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Heavy dark clouds
over a fragile leafless tree
- Morning News scream of Exploitation
{A Table Plant at my window}
It so happens I’m tired of just being a man.
I go to a movie, drop in at the tailor’s – it so happens-
Feeling wizened and numbed, like a big, wooly swan,
awash on an ocean of clinkers and causes.
A whiff from a barbershop does it: I yell bloody murder.
All I ask is a little vacation from things: from boulders and
Woolens,
from gardens, institutional projects, merchandise,
eyeglasses, elevators – I’d rather not look at them.
It so happens I’m fed – with my feet and my fingernails
and my hair and my shadow.
Being a man leaves me cold: that’s how it is.
{if you look at this pic closely, you may get the hint of a nest where the little crow who I named “Break free” lived with its mom and dad}
Still-it would be lovely
to wave a cut lily and panic a notary,
or finish a nun with a left to the ear.
It would be nice
just to walk down the street with a green switchblade
handy,
whopping it up till I die of shivers.
I won’t live like this – like a root in a shadow,
wide-open and wondering, teeth chattering sleepily,
going down to the dripping entrails of the universe
absorbing things, taking things in, eating three squares a day.
I’ve had all I’ll take from catastrophe.
I won’t have it this way, muddling through like a root or a
grave,
all alone underground, in a morgue of cadavers,
cold as a stiff, dying of misery.
That’s why Monday flares up like an oil-slick,
when it seems me up close, with the face of a jailbird,
or squeaks like a broken-down wheel as it goes,
stepping hot-blooded into the night.
Something shoves me toward certain damp houses, into
certain dark corners,
into hospitals, with bones flying out of the windows;
into shoe stores and shoemakers smelling of vinegar,
streets frightful as fissures laid open.
There, trussed to the doors of the houses I loathe
are the sulphurous birds, in a horror of tripes,
dental plates lost in a coffeepot,
mirrors
that must surely have wept with the nightmare and shame
of it all;
and everywhere, poisons, umbrellas, and belly buttons.
I stroll unabashed, in my eyes and my shoes
and my rage and oblivion.
I go on, crossing offices, retail orthopedics,
Courtyards with laundry hung out on a wire:
The blouses and towels and the drawers newly washed,
slowly dribbling a slovenly tear.
{a tree near the sea side, will soon get its fresh batch of leaves and branches}
………as usual, I am struggling to construct my thoughts. There’s so much happening around in those strips of local bazaars, where visibly tired men and women (after tiresome and demanding work) with their backs stretched over the baskets filled with fresh vegetables and greens, chatting up with the vegetable vendors, striking a better deal for the evening, the tired truck drivers indulging in light-hearted conversations with the barbers in a dimly lit barber shop, a group of women in their 40s standing frozen in their thoughts while waiting for the bus that takes them to their respective homes safe, a little girl standing next to her mother pouring clean water, collected in a small pot, over the Siva Lingam in the Hanuman temple, adjacent to a tiny shop that sells old junk, a few feet away, is a tiny mosque where men assemble in the afternoon to offer their prayers ….watching people going about their daily tasks, carrying on their faces a commitment to finish the varied tasks by the end of yet another emotionally debilitating day (this is true for many. Those fortunate ones can be counted on fingers), fills me with a sense of energy and optimism about the world and life, which seem to be hurtling towards shocking a level of unpredictability, these days. It’s like withdraw self from the world, bring the knees & limbs closer to the stomach, feel the tightness around the thighs, as if a human body is closing its doors tight against the world outside, crouch in the shadow of a branch that crawls against the bedroom window and draw strength from the little bird who is being fed by its mom. And meditate on decay, on life, silently. Interestingly, it’s the poor, the struggling class / the working class of the society gives me that required bit of energy and courage. The superficial and shallow beauty being flaunted by the rich and successful, the so-termed class disturbs me a lot.
Neruda’s “Walking Around”, a melancholic walk across streets, captures the existentialism of life, a sense of disappointment about the disturbance being caused by the structural progress, the destruction of nature and man himself. All of us, subconsciously (the screams of which, at times, are loud enough to cause tangibly felt discomfort), feel the need to take a “little vacation” from regularity of daily life, formulated in well-defined moves, i.e. get out of a rectangle shaped bed, 10 mins of reluctance with the hand perched on a sleeker rectangular bodied mobile communication device with curvaceous corners, enter the “phase of civilisation”, commute through the roads-based commotion that comes in various forms & sizes, walk into the artificially lit liveable-breathable-cylinder shaped environment, deliver organised talk (presentation) to the benumbed souls around a rectangle shaped wooden table…..one feels numb and staggered after such drone-like encounters!
