A Decent Burial

Now I am looking at everything through a different eye. A convalescing eye. At the end of the year, I can make out a hazy horizon, the beginning of the end is inching closer. I wish to leave his memories behind,  give them a silent burial. I wish no one remembers a thing beyond this. Like it never happened. But here is something I can't help. I can't help gathering him, in my hands, where like sand he slips out from between fingers, every passing moment. Still I would make a note of what I remember. This would help me forget faster.

He was a converted geek. You know a converted geek, don't you? A used-to-be geek, but the quintessential cool guy today.  Covetously sensitive at times, and at times the overconfident bloke tending towards sexy. Lived life on optimistic assumptions, something he couldn't make me learn, we didn't give it enough time.  Apparently down-to-earth. But housed this huge ego inside, I guess, I could never know for sure, could never ask. Though I loved him, I was a trifle scared too. You know love and fear go hand in hand, you would call me a maniac now and nail it into my head that it was an attraction, but I wouldn't agree. So don't even try. Had very very gentlemanly traits, you could trust he would walk an insanely drunk woman home without taking advantage. Even if that woman was much drooling in love with him. I am just saying, that woman wasn't me. Oh and there was no such woman. I have my own prince charming assumptions of him and this was one of those. He loved obscurity, living behind covers, when every damn person is only trying to be more known. Made him look like an outdated model of prospective mates, but somehow that didn't matter much. Love being blind, we all know makes flaws look so lusciously attractive. Was stubborn. He wouldn't let me sleep without driving home the point, his or mine! This jerked my nerves, but being on my own so long I began to doubt if it was just me who wouldn't budge. 


And I don't know if I am sleepy or what, but trying to remember beyond this I would be straining my memory. Guess I have burnt it all inside. Nothing more to bury then. RIP. Amen!

past that wasn't

If you could allow déjà vu for once, to happen to you, when would you want it to happen? When would you want a bit of your past to retreat, for a brief interval and leave you estranged, yearning for a bit more? Yearning for a thing that never happened. Do you realize that it is just not the past that is a part our past. A lot that didn’t happen is still entrenched in your mind, not letting go of its tiny existence in your conscious. Fading and gaining focus again. Things that didn’t happen because they couldn’t. But what could you do?


But what could you do? Your wanting couldn’t have been any more inconsequential. You lost what you could have had, from your fingertips. The words stopped right at your lips, you couldn’t say them. You realize that helplessness, don’t you? You have been there.

You have been to places that never were. You have met people who you never met. You were never as happy as you seem to remember you once were. It’s all a figment of your constructed past. Lies that you have put together to console yourself, for the unfulfilled life you have had in the past. You get where I am taking this?

And now when all that is bygone, illegibly past, your senses do not let you distinguish between the real and unreal past. The one that happened and the one that never did. I understand that is an act of self defense, and what could you do?

Something of this sort, happened with you today, remember? There was this temporary transportation you had back into time. This is where my first question came from. Don’t think this is crazy writing. I am sober and this is absolutely making sense. A part of the past that never happened came to you in the guise of a memory, a real memory. In the hurry of the moment you too couldn’t make out. It felt like a real happy memory. Love was with you. You smiled.

But the next, you cried. You found out it was a lie you had told yourself so desperately that even you mistook it to be a truth. That thing never happened for real. You could have made it happen though, but you didn’t. That made you sadder and you cried a little more. But what could you do?

Don’t think this is crazy writing. I am sober and this is absolutely making sense. And now you are wondering would you have chosen some other time for that piece of time to come walking back to you. You don’t understand this but this makes so much sense.

Travel-ouge

I had been on the move for the last twenty odd hours, practically for the last few years, but contextually. The road drive hadn't given me this bad a nausea ever, and the lack of sleep co-conspired. I would get out and take in gulps of air, roll my windows down, breathe in, try to sleep, fail in the process, regret my life, feel restless again. I had flown the first part of the journey and then took a train. The intention was to save some money. I had eaten out and shopped like a maniac this term. Besides getting tired of comparing the uniforms of air hostesses, I also have this thing for overnight train journeys, alone.

