Mich & Amit..

'Cabbie take me home'

'It's icy cold out here, and I would rather be left out tonite'

'But cabbie take me home'

'In life, I am doing a lot of running, but not getting anywhere'

'So cabbie, take me home..'

Says Mich

'Calm girl'

'Take a deep breath'

'I'm almost holding your hand'

'In you I see a Goddess'

'All roads lead to you'

'Don't go home tonite'

Says Amit

'But I love me more than than/..anythin els'

'This is killing me bit by bit'

'They want me to change'

'I am going mad, so'

'Amit, I'm so going mad'

Says Mich

'Girl, my Mich'

'Hold yourself and listen'

'This wind blows your hair'

'And sultry is the way you look'

'even when it's icy cold out here'

Says Amit

'But Amit'

'I aint beautiful'

'That is what I am all about'

'I aint beautiful'

'That is what I am all about'

Says Mich

'Says who? Mich?'

'You're my Goddess'

'My Karma..all I have'

'Beautiful or not'

'You are all that you are'

'You are me.. Mich'

Says Amit

'But I am so confused Amit'

'I don't know what is it I want'

'What is it that makes me so sad'

'Honestly I don't'

'I have been lookin for help'

Says Mich

'..Mich'

'You're sweet music'

'You ae the romance between words..'

'Mich'

'You're the way the wind sways'

'The dry leaves twirl..'

'You ae a beautiful mind, Mich'

Says Amit

'But Amit..'

...

Love Child

the part of you that is within me

keeps me awake tonight

night after night..

he reminds me of you..

of our furious love

the passion that lived between us

our love made of unsaid words and lowered gazes..

the passed time

the silent prayers

my fear of falling apart

the fear of fostering this fear..

when he sees the light of the day

all in the world i want is to see

you play him

chase him out of the bushes he hides in

roll him on the grass..

kiss him all over

smother him

the way we never did

bestow on him..

the remnant of our love

let me not regret anymore

of that half love

in him..let it live on

tonight, let our love

meet the horizon..

Wish

I wish I were home now. Me and mom would have just come back grocery shopping, holding lots of bags. Panting coz the stairs. I wish so hard, I can almost hear the lock of the main door clicking open, and I can see myself switching the light on and throwing the bags on the floor. Sinking into the couch and skipping the news channels on the TV to find some old hindi movie playing somewhere. I wish so hard I can breathe the smell of the rain in the air. The mild breeze that enters the living room from my bedroom. I can get flavors of spices from the kitchen. I can feel the cold with my barefeet,walking into my mom's bedroom..and I can hear the sound of shifting of the curtains. I can see the highway from the window. The chain of lights. The hurrying traffic. The waiting rain. Mom saying dad would be home any moment. And so much more. I am almost there..

I wish I could go out tonite. I have this particular black dress I wanted to wear. I wanted to see myself getting down the stairs in that. If that's not weird enough, I wanted to dine out. I wish to hear the clinking of glasses in an up-class restaurant. I wanted to lose myself in dim lights. Iwanted to be gifted a thing or two. I wanted to look down at the boisterous street from the glass of the particular up-class restaurant. I wanted to have some hot chocolate stuff. Later I wishedto be walked back home. My gait dancing in total abandon, on the sidewalk. Unafraid. Swaying to unheard music..and I wished to see all this happening, through your eyes..

These are just 2 of the 22 weird wishes I made..TOday!

Gamble.

You, right now look like a big gamble. Doesn mean that things are gonna get any better in the future. But.

You're so unbelievable. Unbelievably good or bad, we are yet to discover. Or we would never know. Who cares? Why care!

But your eyes. Red eyes. Are much like mine. Unfortunately those are the first things that caught my attention. No, the attraction part is not unfortunate. But that the eyes in a man would register in a woman's mind is pretty much unusual, no? Because mostly it could be the anything but the eyes.

Anyway.

There is this facade you put up. You know, you tell me that your life is a real bad deal for you. In fact your frustrations make you an even more attractive prospect, because they superfluously eclipse mine and make me think less about me and more for you. But all this doesn't show on your face, so both of us agree that what's un your face is a facade. But what if it's not? What if you are lying to me? What if your life is well sorted out inside yur mind and you are just plain lying to me? I am suspicious I agree. But you could be a liar, you know? That is precisely why You are a big gamble, at least for now. While I am writing this, you are.