…All I ask is a little vacation from things: from boulders and
Woolens,
from gardens, institutional projects, merchandise,
eyeglasses, elevators – I’d rather not look at them.
{Pic Courtesy : Him}
Rolling its blues against another blue,
the sea, and against the sky
some yellow flowers.
the sea, and against the sky
some yellow flowers.
October is on its way.
And although
the sea may well be important, with its unfolding
myths, its purpose and its risings,
when the gold of a single
yellow plant
explodes
in the sand
are bound
to the soil.
They flee the wide sea and its heavings.
the sea may well be important, with its unfolding
myths, its purpose and its risings,
when the gold of a single
yellow plant
explodes
in the sand
are bound
to the soil.
They flee the wide sea and its heavings.
We are dust and to dust return.
In the end we’re
neither air, nor fire, nor water,
just
dirt,
neither more nor less, just dirt,
and maybe
some yellow flowers.
In the end we’re
neither air, nor fire, nor water,
just
dirt,
neither more nor less, just dirt,
and maybe
some yellow flowers.
The fields infused with yellow-colored exuberance enfolds a traveler, tired yet ecstatic, who deliberately mapped out some space for that much-awaited meeting with the Yellow Flower fields, in his journey, with a profound non-human conversation. The Yellow fields are known widely for their language, which casts the oldest spells over humans, a language only an artist could understand and speak. Far-off lands, people live in foreign lands are materials for our dreams, which we see with our eyes wide open, and trapped with that allure charm, we whether or not like it, walk around with a displayed distaste for the land we live, the surroundings we breathe in. The great old wisdom says, when we see things from afar, they reach out to us as something very special, mysterious and a body carnival like festivities, so that means, do we have to detach ourselves from the environment that’s within our reach and watch it with renewed eyes. And the queer sense of exoticism of foreign landscapes that live in our dreamy eyes, tend to grab, fiercely, a deep layer of mystique aura, when they are captured and sent by a stranger? am curious to know - which element of this image is reinforcing its captivating beauty? the grounded tree with its head held proudly against the blue skies, providing a constrast-like experience to our eyes so that they could sink into the softness of yellow fields or the heady, bewitching vast stretches of yellow floral beds, who have this wicked plan tucked in their floral hearts to leave our palms benumbed with their gossamerish flower dust when we dip our hands into the picture? :) The Postcard like picture reminds me of “The Wind Will Carry Us” by Abbas Kiarostami.
Link : (Ben Kweller’s Make It Up, is the background score for Ray Ban NEVER HIDE campaign)
Most faces, after a while, make time for a new programme - to cultivate serenity.
They often seem to stare blankly at spaces, which are empty of any material to
ponder about – a ceramic mug with a broken handle, spaces between fingers,
a crack breathing life on the wooden table, a tiny branch moving softly in the
breeze, the theatrical highs and lows of a stranger’s talk etc etc.
I, usually, do not under-estimate such faces.
As my face, somehow, aspires to belong to that tribe. Faces,
which traveled across the rugged life-landscape with aplomb,
never flinched from events of discomforting truths, moments of
realization. Faces, which survived bitter winds of humiliation,
and learnt to tuck them under the thick and deep layers of maturity.
You may get an imprint of all roughened up, lined and wrinkled facial landscape.
You are programmed to go wrong, at times. These Faces, perched amidst loud,
talkative and youthfully dressed up crowds, practice withdrawal from conversations
to indulge in Short races of memory-A girl child running through the paddy fields,
a young teenager’s face, out of breath, pressed against the trunk of a tree, a little
far away from a group of boys, a young woman’s search for a man across
those regularly held rituals of Coffee, evening walks, brief hugs, goodbye tears…
Short races of memory rejuvenate one’s being. That’s what these faces do.
Many instances, a face of such kind, raises a frantic search for that familiar face
it fell in love with, which some time ago, prepared to disappear one fine day.
How and when would faces consider the decision to leave, and what are
those various ways to leave? I do not know that. But I certainly know
how it feels like when a face gets up from its fall – quite a disgraceful one,
decisively builds its army again, borrows strength from everything nearby.
Would it ever withdraw from the world? Undauntable may have an answer.
Most faces carry dead chapters, which make them attractive and alive.
You can identify them, even from far, they may not be known to you, but
they look fuller, look a great deal like those darling paintings you study,
intensely, with a wine glass in your hand. They effortlessly introduce you
to that natural human glow. Faces, which traveled across the landscape,
speak volumes. They perform in theatres, hard rock cafes, and urban street
settings. Permission is limited to Experienced and Seasoned with life.
