5 posts in an hour...
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i am empty!

To forget or To remember

To fly?
To float?
Maybe!
ButTo forget is not my desire.
There now lie my rough notes
Where I once forgot destiny
In the undercoats of thoughts
To be lost for once and all.
To remember would be thus be
A privilege that I should seek.
Or so it would seem from far
A whisper captive in a jar
Is not a beautiful sight to Dream of.
But to forget it
Turns out is a bliss.
To leave
That which I cannot believe.
And let the dried up wounds
Remain covered up with silks
While memories fade away
Into oblivion.
.
.
A stroke of Destiny to silence desires. ah!

Another ungranted indulgence.

You can be just a beautiful dream,
If I let you realize into my reality
You might just melt in the spaces Between my fingers.
No traces
To be found when I look around.
You can be the sunrise or dusk
But if I try to fly like an albatross
To reach out to your hands.
You might just vanish beyond
My closed eyes like yesterday.
How can I touch yesterday?
Tell me,If I can hold a dream in my hands.
Or if my time like dry passing sands
Can be kissed on its lips in the dark?
How can I fiddle with images thatdon't even exist?
You tell me if light travels faster than sound...
Why is it that I hear these voicesbut I don't see a thing at all ?
Can I fall from the lowest spot
That I've known?
I still feel thatI am falling through the gaps
In your fist.
Clenched hands And teary eyes do tell a story
To my dreams.
How can I flee from my past ?
How longWill I last?
Through the song...
Waves of emotions hit the shores of reality.
To hit through
Half closed eyes and make me
Realize that breaking free
Is an indulgence that lost
Lovers can no longer afford.

It Begins at the End

Rushing into the roads,
I could feel my blood,
As it rushed through all of my pulsating veins.
Adrenaline does get explosive
When its mixed With tears.
And fear can get past all emotions,
In just a blink of red flowing eyes.
Hush me
If I cry too loud
for I am in a mad rush;
Out to reach tomorrow today.

Just yet I cannot give in.
Or give up.
For I have to find a way out of this moment.
I need to be somewhere. I am needed.
I have been seeded, with pain again.

But this is not who I started out to be.
Not me.
Someone's waiting out there with red roses
And a bunch of caring thoughts for me.
I am at the wrong place.
At the wrong time.
I cannot float away into the ephemeral skies.
Not tonight.
Not this time.
Zipping past blood on my face and hands.
I can feel the need to go far away.
To call it quits.
To say I am done..
.
.

I remember where I begun.
In a bright sun lit afternoon,
so unlike this stormy night.
I can fly, in my dreams.
Or so it seems, to me.

Someplace within my dreams.
Some lines within my hands.
Call out to me.
To be.
To stay,
for just another moment
and then to find the thought that I have held on to...

Every day that I have lived.
That which I have dreamed.
I need to live it now.
Here it begins,
where it was supposed to end.
And a beautiful dream,

to fly...

War with my reflection

A looking glass; A mirror on the wall;
My reflections;
Scars on my face; A memory of yesterday remains -- With me,

when I walk down the lanes in my mind...Curtained thoughts; Curtailed; Tip-toe from behind,I brush my hair; More hand than comb; Ruffled hair,Water dripping down the faucet; Trickling despair..Fundamentals; Principles; Ethics; Morals shaken up,Yesterday; Today; Tomorrow;

Time blends into me...And I into time; ticking every minute;
Walking to you -- Is it you that I am walking to?
Am I walking yet?
Am I running away?
From you?
For you?
I forget -- The reasons why I run?
The reasons why I stop?
The water trickles on with your reflection in every drop,
My eyes fidgeting with my mind;
The mirror;
The scars...I turn around and look back over my shoulders, Stealing glimpses at my own reflection;
It talks to me -- Sometimes it does;
In whispers most of the time,Hushed tones; Loud silence; Angry; Serene; Sublime!Metaphors and their affiliations floating through -- The mirror;
Attaching to me, and to my image...
I try to scratch the mirror to remove the scar...
Futile attempts; Unknown trysts; A lasting war...
I clench my fists; I want to have no past;

Just today -- That's all I want for me;
I stare at the mirror -I stare back at myself;
Pleading guilty one more time. Kneeling down in my thoughts,
ask for forgiveness,I ask for more; And more; And more;
Nothing less;I stand on the floor;
Wrestling with my yesterday,

I hit as hard as I can - Smashing the glass to pieces...

