moves to peep inside into her own house, her quivering eyes raiding the place for signs of terror when her drunk husband barged out in her face. Balancing on unmeasured steps and breathing anger, he was instant. He grabbed his daughter, like we suddenly pounch on a paper to prevent it from flying in the air. He lashed her cheeks thrice before shoving her besides the 'chulha' on the cemented saddle to make 'rotis' for him.

Now, her mother was thinking and this time I knew what thoughts spoke to her.

He was sitting on the window seat, leaned mostly. The train had been false to its much applauded flaring speed and was travelling too slowly to attract everyone’s disgust. There was a continued chaos in the train, infants crying out loud, newspapers being folded and being read and ringtones that varied on a wide spectrum, from the typical Samsung one to US band songs to ditties that praised the god. Around him, the people were all hidden behind books, one enslaved amid Amitav Ghosh’s creations while one was devouring the end of a thick novel, the name of which he could not see. He was thinking of his future, trying to steal that one thumb rule of life that would ensure him a successful and victorious future although he was wise enough to know that life was never meant to be walked on one thumb rule. He had the Ernest Hemingway’s ‘old man and the sea’ in his bag and thought to pull it out to keep in harmony with the vicinity but those iterating fears of a pale future kept clinging his head and he kept striving for that one thumb rule.
That was when the writer instinct in him slackened out and he drifted into the portal of reveries. The fears which he was coercing himself to abandon had all fallen apart and before he knew, he was framing stories one after the other. Stories came up to him like someone turning the pages of a notebook in his mind and he was just reading them up. He would think of a couple, their love unconditional like a free flowing river, rejuvenating like hazel but their puerile judgments on each other are a barricade in their trust to marry or he would envisage the story of a vendor who had lost his daughter at a railway junction. He knows that many of the tales are naive and embryonic but he dreams and believes that one day he would stitch them all together to weave a story of the world for the world.

* the old man *

Amid the sky's tinted orange stains,
the sun was being devoured by the mountains.

Under the dusk sky walked an old man,
watching him over, the poem thus began.

Alone, the old man was walking not, down the desolate lane,
his grandson, he was carrying on his back pain.

The infant's tiny fingers were teasing the deep wrinkles of the old man’s face,
while the old man's weak fingers combed his  grandson's scantily haired scalp.

As they walked along, the child got lonelier like those tall trees,
for the old man drifted back to his jolly young memories.

The evocative memories of the old man always had her,
she, who never did break their promise of being together.

She was true; it was her illness that served the barricades,
alias their love would have chuckled for decades.

It was the very lane on which they went for an evening stroll, she and him,
a stroll that had always pampered their love under the sky going dim.

The old man walked the road like a river flows its awry way,
he knew every turn that kept deranging the road's array.

The old man halted to feed the swift, mob like pigeons,
these pigeons might also be remembering her, he envisions.

*only if dreams could breathe in the bright*

Dreams always fool us. First they will barge into our sincere sleep, cause us to mingle with them, to unite with them and then they die incomplete with the first yawn of the morning.
Ruthless, they are. A mantle so grand they will build, it will belittle every realm of the vast sky, a story so untold they will narrate, you will love it as you love a new born.
The night gets raven, the dreams get tyrant. They will conquer you, they will consume all of you. You will wander in the alleys of your dreams, your mantle will shimmer so bright as to beckon you, your story will bicker so loud to urge you to scribble it.

But the night travels swiftly to its end. The dreams fall weak, the alleys seem ethereal,  the palace fades away, the enthralling story dies an insignificant story as you go and see the sun.

a story - part I

“Disperse out guys, be quick and nimble,” she directed her team. She headed the force to vanquish the human trafficking menace that had trampled upon the lives of many innocent children. The children had those shitty blotches on their hands, the stamps, the seals that proclaimed of their enslaved childhood.

Her prismatic visage had however always belittled her dexterity at her duty. Her confident caring eyes, her smiles, some being restrained to bulge out her cheeks, some being benevolent enough to part her lips. She was the right matchstick to annihilate the dense forest of that menace, I will second anyone in that. but I hated her, I always had contempt for her till that one day.

“Boss, you disappear through it,” that squad has again trailed us.” And you all, he commanded again, you all will follow me. He was an enigmatic character. A gentleman at heart, he propelled inhumane deeds.

A naive or puerile, he was not but today, today his judgement and strategy, both had toppled. The squad had encircled them and they all did flap for a run away but in vain. They were all caught and she started nearing him, the gun checking him out for her.