[link:Simone
You're getting older
Your journey's been
Etched on your skin
Simone
Wish I had known that
What seemed so strong
Has been and gone
{link :Ben Kweller’s Make It Up
Sonnet XVII (100 Love Sonnets, 1960)
I don’t love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as certain dark things are loved,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom and carries
hidden within itself the light of those flowers,
and thanks to your love, darkly in my body
lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I don’t know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.
I am …..
When I close a book
I open life.
I hear
faltering cries
among harbours.
Copper ignots
slide down sand-pits
to Tocopilla.
Night time.
Among the islands
our ocean
throbs with fish,
touches the feet, the thighs,
the chalk ribs
of my country.
The whole of night
clings to its shores, by dawn
it wakes up singing
as if it had excited a guitar.
The ocean’s surge is calling.
The wind
calls me
and Rodriguez calls,
and Jose Antonio–
I got a telegram
from the “Mine” Union
and the one I love
(whose name I won’t let out)
expects me in Bucalemu.
No book has been able
to wrap me in paper,
to fill me up
with typography,
with heavenly imprints
or was ever able
to bind my eyes,
I come out of books to people orchards
with the hoarse family of my song,
to work the burning metals
or to eat smoked beef
by mountain firesides.
I love adventurous
books,
books of forest or snow,
depth or sky
but hate
the spider book
in which thought
has laid poisonous wires
to trap the juvenile
and circling fly.
Book, let me go.
I won’t go clothed
in volumes,
I don’t come out
of collected works,
my poems
have not eaten poems–
they devour
exciting happenings,
feed on rough weather,
and dig their food
out of earth and men.
I’m on my way
with dust in my shoes
free of mythology:
send books back to their shelves,
I’m going down into the streets.
I learned about life
from life itself,
love I learned in a single kiss
and could teach no one anything
except that I have lived
with something in common among men,
when fighting with them,
when saying all their say in my song.
Ode to the Book - translated by Nathaniel Tarn
“Odes to Common Things” by Pablo Neruda is a collection of elegant poems, which celebrate simple, ordinary things, we see/consume/use everyday, every moment, but nurture no thought about them. Dearest master Pablo Neruda’s inquisitive study of ordinary things influences one to see the world around him/her Afresh. It’s an evocative intellectualization of seemingly simple things which do throb with unusual images that live so far away from the naked eye. Through the irregularly formed and shaped verses, everything around is seen emerging alive with a certain degree of meaning/significance, everything is felt glowing with life, conversations are seen being struck, ….it feels as if a life is being celebrated, whose presence, till the previous moment, has not been acknowledged.
The street
filled with tomatoes
midday,
summer,
light is
halved
like
a
tomato,
its juice
runs
through the streets.
In December,
unabated,
the tomato
invades
the kitchen,
it enters at lunchtime….Ode to Tomatoes
Out of lemon flowers
loosed
on the moonlight, love’s
lashed and insatiable
essences,
sodden with fragrance,
the lemon tree’s yellow
emerges,
the lemons
move down
from the tree’s planetarium….….Ode to A Lemon
Maru Mori brought me
a pair
of socks
that she knit with her
shepherd’s hands.
Two socks as soft
as rabbit fur.
I thrust my feet
inside them
as if they were
two
little boxes
knit
from threads
of sunset
and sheepskin……. Ode to a Pair of Socks & Many others, Buy the Book, an essential for your collection.
I love you– though I rage at it,
Though it is shame and toil misguided,
And to my folly self-derided
Here at your feet I will admit!
It ill befits my years, my station,
Good sense has long been overdue!
And yet, by every indication,
Love’s plague has stricken me anew:
You’re out of sight– I fall to yawning;
You’re here– I suffer and feel blue,
And barely keep myself from owning,
Dear elf, how much I care for you!
Why, when your guileless girlish chatter
Drifts from next door, your airy tread, 
Your rustling dress, my senses scatter
And I completely lose my head.
You smile– I flush with exaltation;
You turn away– I’m plunged in gloom;
Your pallid hand is compensation
For a whole day of fancied doom.
When to the frame with artless motion
You bend to cross-stitch, all devotion,
Your eyes and ringlets down-beguiled,
My heart goes out in mute emotion
Rejoicing in you like a child!
Dare I confess to you my sighing,
How jealously I chafe and balk
When you set forth, at times defying
Bad weather, on a lengthy walk?
And then your solitary crying,
Those twosome whispers out of sight,
Your carriage to Opochka plying,
And the piano late at night…
Aline! I ask but to be pitied,
I do not dare to plead for love;
Love, for the sins I have committed,
I am perhaps not worthy of.
But make believe! Your gaze, dear elf,
Is fit to conjure with, believe me!
Ah, it is easy to deceive me!. . .
I long to be deceived myself!