Undo me before i get Undone

I am being disguised as a cover up lie,
Like red bands and frills on the way...
You never really know if you can fly
Till you hold your breath and fly away...

Once more in a fleeting glimpse it goes
Past my Chevrolet, like an x-mas tree...
Hidden in memories in the silent lows.
What would I not give, to be just me?

You could find me unfolded in a corner
Unwrapped from within, swirling around.
Like I had my way and the right answer...
I could sing so loud and make no sound.

Write me another word of love tomorrow
Have been a cover up lie for so long...
Undo me while I can be undone from sorrow.
I really want this to be a happy song..

I am still here

Why you got to bleed me like that?

Knock me, cut me, kill me like that?

You want to blow me up, into a million pieces

But you fucking fail to see this

That I will always rise

Coz, I am the proverbial phoenix

So when you decide

To gut my pride

To rule and divide

To make them choose a side

To silence my sounds

To push me around

To injure my soul

To burn me whole

To annihilate

To desecrate

To decimate

You should remember the past

And how it couldn’t last

Coz this beast’s growling inside,

And this dog has too much of fight’

To go down like that

Hell, no

Its just readying its stride

So don’t think if it may not

Or that it might

Coz you know I definitely will

come for your head some night

And I don’t just tried

I am here today

You can’t deny me

Despite the attempts to fry me

I am back

I am breathing

I am healing

Despite the fucking splinters

And the acts to hinder

No more can you injure

My spirit, my years

And all that doesn’t belong to you

Despite your attempts to buctcher

Don’t think you are familiar

With my ability to reincarnate

To recreate and regenerate

My system might be flawed

My protectors, all lock jawed

But I am not dying easy

Not ever, not this time

Not by zeal’s disfigured mind

All the ammo you can borrow, steal and hide

Will never be enough to raze my shine

Of films and sounding filmy

Ok, so this might sound a bit filmy. But, here it goes.
I will have to take you back to the late 1980's for this. Mostly because I haven't seen the early 1980's myself (or the years prior to them).
So, we are talking about that time of the last century, when streets were empty on sunday mornings because B.R. Chopra’s "Mahabharata" was being aired on Doordarshan. When, Mr. Sharma had to climb the stairs to terrace every fortnight to re-orient the "aerial". When, Rajiv Gandhi was in the middle of his Prime Ministerial tenure. Tendulkar hadn't arrived yet. Mithun Chakarborthy was a rage, Tezaab was a bigger rage, and "ek do teen" was a craze (it was the anthem of the decade).
I must have been in Ist standard then. Bubbly, animated, bouncing off people and things with a constant smile painted across my face. I can go on staging the setting for hours, but I guess you already got the picture.
It was during this period that we were introduced to music at school. It must have been the first class. I guess it have been the first class for the music teacher as well. She could have started with the desi “sa re ga ma”, but she probably thought of doing something different. She lined us all up, and poor thing just asked if anyone of us would like to sing.

Now, when you are 5 you have the feeling that you are the best. You are the king of everything. If you ask a bunch of 5 year olds how many of them can paint, all of them would raise a hand. Ask the same question to a 100 graduate students and you would be lucky to get 5 volunteers*. But I wasn’t a graduate student then. I was 5. The king of everything. My right hand was stretched out in a moment of that question being asked. I stepped forward, turned around to face the class and in the meantime finalized the song in my head. You guessed it right. In 1989, any song by a 5 year old had to be “ek do teen”.

Ek do teen chaar paanch …… HAHAHAHAHA

Sadly I had just reached “paanch” when the whole class burst out laughing. Embarrassed and red-faced, tears rolled down my eyes. The teacher sshd everyone and consoled me and then consoled herself. Her experiment had totally failed. Within minutes we had begun our musical journey with “Sa Re Ga Ma”, “Sa Sa Re Re” and “Sa Re Ga, Re Ga Ma “
But that’s not what this story is about. It’s about the afternoon after school. I went back home, ate and recited my day dutifully to my mom with special emphasis to the musical misadventure part. I told her that I would never be singing “ek do teen” again. She looked at me and told me something that I would never forget.