* bless *

We had to attend a function at night and so I was before mom nagging her that it is just a function for elders and that I will be left alone idling with my phone there. Actually, it was a formal function for 2 days to toast the 50th marriage anniversary of a couple. 
The next moment the phone blurted loud. It was the bride herself on the other side.
“Ekta, you will have to come with your family, you know I may or may not live to invite you a next time.” These were the bride's unabridged words as she conversed. I came to know that she was suffering from cancer which has advanced to its IV stage.
For the next few minutes, many thoughts trailed and gashed inside my head and I kept thinking how a person can live when he knows that all the glimpses flipping around him could be his last ones.
During the function, for the whole time, she had a transcending calmness embellishing her visage. The tumor had stretched out to her stomach and she was enduring intermittent but agonizing pain for the last few days but she hid it all with her serene, perennial smile. She even accompanied the guests on their outings.
Later I came to know this total jolly gathering was stemmed from her children’s thoughts that it would be a good thing if their mom could see all her well wishers all at the same time under one roof.

I just hope she be blessed for every second she breathes

coronation day

I have no name
but you forgo me not,
for I also lug matter within me.
Serenading the dazzling stars,
dodging the vagabond debris out here,
I crept past the boisterous Jupiter.
A dull and monotonous stroll, it was,
the elite octet of the milky way, total desolate
till I was flanked by your prismatic earth
and I halted, not to flirt
but to gape at
the intense crimson, the nation of India
was sheeted under.

It was the day of coronation,
RELIGION was coronated as the sovereign.
A tyrant it was, it had its cadres,
whose rule had spawned unrest.
The kingdom was its sword,
and the kingdom, its shield.
Using people for defense,
and commanding people to attack.
Its rule was a plot of destruction.

knights, rooks and pawns, you are,
the sovereign, poised your king,
a game; a plot, so agonizing,
that you all will win in your graveyard.

Infinities

There was a boy who was confused about this art of writing. He believed that he would just need some dictionary storage and a little flair in appeasing the tenses to reap write ups on the paper. And there was this abysmal depth in him to devour novels, run over the famous quotes, to see a movie just because it had dialogues from the actual novel, to mull over the extended meanings. There were lines which had affected him deeply, “some infinities are greater than other infinities” and that a person who is suffering should justly be blessed with the bigger infinity. These were the lines that would harrow him that how will he ever be able to embellish such lines in his life time. He dreamed to write and just write. He would be happy when his write ups would be published, although on a small scale and would grab some applauds but then that one insecure corner of his heart would thud again whenever he would read a beautifully crafted write-up elegantly juggling with the words to spill out the feelings of the writer.
Yes, he was sinking into this abyss. But he didn’t cease to write, he didn’t keep him away from reading, he didn’t stop to discern the simple feelings of the authors from their astutely crafted lines. Time passed, he kept writing. In actual, he kept mingling with every word, understanding them, listening to them while he would write. He came to know that how we are not bound to always crave for better when we have a beautiful life to peruse at. Its good to make the best of what we have, to listen to the tiniest entities of life because those are the infinities in which our lives are preserved.

He lived while his life wrote the better of him.

* the friend *

Amid the constant chattering of the rain, alone in the impeccable black of the night, he was walking hastily down the road. The mild breeze of the evening had succumbed to the violent air currents in the night. Nevertheless, he kept wading through the restraining tumult.
It was 2 years ago that he had embarked on his journey to pursue his dream of becoming a writer, to personify those lifeless words in his heart to peer at this subtle world.
He would spend hours carving stories out of the world. Sometimes, a gazillion of thoughts would assail his mind and he would lose his story in the delirium and sometimes mere endings to a story would flag off a quarrel. Yes, there were stories on his papers depigmented of their endings.
But this did not deter him; it did not portend of any despondence in him. He would ceaselessly fumble with the blending of words to embellish every sentence, to stuff every sentence with the marrow of life, the feelings. For two years, he reaped stories and etched parts of his incomplete tales together.

-- The road had come to an end. His watch was poised at 11.30 pm. Drenched completely; his jacket was dripping the rain water it had gulped. The street light above him needed urgent repair. Ironically, it colored the night even more raven. He was standing in front of his old friend’s house, a friend who was more than a brother for him, a friend who was both a benign critic and an ardent applauder and a friend who was the ubiquitous observer of every story scribbled onto those pages.

He again looked at his watch. It was late.

Nevertheless, he rang the bell.

* avenge *

I have grown up. But I need to tell you that my life dwindles as much as I live each day. I live each day to mend that one dreadful day, to fuse some moments of stillness in that day. Had that day not dawned, had the clock died before those moments of carnage, I would have helmed my life more diligently. I crave for that stillness in this ruckus of my life. Had my life been serene, I could have framed my dreams, I could have extolled the bliss of my life, I could have exhumed myself of my orphancy. But now, plots to avenge my loss guard my sleep of any fantasy and dream, echoing wails proliferate in the silence of the night.