Alexander Pushkin (1799 - 1837), Images are grabbed from “Anna Karenina” - Leo Tolstoy
* To Someone, who I would love to share my Evening Walks with.
William Wordsworth, “The Prelude”:
“When from our better selves we have too long Been parted by the hurrying world, and droop, Sick of its business, of its pleasures tired, How gracious, how benign, is Solitude.”
“You should never close a book until you’ve read something from it…”
“Well, just a sentence or a word. It can be very, very revealing. Just read something, anything. Well, read from the top, then…”
“….See, you are sad and happy. You don’t smile but you are content. You are sad and happy at the same time. In Brazil we have a term for that - it’s ‘Saudade’. It’s like … melancholic, nostalgic; it’s very Bossanova…”
They distract me. Lovers walking hand-in-hand,
leaning together on every damn thing, they come
across, or his arms hanging loosely around her
waist, a spirit of recklessness at its best, or fragile
vine like her arms clinging to his reassuring broad
shoulders. I must say an excellent portrait for the
contest:“A companion for the last season of this year”
Or affection held within is demonstrated, confidently,
to turn public’s eyes towards the blissful world of love.
Ah how cruel I could be? How bitter I could sound?
Damn fools, they think the world is awestruck with
their performance of “Seeing is believing”.
But they do not know how many walkers-by lurching
closer across, reminisce about the way they kissed
their partners, at dusk, in the park, around the corner,
while watching the movie in a darkened theatre, clenched
the lover’s face so tightly that they left bruises, which
would have hurt, at one point of time, as a painful
reminder of having encountered stories of betrayal
and infidelity. Or a doomed venture which had people
losing their identities, willingly, in an exchange, which
had the best of minds spending restless nights – moving
their limbs, tossing and turning their torsos all through,
waking over nightmares, scratching their balls, sitting
on the couch to consume others’ interesting lives on the
red-carpet, in the boulevards. Everyone is bound to lose
to something larger, inexplicable mechanism of history.
At this very moment, I can see, a man standing in the
airport lounge, kissing a woman who is as tall as he,
more handsome and older than he is, holding her close,
the way she wants him to hold her forever. It might
make a pleasantly delightful view for others, who may
choke on a surge of dreary trips down-memory-lane.
I mumble, am sure, they are just lovers, each is married
to someone else. Things around us change, blame the
seasons which bring other people into our lives. Trees,
toughening up their hearts, are shedding their leaves now,
and flaunting their bones to the world. One more brilliantly
hued leaf breaks down on a blade of grass. People, as always,
try to errect positions of Spring in Autumn. And I am
embarrassed to see them possessed in such an odd manner.
And will the flowers die?
And will the people die?
And every day do you grow old, do I
grow old, no I’m not old, do
flowers grow old?
Old things – do you throw them out?
Do you throw old people out?
And how you know a flower that’s old?
The petals fall, the petals fall from flowers,
and do the petals fall from people too,
every day more petals fall until the
floor where I would like to play I
want to play is covered with old
flowers and people all the same
together lying there with petals fallen
on the dirty floor I want to play
the floor you come and sweep
with the huge broom.
The dirt you sweep, what happens that,
what happens all the dirt you sweep
from flowers and people, what
happens all the dirt? Is all the
dirt what’s left of flowers and
people, all the dirt there in a
heap under the huge broom that
sweeps everything away?
Why you work so hard, why brush
and sweep to make a heap of dirt?
And who will bring new flowers?
And who will bring new people? Who will
bring new flowers to put in water
where no petals fall on to the
floor where I would like to
play? Who will bring new flowers
that will not hang their heads
like tired old people wanting sleep?
Who will bring new flowers that
do not split and shrivel every
day? And if we have new flowers,
will we have new people too to
keep the flowers alive and give
them water?
And will the new young flowers die?
And will the new young people die?
And why?
(Brendan Kennelly)
I was feeling sour, a few hours ago, “there should be a point of termination to this process of getting hurt repeatedly, which at times comes with a partial allowance for emotional subordination, emotional abuse. A gradual elimination of self from such world appears to be more an intelligent decision” ….
Many poets have written about “Growing Up”, a child leaving his world of blissful fantasies, a world where wicked kings torture beautiful princes and princesses, hold them captive in some brooding, fear-inspiring castles, the air in which is brewed to a higher level of pungency by those evil spirits, i.e. magically wonderful old witches, then ensues outside the castles’ windows, a series of battles between “Good people and Evil people”, which usually result in celebration of invincible and much-desired bright points of termination “….and they live happily ever after”. Childhood is also about being curious, painfully inquisitive, probing everyone around about everything around - why, who, when and where, and releasing, overwhelmingly, an onslaught of queries about things that grown-ups, parents, and other elderly gentlemen & women, got acclimated to, who have taken many things for granted, and to amuse immensly at them floundering across to find the right expression to explain a “have-seen-but-never-spent much thought” phenomenon. We call them “Child-like Wonderment”, a phase of “Inherited Immaturity”,{link: a lifestage when the sense of helplessness is not something to be pitied at….}, which tends to evoke multi-hued emotions in us, the grown-ups and that much avoidable “Oh I wish..”, “Kaash…” factor!