She told me that all my life I would be facing the same predicament. I could either step forward and make an effort to do something, or I could stay rooted and poke fun at anyone who would. It was for me to decide. The tone of her voice told the child-me that she considered the first one to be better than the second, although it looked a raw deal to me back then. Poking fun was so much easier. Being poked at wasn’t.

I had forgotten about that incident, when something in the Pub yesterday reminded me of it. CAT is what the people everywhere talk about these days. With CAT few months away, people who have never prepared for CAT, who never had the courage to take that step forward, question those who did.
“Do you think you would make it to IIMs? I mean they are the toughest institute in the world to get into.”.

Sad. Some of us just don’t ever step forward.

Memories

The chain is weird. There is no way you understand the link. But the recollection is perfect. It's like an image embedded into your brain. And you know you would never loose it, you would carry it to your deathbed.
What am I talking about? Memories. The weirdest ones. The ones you somehow remember across ages. And it amazes you. Simply, because the year wasn't momentous. The day wasn't and neither was the moment.

My memory, especially, is made up of many such odd moments. Moments, where I have a flawless impression of the entire conversation.
Like this one time, I was returning from my grandmother's place on a Rakhee day. I was 5. We got on a bus and I must have fallen asleep cos when I woke up, the lady sitting next to me pointed to my rakhee that was beginning to come off loose. Why do I remember it? I never met the lady again, my entire life. I don’t remember any of the other 18-odd rakshabandhan days. But I remember that particular one.
Or this time when I was in Class II and my teacher told us the story of "Steam Engine" in the EVS class. I remember it perfectly, in her very own words. Or when I banged my head on my fourth birthday and won the scar that covers my left eyebrow. The list is endless..

A lot of people talk about how one's whole life flashes before one's eyes, the precise moment before death. I doubt that. I don't remember my whole life anyways. But if anything like that is supposed to happen, I am sure it is going to consist of these very instances of memory. These very indelible chains.

Sleep

I stay awake pondering over the vast array of my thoughts-their beauty, their filth, their eccentricity and their incompleteness. In my desperation to extricate myself out of this mess, i seek you-sometimes as a medicine, sometimes as an escape and sometimes as a panacea to all my ills. My thoughts and dreams are like a virus that i nurture with great care and respect,and scorn silence as unintelligible.
Silence,retreats from my door after knocking at my eye-lids for hours on end,only to return again and to retreat again. The edifice of my shattered hopes and unpleasing reality lies in ruins and when i am about to shed a tear on my satiating beravement, you blow in with an ineffable calm, almost intoxicating me to unconciousness. My mind too empty, too tired to disturb gives in slowly, finally. and then its the end.the end of me.
the end of being, only to be brought to life by a vexing buzz of the alarm.

I Wish, I Hope

I want to adopt a child someday.When I used to go for morning walks with my mom , i used to casually remark this sometimes.She thought something heavy had fell on my head when i was a baby to get me into this condition.She told my dad and he thought I would be all right after marraige.He told my sisters and she bet on the fact that my would-be-wife would ditch me within 50 months of marraige.I hope they were joking.

Not the adoption of the kind where I write out a cheque every month and it goes to get the kid some notebooks and toys and crayons.But the type where that kid grows up in my house and gets my love and affection.

I want to do this.There are so many kids out there who have no one to love them as a parent would.No mother to caress them when they scrape their knees.No dad to ride piggy back on.No one who knows their favorite dishes and cooks them as a surprise.No dad who scolds them when they flunk in maths.No mom to check if they have the quilt drawn upto the ears at 3 in the morning.

I find it a little false to be content with bringing in your own kids to the world and then just restricting the love to them and pretending that all is well.The kids who don't have parents are just as innocent as anybody and deserve the same love and care.

Ive got a childless couple in my neighbourhood. They should be in their 40s.They havent adopted and prefer to keep a German Shepherd instead , who is a rather ferocious one.

The lady once remarked to my mom "dekho ab apna baccha to apna hi hota hai".(After all , nothing like an own kid ).

So its ok to bring in a new kid to life and look after him .and its wrong to love and nurture a kid whoz already out there , feeling lonely and unloved.You want to light up a candle but not to protect one in danger of being blown out.