Sometimes I remember Geet saying Ladki aur AC ka kya connection? But whatever. So I was waiting at this station, having dinner by myself, sipping coke, people comfortably staring at me, lone woman, with lots of luggage, look who deserted her. I have reached that stage in life when I am comfortable with most of such stuff. Also I was reading this travelogue. By an author who accidentally happens to be an acquaintance of mine. I don't know which way to put it, an acquaintance who happens to be the author of that book?

So I was reading this book, yearning for a world that was all around me. Keeping sleep away, my shoulders we stooping, my back had almost passed away thanks to the bags. After I got in the train, I called people to tell them I was alive and safe. I was slouching on the side lower berth, if you know what I mean. But the man sitting opposite me was exposing half his underwear and more. I didn't know which way to look, climbed up to my berth and slept off.

At 3 in the morning, I was sitting on my suitcase near the door of the train waiting for my station, yet reading that book! That s-o-b railway guy comes to tell me that the towel from my bedroll is missing. Did I steal it? fuck! We go and search again. And I was so angry when I didn't find it. He asked me to show my bag, imagine! s-o-b. Just then all the old men were walking to the washroom in their crumpled pajamas. I cursed myself for waking up so early and it was scary cold. There was another guy with me, waiting. Smiled and asked me where I was coming from. Calcutta. End of conversation. I don't think it's a problem, but I just don't talk, not with people I know, not with strangers.

Then I remembered having broken up earlier this term. I had this sudden craving to have him beside me, cracking those nutty jokes and laughing with him. But dumping, when you sense being dumped is just around the corner, is the absolute zenith of human intelligence, the victory of the ugly human ego. Plus the ecstasy of being by myself is orgasmic sometimes.

Travel-ouge. So tell me, will I become a published author before thirty!

5 am thoughts!

I met an acquaintance of yours. Common friends are a great discomfort you know. He asked me how I know you. I wanted to correct him by saying that I knew you. But he didn't deserve to know that. I asked him how he knows you and he came up with a convincing answer. I had none. My heart shrank for a moment and then I nervously told him that you were just an acquaintance. World is a small place. It's hard not to know people. Just an acquaintance. Did I say friend? I don't even remember, I was a little too shocked. It was like our tiny secret could be out in the open anytime, my little secret. I told him that we knew each other for sometime, sometime before we lost touch.

I didn't tell him a lot of things. A hoard of things.The way I lost my sleep when you wanted me to be awake. The way you never got me down from cloud 9. The way you made me laugh, breathlessly sometimes. How at the end of those laughs I would have forgotten why I had begun laughing in the first place. Yeah, that crazy! I didn't tell him all this. I trust you, you haven't told him either, have you. I hid from him memories of our endless conversations, late into the nights. I didn't tell him about your caresses to my early morning sleepy mumbles. He doesn't deserve to know, does he. Some stories should die untold.Unheard. Some secrets are created to be frozen.  I didn't tell him how much you had entered into my conscious, how you were almost on my speed-dial those days. How you lived in the back of my mind, all day all night. I didn't tell him about my endless waits, I didn't tell him about my bouts of madness, utter madness, that unruly longing to belong to you. Nah, nothing.

I din't tell him that I was practically in love with you. I din't tell him why we couldn't be together. Nothing at all. I hope he doesn't have the slightest idea and isn't mocking at me inside. I would hate that. Shit, I hate common friends. I just hate-hate them.

Prequel to this: here 

Ugly

This one is going to be blatant. Blatant.