{Link :One amongst the Most Expensive Paintings and I fell in love with the sense of tranquility captured in this master-piece} and I felt like putting down my thoughts under the series (Still Life - What I wrote for Sunflowers by Vincent Van Gogh)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
{Backdrop :Someone told me about this new Poetry classes in the town.
People write about fruits, flowers, jugs, vases, tables, chairs, empty room etc., which sit still and stare back at them. I walked a corridor, up some stairs, and down another corridor, before stopping in front of the classroomI sat next to a man, who is younger to me, who has a cheerful smile on his face and a happy tone. He showed me a few lines that he wrote for this painting. Through his words, I found him as a well-versed, extensively travelled person. He seemed to have walked across various countries, sleepy villages, which I dream of. Always. How should I start my thoughts for this piece? I closed my eyes and recalled those great lines}
An Old man, in some rustic land, wrote a poem , many years ago-
“For I have had too much
Of apple-picking : I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired...”
{After a while, I am up to read aloud to the world, what I wrote}
We arrived at their doorstep in our weekend dresses.
Like those songs about changing seasons in the fields that are far away from the big towns.
We, fruits from the winter fields, reached the market places buzzing with activity, in wooden boxes.
Many faces stared at us from distance, and inhaled sweet scent of our bodies.
A cheerful looking woman lifted us, gently, out of the wooden box, and covered us in a soft white cloth.
After reaching her house, she kept us in a white porcelain plate.
I am glad that she did not separate me from my friend.
We nodded our smiles at a few other brighter skinned mates with tangy attitude.
They are sharing the room, the wooden stool, the family dinnertime with us.
The little girl and her older brother, in white garments, sat up close to us and held their breath.
We, Young and Fresh Apples, for the first time ever in our lives, traveled beyond those orchards,
where we grew up.
Where, young women with lovers, used to wake us up with Good Morning kisses, with their delicate
hands caressing smoothly our round juicy bellies.
Each one of us, now, wear memories of those bright days, of the air lighter and cooler, moving up from meadows with swirling waists, where one can see no black-coated roads.
We grew bigger and rounded under the open skies. Someone brought the July rains, which laughed softly on our plumper and juicier shoulders, and the rain drops gurgled past, one fine evening.
The air of the orchards grew thicker, sweeter with our light multi-layered scent of our bodies and months rolled by deliriously.
Gentle folk in clumsy dresses, their calm foreheads glistening with sweat, walked in their rugged and durable feet around us to check , to be sure that we are free from bruises, holes, scars and even bites.
They worked hard in the fields until the evening, and at times, one could hear the light-hearted teasing exchanges between them trekking downwards.
Many glad evenings appeared and stayed with us.
To watch young people merrily dancing for some musical beat, under the orchard trees. And down the path towards their village, after a day’s labor.
We never wanted to part with those sweet evenings and we shut them, carefully, in our palms.
We observed silently their frail gestures of love, the first ever bites of love, in the cool nights and enclosed them in our sweet hugs.
Now we are here, so invitingly sweet, blushing with mysterious love stories that rise slowly from our soft skins.
Everyone wishes to come closer to us, to understand the color of the country we are from.
To understand the language, baskets-full of stories, poor people murmured around the dinner tables
in old cottages with thatched roofs, far away from the big towns.
The stories from fields of winter, which they shared with us in the orchards, later.
The following day. When they touched us – the Apples with their delicate hands.
What actually happened then? Where did it go wrong then?