Right now, like I am treating everything else in my life, I am analysing you. Making lists, and scratching things out. Making charts, for which way we could go. And then again, putting down my pen and looking away from all analyses and staring at something I still aven't realised what; and wondering about what is now.

Now is what is passing between us. It is the sum of my withdrawals, your silences and a hoard of other things, I care not to list down. Whatever is, may be it is somewhat, sometimes, worth it. At least for now. While I am writing this, it is.

None of this is true. I am simply hallucinating. Or may be I am not. I am not. I am just a trifle more crazy, tonite.

All of a sudden I am remembering things. Long highways on lonely summer nights. Scanty lights beside the roads as my cab zooms away. And I lose touch with them. And I lose touch with everyting. I open my hands and let time go. I remember departure, estrangement. The irreversibility of life, haunts me. Even if that was sad, it wants to come back.

I try to draw more lines now. I try to match the past with now. The now that breathes between us, like it were alive. Remember, I told you? But then there is no sync. It's so abrupt, that I fail to gather. And so I want to ask you. Are you true?

Does life need to continue from where it left? Can't it start again, from the beginning? Despite the abruptness. Can't wE take this leap? Together?

Or we shouldn't. I shouldn't. That way I would give life a chance to slap me left and right, all over again. And then life would mock and laugh and I would swear never to believe in things as fragile as this ever again. And to never Gamble ever again.

PS: Forgive this post, if yu can..I'm sleepless..head-ached..n' lovelorn..

PS: A few hours later. The verdict is out. I am not Gambling. No way.

Alibi

I don't have an idea. I seriously can't keep track of things. And I am pretty sure I can't do anything about my pre-occupation. I am like always thinking of somethingelse, talking to some non-existent entity, in a distant universe.

How long can I survive this world while I live in another? Till sometime back I had managed to pull myself through with the excuse of being different. But that doesn't look possible naymore. My tricks are failing me. My alibi doesn't shield me naymore. And I wonder..

My life has been moderately okayish. Except a couple of them, I haven't kept many qualms. I have grown up like a person inside a person, pretty much in isolation.

There aren't any externalities in my life. I have created a shell around, and I am very cosy inside it. Almost always asleep. So when in *this* world people call my name, I am always shaken out of sleep. Can I afford this? I wonder..

I have had this hopelesslyromantic love affair with the written word. I am madly passionate about sorrow. Solitude turns me on. I am at peace with a slower pace. I have always*always had it mY own way. And now change looks like the last thing in the universe (yours and mine) that we can bring about. I don't have the slightest idea about how to revert to mundanity..

So nor will I..

One Friday evening..

He sat with his legs stretched towards me under the table. Earlier I wondered if that he did to confirm his authority on me. But later that ceased to matter anymore. Authority confirmed or not, he invariably takes me wherever I go.

He looked pre-occupied. Wasn't with me. I didn't meddle with that. That's a part of getting used to eachother. And that is a hassle free process when the reason of you two beingtogether is that both of you are pre-occupied, indifferent and insolently so; yet infinitely passionate, weirdly in love with yourself and madly in love with each other..

He was making calls, breathing heavy, looking around. Stretching his hands and looking at corners of the roof. It was impossible to catch his eyes.

We were supposed to be working. We decided, Friday evenings they would be. Week days were killing me. We hardly ever could meet. So we decided Friday evenings they would be. A lot of stuff had piled up. I was tired, sleep-deprived and silent. He was red-eyed and distant.

I wanted to go for a walk later, may be, if time and situations permitted. And if he got out of his shell for the night. Staring at the laptop screen, my eyes began toache. Numbers and letters merged into each other. And diverged when they felt like. He was looking away and thinking, working away. Do I distract him? Or anything.

I crushed his pillow in myarms, pulled my hair apart.

'Ideas never come to me this way. I am deaD'

He didn't move.

'Are you even listening to me?' I cried.

He looked atme then. A smile gushed on his face. His eyes were so much like mine.

'I'l get you coffee'

He got out of the room, exactly what I wanted. Alone now, i leaned on his heap of clothes on the bed, and don't know slept for how long. Fifteen minutes..Twenty?

I woke up to a heat shock. He was brushing the coffee cupagainst my cheek. Waking me up from sleep, is something like murder, if not more. I screamed. Spilt the coffee on me, on him, on the whole of his bed.

What followed were his obvious peals of laughter, a tiny tussle of muscles, between lovers. And incessant rain outside. One Friday evening.