How does it feel to be reminded of your roots? To be shown in glimpses, visions of the place to which you belong to for real? Visions of the place where you would want to belong to? Ironically you have made all the sacrifice in life to move away from that one place thus, craving for it more. Your life has been a happy bundle of contradiction and you're looking at it through a glass now. You can't go back and change, but you can look, mercilessly, remorselessly through. You're too tired to regret. That's what long road trips do to you. Staring out of windows, winds setting your face ablaze and hair a-mess, they make you oscillate, back and forth in time, forfeiting now. That's what hundreds of miles on dusty highways do to you, to me. That's what absolute darkness reminds you of.

I had this lasting dream to witness the Brahmaputra. The only masculine river. When I crossed it, the crazy reflections of the crescent moon danced on it crazily, my eyes witnessed what they call a paralyzed fixation. Soul-overwhelmed wouldn't be the word if I would put it that way. So I would let be, that expression, or the lack of it. I also looked for dimming lights on distant mountains, endless roads, nameless milestones.

The lack of surety, adds to life a tinge of beauty it doesn't otherwise deserve. It takes the responsibility off your shoulders because you can't predict. You just sit there, and watch, your own life turn out into a hazy mixture of what you wanted it to become and of what you never wanted it to become. Long, really long drives make you mull of how inconsequential your own wanting has become. And yet they've stayed, the desires, and their untiring ambition.

Also, you get realizations. Here is the blatant part. When I see the world, when my eyes see the world, they put it in two neat categories, non overlapping categories, the pretty and the ugly. Note, beautiful is not a synonym for pretty here. This inevitable segregation happens in the first few seconds of perception, like the impatient human mind cannot rest. The pretty are given a hug and set aside. The ugly are abandoned. Like me. In this abandonment, the ugly sit alone in cold dark rooms and think and feel things the pretty never would. Solitude, forced or claimed is sometimes the most affordable glimpse into paradise.The ugly gets insights, and depths, long enriching journeys into her own self and outside. These journeys help them find each other. I realized just why I connect so much with the ugly. And this is it. Let's call it off now.

Meaningless Kiss

I am high

And you're clearly not low

It's a meaningless kiss

Though twasnt supposed to be like this

We're not in love

And this room's dark

Full of strangers

We're strangers too

Tomorrow's a Sunday

Remember this, we won't anyway

I sent the ones who loved me away

Now am alone forever

Though I din't sink in thy eyes

I can tell you're the same too

So just a meaningless kiss

And  let it be

Oh 

Let it be

Flawed Life

I promised I would be a nice girl. That wasn't enough, I wailed to be taken to the sea. Beating my feet on the floor, curled my lip and made my eyebrows meet in the middle and said 'Please'. I was tried to be appeased with chocolates and trinkets. But I wouldn't settle for anything less than the sea. My heart began fluttering the moment it was told that we were under a two hour ride from the beach. I could taste the salt in the air.

The road was dark, shaded by trees on either side, the sun, hotter than usual and the afternoon quieter. Lakes locked in the mainland, brackish and blackish, were a prelude to the emerald waters I longed for. The first sight of the sea is retained in my eyes even now, like some eternal snapshot. Sands looked endless, the sun danced as many mirages. It was as deserted as could be, waves were mild though, looking at the water receding from between my toes, a healing amnesia came over me.

Then we went to this delta sort of a thing, the river, Mahanadi fell into the sea, that place was rocky, waves were taller, more virile, they lashed onshore, disappearing into foam, drops of which landed on me, I was elated beyond words, gurgling away in laughter. Then an unexpected silence visited me, that happens often, people who've been with me would know. The waves began looking angrier, like their lives were locked by the confines of the sea and they wanted to be freed, but all they could touch was the rocks. All their pent up emotion erupted in that one moment when they dashed those rigid boulders. Catharsis, was it? But unable to move an inch beyond, they died and retreated into the sea.

The river on the other hand, was unaware of its life ahead, uncomplainingly it emptied herself into the sea. I pitied the poor thing, it had come a long way, hadn't it? Begun as a playful waterfall, meandered through miles of sands, merged and unmerged, broken and gathered. All the time, all of its lifetime it had wanted to meet the sea, waited, craved, yearned to be caged. I pitied the poor thing.