I really cannot tell everything from the start. I cannot even
begin to put into words who brought what to me. Nevertheless,
I attempt at introducing a few moments to you someone eager,
so vividly, each moment in its full glory that starts with *when
{*is the common thread} – the paint started peeling off in strips,
the face held its breath and peered into the dark night, a
“Do not Disturb. I want to grieve all alone” sign on the doorknob,
piles of old letters that meant something once to a pair of playful
feet went into flames, the young woman stood still– shocked-looking
so vulnerable, abandoned, in her blue dress at the petrol station,
the bridge collapsed near a village, the small town disappeared
from her map, something unknown destroyed the most optimistic
heart behind the curtains, the feet learnt a new habit of strolling
all alone, the face drowned in the bowl of deep lake causing ripples
of disturbance, the wings (I mean shoulders) went cold, the heart
contemplated a suicide by cutting a few veins around the wrist,
the telephone line went dead, the things that were stolen, the hands
pound the air when riots happened, the tears-stained cheeks were
admired by a co-passenger,….each may sound like a scream of
exhaustion, which the world could not hear. I may miss a few details
when I am retelling each on different occasions. But I get her face quite
right every time she who held me in her grip, when my life went into
slim chances, and allowed me to feel that I belong to this world; she
who stood next to me when others in the railway station laughed at
how crazy I looked; she who told me what it feels like to stand so deep
in anger and yet be so controlled, calm and firm-footed; she, without
any emotion, who folded one more story of mine neatly and put it in
the old trunk that sits half-forgotten on the dusty floor of the attic.
‘Pretty women wonder where my secret lies. I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size. It’s in the reach of my arms, The span of my hips, The stride of my step, The curl of my lips. I’m a woman…. {Link :Maya Angelou}…
that’s how I fell in love with a woman who can think like a woman, who can write like a woman! and since then I never looked back in anger and frustration and I never delayed a moment to celebrate the Carnival of Womanhood - J
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
enough money within her control to move out
and rent a place of her own,
even if she never wants to or needs to…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..
something perfect to wear if the employer,
or date of her dreams wants to see her in an hour…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..
a youth she’s content to leave behind….
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
a past juicy enough that she’s looking forward to
retelling it in her old age….
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …..
a set of screwdrivers, a cordless drill, and a black lace bra…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ….
one friend who always makes her laugh… and one who lets her cry…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ….
a good piece of furniture not previously owned by anyone else in her family…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
eight matching plates, wine glasses with stems,
and a recipe for a meal,
that will make her guests feel honored…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
a feeling of control over her destiny…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to fall in love without losing herself..
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to quit a job,
break up with a lover,
and confront a friend without;
ruining the friendship…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
when to try harder… and WHEN TO WALK AWAY…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
that she can’t change the length of her calves,
the width of her hips, or the nature of her parents..
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
that her childhood may not have been perfect…but it’s over…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
what she would and wouldn’t do for love or more…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to live alone… even if she doesn’t like it…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW.. .
whom she can trust,
whom she can’t,
and why she shouldn’t take it personally…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
where to go…
be it to her best friend’s kitchen table…
or a charming inn in the woods…
when her soul needs soothing…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
what she can and can’t accomplish in a day…
a month…and a year…
{Praying for Some Kindness. For Silence. For Sanity. For All those good things that keep humans ALIVE.
Across the World.Traumatised Souls. In the Streets. At Work Places.}
Now, moving onto my “CRIB” session…
It’s because of them. Isn’t it?
You slam the receiver down, and wonder what to do next.
You close the door, sit down on the toilet with the seat lid lowered,
and give the floor a blank look for sometime. Or slam your fists
against the walls until it hurts, fill yourself with some unknown rage,
familiar tears. It does not seem to help at all. You do not understand
how cruel they can be. You do not understand any of this.
You sleep thinking of this “new acquisition”, which seems busy in
laying down a stone fence around your world. You wake up to see
stained cheeks, worn facial features, a fresh new wrinkle of sadness.
It’s because of them. Isn’t it?
You walk around as if you are in a bizzarish state of the union
with failure, a charming sight, so understated for them to steal
some glances from you when you are not paying much attention.
You look so boring, some sensible dress hung down loose over
the shoulders, which feel much lesser confident today. Your feet are
frozen inside the carriage- the shoes. You do not understand any of this.
You are making friends with the bitch inside you, which barks hysterically,
at those careless humiliations, casual dismissals, they make. It’s been done.
The Damage. You are weary of them -People who come with words.
Yes, you are weary of them - People who come with words.
Wearing no emotions. People who stitch a wretched soul out of you.
They do not settle for nothing less. They create stuff that pains most.
They are in the business - Casual Dresses for Inhumans.
After thought : “Lessons on How to be nice to others, how to be understanding towards others, need to be taken for such creatures in some class room. Admission is open to all age groups, both the sexes, old, old getting younger, young and young getting older. Kindness needs to be Advertised in & around the city - on the hoardings! such a wrecking influence, the world I work in and live about, has on me….”
{Link : Pink Floyd Or stay on as One more stunted mind}, someone who I write to these days, said something truly valid, ”People are being designed to maintain STATUS QUO in Organisations or Work places” .
Life’s all about - wooden benches, classes, stunted minds, Ants, Grasshoppers, Teachers’ pets, Bosses’s pets, Sleepers, and Coaches! A vicious circle is drawn with a renewed vigor ,time and again. Huh!