I dont really give a damn to what people say , especially these pesky relatives.I dont believe that I should respect anybody just because I am related to that anybody.I like more people outside my relations.If a person is good , i like him even though he may not be from the same planet.and i dont like many of my relatives because all they are interested in are things like which car was "gifted" at my cousion sister's marraige or if my cousion brother has got a girlfriend at his college or if my aunt's newly bought diamond set is a genuine or fake.
So I don't care about what they say or think about me.Because at the end of the day , it's myself I have to answer to.

Its ok to plant a fresh sapling and nurture it.But I think I don't want to ignore a sapling which may wither away without love.I don't know if I would be able to do so.Its always easier saying things than doing them.I want to do a lot of things , yet I don't.I wish I do this.

Murder In Loo!!

Warning : Absolute No brainer.Its not even funny.But to be frank , I do not care.I enjoyed putting it down.And that what I wanted.And I am not drunk.I am plain crazy.

Beep.Beep.Nothing happens.Beep Beep.My left eyelid sleepily pulls up like the shutter of a shop being pulled up.Beep Beep.Beep.Beep.Yaaaaawn.I sit up on the bed groggily and reach out to switch off the alarm in my cellphone.I try to feel the cool breeze on my face , try to smell the flowers , try to feel lucky to be alive and try to think something on the lines of " Wow.This is a beautiful day!".But nothing of this sort is felt and I look back at my pillow and imagine myself sleeping open mouthed.My imagination changes channels and I see my professor waving a big pink coloured "F" wrapped in yellow ribbons.The threat of getting the F grade makes me decide i have to get to class.I fish out my toothbrush and toothpaste. ( commercial sidenote :Close up gel toothpaste.Kill bad breath.Grab the close up confidence ! Now a 200 ml tube in just 12 rupees ! ding dong.) I walk upto the bathroom on my floor.I get to the washbasin.I stare at the mirror.I think I resemble Shahrukh Khan in a way.I lean in closer to the mirror.Look at those eyes.I am cute , I whisper to myself with a smirk.

"Never heard a girl say that to you though."

Huh ? Who said that.I turn around.Nobody.I know I should not have watched back to back movies last night.It does strange things to my hearing.

"And now don't brush too hard , lazybum....and dont look around like you have woken up on Jupiter , I am here , right here in your hand.Soft hands though , I must say."

I look at my right hand.I have my fingers curled around my toothbrush.Ok.I have never seen Michael Jackson reciting the Hanuman Chalisa.I have never seen George Bush singing "Roop tera mastaana" on CNN.And I will never see a toothbrush talking to me.These things are impossible.

"Now dont look like you have just seen Laloo Prasad Yadav in a Bikini.Its me,your toothbrush."

Me : Gosh.I feel like I have seen a Laloo Prasad Yadav without a bikini.How are you able to talk ?

Toothbrush : Just shut up .Lets talk about the Book meme you have been tagged with.

Me ( "caught-while-stealing-eggs" expression ) : Err...ahem....what book meme ?

Toothbrush : Now do you want me to jump and stick my bottom in your nose ? Its the stuff where you have to write/talk about the books you have read and all.TAGGED!

Me : Shit.was your daddy brush used by the CBI director ?

Toothbrush : Interpol chief.Now for the book meme.

Me : See.You can expect tendulkar to play for the Indian Kabaddi Team.But you can not expect me to talk about reading.I mean , I have minimal reading habits.Even my illitrate grand mother would have read more than I have.

Toothbrush: Shut up.Lets get started.Total number of books do you own ?

Me:Man,this is gonna take some counting.Lemme count.One.Two..Two...yeah...Three...umm...Three...Threee..Threeeeee

Toothbrush :Man , you are pathetic.I hate that I have to enter the mouth of someone as ill read as you are.

Me ( looking at my feet ) :Yeah...I know..actually I got my comics on rent , never bought them , you see and...

Toothbrush : Cut the crap.Last book you bought ?

Me : Ah , I know that."101 ways to eat a talking toothbrush."

Toothbrush ( suddenly looking up):Wha... Wow, that was scary.My bristles are trembling.Last book you read ?

Me ( with a wicked smile by now ) : I read the same one.