I sighed, then pitied me a little. Drawing parallels. Flawed life.

short breaths, spaced out, numbness, silence, 

nonchalance, darkness, now, here, me, alone, sighs, 

tears, ache, heart beat, heart beat, heart beat

it is said everything has a reason behind it. still i don't know why i let you go. and i'm yet to know why you never turned back to me again. i don't think i ever would. i don't know how much of us i have outgrown either. i am not sure if i am still waiting for you. but i don't ask questions anymore. 

no more. 

the lack of you, would've turned me into a rock, but it didn't. i break down oftener, inconsolably, sometimes, when i am cold and alone in dark rooms, when i don't have to pretend that i am fine, i cry

deep breaths, spaced out, solitude, smoke, cold,
 the last tremolo of pain,

 silenced cries, forced peace, relief, the lack of you, 

the lack of you, the lack of you

Why's everyone getting married?

It shouldn't be a big deal but I seriously thought I was younger than this, I am just twenty three and many many of my friends are getting settled for life, I haven't even zeroed in on the guy, I don't even have the slightest idea if such a person exists, life is moving too fast, two years ago we were all jostling in crumbling hostel rooms, chatting up, settling scores, thinking about careers, working hard, pretending to work hard and now everyone is getting married, all of a sudden, out of the blue, statuses are getting updated from engaged to married between days, whatever happened to the knitting of dreams alone, figuring out life before you called it a day and surrendered and shareed your life with a whole another person, may be I right now am too selfish to even think of such a thing, even if I had loved someone I would prioritize myself above the knot, or rather the life I have been through has ensured my belief in being alone and happy is so important that everything else looks like too risky or emotionally foolish a venture, but it's weird to see my langotia yaars getting married, as it is thanks to those formalities I wasn't very comfortable asking, 'How's your boyfriend?' and now asking 'And how's the husband/wife?' makes me swallow two or three lumps together, nothing is wrong with me, it will take some getting used to, some more time; but the best part about being as austerely single as I is that you think you see the world in a light all those blinded by love men and women fail to see it in, if love blinds, doesn't marriage kill, and with this the longest sentence written on this blog comes to an end, I am sure you've not reached here, if you've then Congratulations, on your wedding if you too are getting married!

PS: I have nothing against people who are getting hitched, and I swear I really mean those congratulatory messages. Astla Vista!

Hope is unreasonable, illogical, stubborn..

Tonite I am a self proclaimed star. No, I am not drunk. Nor have I won anything due to my talent/attitude. Most of the time I am pretty sure I don't have either. But there's a reason behind my self proclaimed stardom. There has to be.

I have had a decent share of rejections in my life so far. That's the victory I am talking about. Living despite these failures. Learning to deal with them, learning to be indifferent to them, is what I have in my kitty today. And I swear these are hard earned.

Everytime I fail I have wanted to be alone. Hell, I never analyse what went wrong. I just vent it out, I scream like there are no walls. I despise company, even in good times dude, in bad times company is evil, fatal. I deal with life, alone. I hate help. Help is pity. Now with time I realise that the number of things that could hurt me that irreversibly has shrunk. The degree too has reduced.  That's the victory, hence the stardom.

I have grown up like a person inside a person, pretty much in isolation. Perfect isolation is my moksha, the light at the end of the tunnel. Insulating myself from everything outside me is the ultimate idea. As long as I am on that path.. sigh


I have won, yeah in this very life. But after being almost choked to death. After biting dust. After having seen my worst fears come true. After having fought & lost, and fought & lost. And I am so used to it by now that winning in the first go is not something I would choose, it's crazy I know. I like to put up a good fight, I like to tread on the edge of the sword. Springing back to life after tasting death. The stubbornness of this hope is resident in me, at least for now. This is the victory, hence the stardom. Sigh

en route

Flying, home bound. Nothing quite like it. Above the earth for three hours or so. Changing cabs, dragging her knapsack, she caught her flight after almost missing it. Home bound, after a long tiring Friday. For a marginally extended weekend, she couldn't make it on diwali and had goa plans with the girlfriends in December, so this time was just about right, to relish home.