Your eyebrows may arch upward in surprise, when I tell you this.
A delicious contentment spreads over my spine, which visits me repeatedly,
when I am out there, managing my role in the wretched world.
Men always remember to draw some comfort from my voice and me.
Especially, when I am lying in the bed waiting for the demons in me
to come out and fall over everything in the room.
A few men speak to me from the bars where they try to see the world through
a beer glass, while a few watching the ember of a cigarette skipping from the
window of a speeding cab, on their way back home.
The location could be different, but the script reads quite familiar to me.
They, initially, make love to my name, and then charge forward. They absolutely
have no regrets of having broken my heart or having bruised me through unkind
words hurled at me, on some evening.
They breathe into me certain disappointing developments - they met in the coffee shops,
in the bed, at the apartment door, in the lift, on a leisure cruise, so on and so forth.
Oh with what a dignity these men perform, the pain stuck in their throats acquires
a sharper intensity. I lie face down, listening to their voices, so close, resonating deep
within the inner ear of my soul.
How many of them, as I write this line, would be struggling with this need for
a mate to connect with? a need to pull someone closer and to curl into the smooth
skin of her neck? a need to escape from the painful storm raging outside his windows,
threatening to rip apart his existence? a need to avoid staring at the field of emptiness
in the middle of the room?
The world is made of unquestionable and unpleasant developments, and there is so
much material for one to write poems. I could write one on the man’s hand stretched
across the back seat of the cab, which is before my car. I could write a learn and do book
“how to face such occurrences with no hint of depression on your pillow”.
Have not I read some time ago – and, above all, the heaviness, and the long experience
of love, just what is wholly unsayable.
Irritatingly enough, I find my heart hardened with each conversation of such kind.
Among the first we learn is good-bye,
your tiny wrist between Dad’s forefinger
and thumb forced to wave bye-bye to Mom,
whose hand sails brightly behind a windshield.
Then it’s done to make us follow:
in a crowded mall, a woman waves, “Bye,
we’re leaving,” and her son stands firm
sobbing, until at last he runs after her,
among shoppers drifting like sharks
who must drag their great hulks
underwater, even in sleep, or drown.
Living, we cover vast territories;
imagine your life drawn on a map–
a scribble on the town where you grew up,
each bus trip traced between school
and home, or a clean line across the sea
to a place you flew once. Think of the time
and things we accumulate, all the while growing
more conscious of losing and leaving. Aging,
our bodies collect wrinkles and scars
for each place the world would not give
under our weight. Our thoughts get laced
with strange aches, sweet as the final chord
that hangs in a guitar’s blond torso.
Think how a particular ridge of hills
from a summer of your childhood grows
in significance, or one hour of light–
late afternoon, say, when thick sun flings
the shadow of Virginia creeper vines
across the wall of a tiny, white room
where a girl makes love for the first time.
Its leaves tremble like small hands
against the screen while she weeps
in the arms of her bewildered lover.
She’s too young to see that as we gather
losses, we may also grow in love;
as in passion, the body shudders
and clutches what it must release.
………I was struggling to construct my thoughts, especially, about “people we meet during our rigmarolic existence…we clad in some colourful fabrics that suit the tone of our skins, that breathe light on our skins, that enhance various cubicles of our cylindrical frames, walk or drive across to a certain destination where we park ourselves for a few hours to implement a string of grey cells that we are blessed with, a journey during which we stumble upon a few! we decide who to beam a smile at, whose footsteps to follow ardently for a few blocks, who to share a body of words with, whose eyes we stare deeply into for the briefest second and smirk at the ”kippered and barbecued” status across, who to fall in love with, whose fragrance to steal, who to think about while raging a silent war under our eyelids to suppress the sweet pain at the curve of our lips as brought in by the respective memories…” we are so much like those cylindrical frames brimming with stories and experiences! and when we talk to other frames, we collect some more stories to add to those ones in our closets!
When I was failing to progress further on my line of thought, I came across this brilliant poem by Julia Spicher Kasdorf. There’s been an inexplicably soft body of silence over my shoulders…how true, when one goes through an experience that is too deep to express, there remains only SILENCE to express it! I have been working on a series of ideation at my work place, a good stream of thought process has been dedicated to my work table. At times, I pause to look out the window, spread a glance across the destruction that’s happening in a very constructive manner, but alarmingly, I find myself a bit too nonchalant about the whole affair! “Getting used to” is such a bad word!