Toothbrush ( in a slow and cautious voice ) : You mean "11 ways to eat a talking toothbrush?".

Me ( with a "gulshan grover" lecherous expression ) : 101 ways to eat a talking toothbrush.You missed 90 ways.

Toothbrush ( voice a with a shade of trembling ) :"Huh...Bah ! ....I ...I once bashed up a shaving brush.And killed a shaving razor that threatened to shave me....he ...he he....Dont you think I am scared......Five books that mean a lot to you ?"

Me ( eyes fixed on the brush , smacking my lips , deliberate voice) : I wish I had some ketchup right now.About the 5 books..My experiments with toothbrushes , To kill a mocking toothbrush , The monk who ate his toothbrush , Harry Potter and the Half eaten Toothbrush and....

Toothbrush ( Eyes as wide as a toothpaste tube's cap , voice as choked as the paste in six year old toothpaste tube) : ...and ?

Me ( husshed voice ) : 101 ways to eat a talking toothbrush....

Toothbrush suddenly clutches its plastic chest , lets out a little cry , sheds off its bristles , and collapses in my hand.It is dead.Of a heart attack.

Me ( looking up at my image in the mirror ) :Man , I knew this book meme tagging thing would end up ugly.

R-A-N-D-O-M................

Everything in life is so random and all random things keep happening at random intervals of tie to random people with random results and impact. Isn’t that such a marvelously random way that life functions so randomly. Okay, if I use the word “random” once again, one of you would sue me for copyright, others might sue me for imitation, and all the other readers would run away!:P

If you’ve been brave enough to come to the second paragraph after all that crap, congratulations, for you must have guessed that I’m in one of those moods when I just feel saying any thing any crap and blabber about life, the universe and anything. Actually it comes from two things…one that I’m totally silly, and two, that I am the good kind of blogger who gives the readers, if any, a full variety in his posts!!:P As in you get poetry here, you get fiction, you get lectures on morality and philosophy, there’s male bashing and there’s female bashing, there are regular Loveguru sessions full of useful funde, you get updates on all the craps I do, you get quotes and you get serous pondering on the state of affairs that is. If this doesn’t prove to you I’m good, nothing will. :D:D

My life as such is definitely going in one of those random patterns. I’m mostly happy, and so bored of being bored all the time that I’m cool with it. The people I work with are nice, they mostly mind their own business and I can still smile and talk if I want. And yeah there are like these two typical characters who come with me in the bus. One of them is called Kalu, and the other is Ahmed. For many days they used to sit behind me, while I spent my looong journey reading something, or just thinking. One day they stuck up a conversation asking something, and since then everyday they keep inventing questions, topics and excuses to talk to me, and I keep giving answers to avoid, or to end the topic, or basically just foil their plans. It’s actually so funny, esp when they compete on grabbing the seat next to me, which I often place my bag on and pretend to go to sleep… Yeah I know I’m sounding like the mean snob who’s playing with others [grin] but what the hell, I’m not the least bit interested in talking to them. They are funny all right, but it’s more like comic. And here comes yet another forward from them. Do they even notice that I never reply?

Anyway, moving from random people to random talk, I was just wondering last night that books are also like real people. They make you react to them, think about them, love them, hate them. They become different in different moods and times, like evolution. Sometimes they tell you just what you wanted to know, sometimes they become your mirror, and sometimes they just shake you up with ignored truths. More often than not, when I read a book these days, I feel like an idiot. Now that’s why I call a book introducing you with your truer self!!

And does somebody know what’s wrong with Delhi’s rains. I mean, cmon, Mumbai and south have had enough. It’s ten days into “monsoon”; I am dying to bathe in the rain!! I don’t know how many people do that, especially as grown ups, but I’d say bathing in the rain is one of the ost delightful simple pleasures. Especially playing soccer or cricket in the rain and getting all muddy and drenched. I used to go cycling in the rain too, as a kid. And yeah, my friend adds, it can be real fun watching others do all this in the rain, esp girls bathing and dancing in the rain! Whatever…I would say I like the guys skidding in muddy pools in heavy rains better. [:(

living elsewhere........