Just after the seatbelt sign was no more, she headed for the washroom. In the mirror, she looked at herself, she didn't feel a thing. Couldn't decide whether to wash her face or not. Engaging in silly immaterial questions, she thought kept the serious scathing ones away. Ambivalence took over her and she stood there, staring at her own face, not feeling a thing.

Later, she saw him in the aisle. And lost half of her sanity in just about a second. Was it him? She saw him walk closer towards her, her seat i.e. Why hadn't she met him in the airport, she could've met him in the lounge at least, she could have abandoned the flight, headed back to her dingy apartment. But she hadn't, she bit her tongue. What would she do for these long hours now? She was suddenly getting tempted to hide her face with the newspaper or something. But that would keep her from noticing how he'd changed, in the last couple months. Undecided, she breathed in large gulps, blood rushed into her head and heart and she wasn't sure if she would break down into tears in the next minute or the one after that or was she crying already?

He was a mere two seats ahead of her, she could stretch her hand and touch his hair. That proximity scared her. All the self imposed stability, those no-i-am-just-fine's had just abandoned her. Behind her copy of the Economic Times, she was shivering. Her mind strayed to his goatee again that wasn't there anymore, she had so adored it. To displace people from your mind, you get rid of the things about you that they loved the most. Wasn't that why she never baby-talked ever, after him. 

She was struggling with facts, the next thing. Wasn't he in Delhi the last time she'd checked on Facebook? What was he doing here? And why did he have to go home the same time she chose to? Why did they have to share the same hometown? Why does life ridicule you after breaking your heart, she thought. It never just gets enough, does it. Call it a day now; now at least, she told the forces conspiring against her. Hadn't she been through too much? Thankfully they turned the lights off, and she sighed in short-lived relief.

Had he noticed her yet? Did he remember her? Of course, he did. They'd broken off just about when they were absolutely comfortably settled. Just about when they'd begun shedding their defenses, opening up, sharing nothings, getting used to having each other. They chose that opportune moment to call it off, suddenly, heartbreakingly. She wasn't sure why. She hoped, he didn't know either. It had just happened, and hence the reluctance to look at each other ever again.

When she turned back after picking her luggage, switching on her two cell phones, wondering whether to call up Mom, wondering if she'd arrived already, or was she stuck in traffic, he said Hi. In one go, she realized that her T was pathetically loose, hair shabbily clutched, half of it falling on her face, kohl smudged. And she smiled back at him.


How're you? 

Good, she said between that smile. Dragged the straps of knapsack on her shoulders and left, abruptly, just when he was about to say the next word.

Outside, she picked up a mauve gerbera for Mom. Only if gerberas could buy happyness!

Unfaithful

The degree of involvement between two people varies, on a case to case basis. You couldn't tell a more involved couple from a less involved one. Or could you? These things are sometimes very vague. Also, defining right from wrong is none of my business. But sometimes, what I behold is so outrageous that I wish I could make the right from the wrong.

I ain't angry. Adultery isn't punishable by death. Neither should it be. But is that why it is so rampant? What is it that makes it so difficult for people to love the one they love. The one. What is the impossibility that distance brings along with it? Why is cheating on your boy/girlfriend so easy? So much so that it hurts my eyes. Is it love only in the romance of being close and not in the being apart and missing each other and falling deeper into love with each other? Why do people fall apart when they're away? Why do they look for other sources of entertainment to keep their minds engaged when they're away from the one they so loved? Can that ever be justified? Why do people cheat on each other? How much more is being in it harder than falling in love? It shouldn't be like that, right? It all comes together. The pain, the joy. All of it. Is there no guilt? Why is love taken for granted? 