My system seems to have lost its ability these days, hope this is fleeting an occurrence, to respond to varied triggers that are strewn on the streets. A day before, for instance, I was watching this old man in a worn-out brown coat (someone must have donated it to him) and white pajamas, who usually sits around the corner with his palm stretched a little further to seek a kind word, a few paisas or something from people who walk past, he seems to hatie this whole job of extending his palm to others seeking alms, and does it with a hint of reluctance! I found him, that morning, standing closer to a few posters stuck outside the book shop, announcing NEW ARRIVALS. I went closer to hear him reading the content of the posters in a low voice. I felt the urge to write a few lines about him, but could not find words. My words failed me once again……..
The lines “Living, we cover vast territories; imagine your life drawn on a map– Think of the time and things we accumulate, all the while growing more conscious of losing and leaving. Aging, our bodies collect wrinkles and scars for each place……” in the aforementioned poem form my favourite set.
I would have written my version in a more or less similar tremor, considering the state of mind I am still struggling with these days. We accumulate a great mix of happy and sad moments from each interaction, the whole basket is so unique to us, and we keep the basket of memories on the window-sill, stare at it admiringly as it glows in the warmth of morning sun, and we, creatures of habit, hope that it would stay the same forever. Little we know that the weather outside could become unpredictable after a while, the evening has a different story to tell, the walls have a different situation to face, when that someone storms out of the room, runs down the stairs, leaving us with a frown or a wrinkle layered in grief on our faces. Thus, begins the story of a “wrinkle” or “frown” on our faces, which the world around, all of a sudden becomes curious of or it could be a genuine concern! Previous night, the youngster felt the latter for me, and I did not hesitate an inch to open the basket to tell the story behind a wrinkle of sadness on my face, with my voice trembling with a thin wire of grief. How much time do you think one takes to break open his/her heart to share what went wrong a season ago, with the other person, and how long do you think the other person would have taken to release his tight grip over his basket to bring in certain degree of relatability? Experiences and interactions (with pleasant or unpleasant, expected or unexpected, serene or turbulent terminations) leave a whole fabric of memories behind with us, words everyday arrange themselves in their respective slots as if they are getting ready for a performance, unscheduled, anytime, anywhere. But we choose our audiences in the same way we decide to do many other things and when the right audience sits by, there’s an exchange of stories, a desire to understand a newer perspective on the story that we have been sleeping with. Beyond this mere exchange of words, we seek comfort of words to moisturise and smoothen the wrinkle or scar that seems to be threateningly deepening its impact on our faces…..!
It did not seem to matter much – your absence in my life,
till this evening when I received a postcard from the Island
you live. It has a picture of an unfolded suicide note on a
wooden table with a suggestion of bright yellow patch of
sunlight from the window. The young evening at your window
seemed restless and the sky outside seemed concerned
about you – a handsome man in khaki trousers and pure white
shirt, his eyes averted with no expression, or is it deliberate
an effort to hide the sadness, which is dripping from the
inner walls of his heart, shoulders drowned in the gravity of
memories from the streets, which he is reluctant to visit them again.
I could feel murmurs of the golden harvest of our summers,
the stolen kisses in the ripe nights of April, the warmth of brief
embraces crawling up to our backs firmed up against the door
shut tight and secured, within the folds of agonized wrinkles
around his mouth.
It did not seem to matter much – your absence in my life
till this evening when I received a postcard from the Island
you live. I terminated subscribing to your updates from the
moment at the cabin, where we argued over some issue
{forgive me, I can not recall}, but trivial matters of life
decide the fate of Affairs of hearts......
{Most would not recommend taking a break when a line of thought is being
put down, it could be great a thought or an admirable effort from someone
within his / her abilities & faculties. Alok would not appreciate this either.
But, I somehow, prefer taking a break. A break - my French classes,
a pleasant drive on Sunday roads, one more dead body of a stray
dog lying in a pool of blood brought tears in my eyes as I recalled when I killed
a heart-beat at one's feet that night, Roger Federer, the Gentleman
who cried after clinching the Wimbledon title for the fifth time straight,thus
equaling the legendary act of Bjorg, his words draped in gentle
robes of simplicity, his accolades for his rival, my dearest boy Nadal...
-------------A break, when I had pleasant conversations with Barb, Rajiv,
a brief pause around Abhi----------
Life when you were with me, I cannot say that it
was in its exotic best, but there were two simple-heads,
two pairs of eyes, two pairs of playful legs dissecting
everything around. Now, in your absence, I feel utterly
naked at times, and my skin conditioned itself to it over
a period of time. I roam about the streets like a mermaid
who had lost her home address, her cheeks and nose pressed
hard against the glass window searching for a familiar face.
But, it's not that bad either. My words are gentler now,
I see poetry dripping from everything, everyone, I just have
to drench my fingers with that, my words went to the shop
and bought o