Can you honestly say that you’ve led life to the best of your ability? How much time have you spent pleasing others and confusing yourself with those imprudent attempts? Or.. Are you entirely satisfied with the attempts you’ve made at living? Are they sufficient? Should you have tried a different approach or devised a diverse expedient to Life? Are these people really just phases or are they indicators of the dissolute permanency settling in? With each new workstation, the energy to champion a cause, any cause subsides. Everybody wants to lead and nobody wants to listen. Did they ever learn that leaders have to listen more than talk? 7 strange months. The usual cacophony has now stretched its choral tempo to now accommodate the perfectly discordant octave of plentiful female blabbering surmounting in the hallways of the Gray Bay. I wonder if my acappella will be easily overshadowed by such disgustingly perfect and rehearsed a piece, as this has come to be. All the coffee and detachment in the world could not account for the wasted hours I have spent at work trying to figure out a new perspective for life. Strangely I loathe it enough for it to inspire me to something better or greater. It’s a distinct form of self-abuse that I hurl quite consciously at myself. There is always something gnawing underneath the calmness that’s my personal space. Its this need to amplify every emotional need and feel the largesse rather than surviving on tiny remnants of sentimental nothings. If you are hurting, you got to hurt enough. If you are loving, you got to love enough. Even pain shouldn’t be compromised on. Whether a savant or a truant, the fact of the matter remains that I find the hole in my life growing larger each day. Its an effort to find people or pages to fill with words or anger- whatever comes first. Incomplete state of being. I stand at a peculiar crossroad now, I wonder what will my choices be. I haven’t loved enough, I haven’t worked enough, I haven’t lived enough and I just might not have died enough either.

Star.....

Last night I was looking at the stars through the window before I slept…strange feeling swept over me…

I smiled.In content. I smiled. In bliss. I smiled. In peace.

I had a hectic day but something happened in the evening..:-)

A glimpse. One tiny sparkle.Sudden sight. Deep view. Fast look. A shimmer.
I was pulled towards the star. My eyes lazily stretched and gazed over and over. Life slipped fast in bylanes beside me. The fast lane grips of a hustle-bustle-mad-rush floated by. My heart felt like a blossom of summer.Thud! It skipped a beat.A smile escaped my lips.

Gawd! There are some moments which you cant relish until they brush past u, and you catch just a glimpse and much like you didnt expect but still somewhere deep down you knew it was coming, the star strikes your eye.

A penchant? Yes! Definitely.
You cant really feel the depths of the dark night when your eyes are fixed on a star!
Like a sea shore which wore a wavy skirt of stars embedded within, life seemed to splash the waves of glitter on me. The star studded sky dropped down as a curtain in the horizon while I stood mesmerized.

So many lightyears away, twinkles a star
Twinkling through the stardust stuff
Dying along to shine and shimmer afar
Order to chaos, showing bliss enough

Moments unmake to make the time go on
Eternity blinks to kiss the present
Then the star smiles in a magical song
The world peeps behind moon’s crescent

In life’s coaster through ups and downhills
The star shows me to live and die but shine
Somewhere there lies life’s simple thrills
To shine bright ironing the wrinkles to fine

PS: If I muster enough courage, I might just reach for this star! *Sigh, I so wish*

You

I love to hold your fingers, like frail leaves dancing in the swirl of a wind.

The way they hold onto my hands, while we walk.
The way your fingers grip onto the hot tea glass balleying around the hotness of the tea.
Within my mind still lingers the moment,when your fingers moved chaotically,throbbingly and yet in an organic motion,etching out my face, their tip kissing every part of my face.
Your fingers rustle in my hair and with every fiddle of your fingers you loosen me up.
You know, i love their tender, their concern, their love and i love you for it.

I can kiss ur eyes for an eternity and it wont stil be enough.
I have seen those eyes filled with love so pure, that it falls short of words.
I want you to know that they are my muse, my courage, my passion and my lust.
I have never seen someone talk so much with their eyes.
Tell me,tell me...how do u enamour me so easily with the poetry of your eyes.
How do you disarm me of my anger, like another routine in a household.
Your eyes meditate the infuriated madness of my need for you.
They are the pacifiers,the intoxicators.

You are a poem, I can never complete
And never want to
because i know that your beauty must never be caught in the dryness of these words.
They are not breathing.
They can never be as beautiful as you.