I hope you remember whose wails barge into the avenues of my sleep. I hope you remember how stoically you sprayed the biased bullets on my parents.  I will never be able to comprehend the extreme callousness sheathed in your soul.

That was the day of revelry. My father had received accolades for something in his workplace. He didn’t tell me much about it. He just said that today he will sit and play with me, that he will listen to my stories from school, that he will be my accomplice in splashing colors on the walls of my room. The air inside the house was more ethereal than ever. My mother cooked dishes that invoked the insanity in me and my father to eat like a horse and the next moment the bell ranted. Yes, you were the one behind the closed door. My father received you. I actually didn’t like your interruption and then further despised you from the rudeness you divulged in your talks with my father. My mother took me to the cellar as my puerile self quivered with fear from the heated altercation you commenced with my father. My mother ran upstairs again.

Few minutes later, doleful wails permeated into the cellar, did you recall the wails that barged into my sleep?  My father tried to dampen your anger but you had been obliterated of your senses of right and wrong. That’s when I came to know that my father had been adulated for uncovering some corrupt deeds going on in his vicinity from which you were being benefitted. The sprouting anger inside you culminated when you started triggering bullets towards my parents. My parents ran all around to dodge your bullets when finally the taps on the floor above were silenced in the room just above the cellar. You still didn’t stop. You searched frantically for me, deranging every decorations of my mother but you couldn’t.

Here I am waiting for you to search me because the plan that guards my sleep is to retaliate against you, to search you from your deepest havens and snatch your breath.

Tragedy - an elegy @ bhopal gas tragedy

That yonder land cries in dirge,
factions of people, all departed into the sky.
Every sight was rued,
their fate had turned capricious.
Progenies, who cherished their eclectic dreams
now slept in the cemetery, innocence all preserved.
The newborns, trailed diligently by death
died by their mothers’ side
and the world remained a mystery for them.
May they meet the angels of the sky,
may their lives bloom, although in oblivion,
may their loss awake the keepers of justice.

* oyster *

-- a bird spilling my emotions --

Perched on that beige twig,

she would not fly.

Peering through my window,

she seemed to daunt me.

Obliterated of every melody

she would never chirp,

abandoned, I sensed she was.

The perpetual sky, till furlongs was her courtyard,

but she wouldn't ramble there,

wounded, I perused she was.

Exagerrated wings, she was sheathed in

but fettered, they all were.

To conquer the yonder mountains,

they would never embark.

Withered, thus I painted her as.

A divulged oyster she was,

painting her, I sketched myself.

Rapunzel

Do you know I look complete with you,
with you, my life rambles in
gaiety,
in gaiety,  now I mock all the odds,
the odds that had once endangered me.

Your puerile chortles caress my soul,
my soul, a silent and sepulchral abyss,
till abyss, I can run just to see you,
to see you is the sole penchant for me.

You anoint sentience to my soul,
my soul, it breathes and dies everyday with you,
my rapunzel you are, I die without you,
you are mine in that sky full of stars.

There are people and there are winners.
Losers are mere poltergeists.

THE ORANGE DRESS (PART 1)

It was 10 of September. I was hesitant but anyhow expressed my desire to her to accompany her in her shopping trek. She knew she needed help and gladly validated my proffer. Out of a thanksgiving or a formality or just out of happiness, I don’t know but she hugged me, a hug that departed me to an abstract world of reveries of freaking but delightful feelings, a hug that appeased my wailing heart. My heart, which I knew had dried up of all hope and happiness, was suddenly recuperated and it thumped harder than drums as if wanting to jump out and dance like a lunatic.

We set out together. My heart wanted to roam with hers on my bike and just when I was directed by my stupid brain to take out the car, came from her a voice , “ we are going on bike, right ? “ and I just managed to say, yes. So, two hearts rolled on two wheels inside bustling markets, through jammed roads and over abrupt speed breakers. I kept a track of every expression of hers, everyone one of them caressing my heart more and I felt more and more happy about her. We barged in many shops and hurried out of many and I kept wondering if any attire could embellish her flaring beauty anymore. Finally, we grounded ourselves to a showroom of some acquaintance of hers. She faked many dresses on herself, discarded many more. I was mum all the time dwindling up every emotion of mine but when that orange attire decorated her, I blabbered out. “This one is for you”. She didn’t muse over much and ordered the orange one and hugged me again. I was stoic this time. Well protected in a rectangular box with the tagline, “dressing up two hearts “, came her wedding dress. I was satisfied albeit my heart withered.