It's not fair. Despite being the uninvolved third party, my heart proverbially goes out. For the one who is so trusting and away and so much in love and is absolutely unaware of what people are up to. Commitment is not that tough, ask me. It isn't. Though it's none of my business. 

quagmIre

Asked to recollect all achievement since my inception, I fell prey to a marathon quagmire. After a few hours of rudimentary analysis, the plummeting trends were clearly visible. If clearly you perceive as an exaggeration, then faintly be it. Faint, but saddeningly understandable trends. Extrapolatable, hence saddening. I explored and found my reason for the same.

Brutal honesty being my synonym, I would tell you the truth.

I was born ambitious. Love spoiled me. In the quest for a complement, I shed me. Shed it gradually, painfully-gradually. Turned into a pessimist from an otherwise. Lost hope. Imbibed sarcasm. Couldn't be a believer anymore. Couldn't afford it. Shrunk into myself. Abandoned faith. Spat at conventions. Began a journey. Some journey.

Love spoiled me. Killed me. Taught me to live after death.

Marooned me in hell. Made me someone I a'int. Forced me to begin this journey. Some journey

rasiyaa aaja
haule haule ras barsajaa
hoton ko, mehkajaa
rasiyaa aaja

baby steps to insanity

to look at the moon 
on full-moon nights
to feel the dark
on no-moon ones
remember?
we used to go to a place


in the shade of pines


remember
do you?


birds flew past
they recognized us
the air had unknown smells


under the stars
we used to sit
and tease and talk
kiss


remember
do you?


now they're craning that earth out
and making a building there
in our place
where we'll never be
ever again


those smells
are now lost love,
lost love
there isn't dark 
no pines
the moon's gone too


and so are we


that place has forgotten us
just like
you've forgotten me
darlin darlin


everything's over 
over
now it's no more us
just me
only me
until i can't
hold my breath
sans you


everyday 
i see that building come up
i try to thrust this belief into me
that you're no more
but can't


and 
no verse
can even begin to convey,
to say
how much 
i miss you
and want you


so much so
that i would rush back in time
to then
and 
just hold on to you
darlin darlin


..

Dementia

Everlasting latitude. This was exactly what I had been looking for, for the past six years. And lately, I had been engaging rather irrationally in my this pursuit. My trivial stint must have surprised him, if surprise could be a euphemism for absolute shock. An absolute early morning shock. So much so that I could have looked like a continuation of a dream, with bags in hand, banging his door just when dawn broke. He was half asleep when he opened the door for me, hair disheveled, breathing in between yawns. But not a question was asked.

We hadn't talked for a week or so. And such a thing happens often, no one needs to give an explanation to anyone. Though it had been enviously long, we had never cared to sit down and define our relationship. Draw the lines we would promise to stay inside of. No, we hadn't. He had tried once or twice, not in my fair recent memory though, but I remember him having tried. Like making an attempt to give it a name, make me meet his friends at least, if not parents. But I wouldn't let a thing this holy happen, ever. I was against anything that would make me grow roots, even in the places I loved. So the we kept it on and off, mostly the latter. I would tend towards being a philanderer of the immoral sorts, but somehow at the end of every single fling or romantic get away or soul shattering heartbreak, I would find my way back to him. Tell him my story, watch him watch me sob. Believing that I could never be able to gather myself, yet learning to rise from shambles.

Something that had always surprised me was how alive I became everytime I met him. Never as conscious as then, never as enlightened as then, and that is not an overstatement. So much so that I had begun to take it for granted, finding him at every turn of the road. And this was the reason why I couldn't draw those lines. Love would make me blind with passion, he never did. He opened my eyes rather. So it couldn't be love. I had supposed it to be platonic, but that it wasn't entirely that, we both knew. Ours fell in no mans land. Hence the dearth of lines.

But this was a big leap. Moving in, living-in. I didn't know what was expected of me. Is it time to draw those lines yet? I stood in his apartment, and thought so. Would poaching eggs early morning, groceries and laundry would be it? It? The end of the pursuit of everlasting latitude. I leaned out of his thirteenth floor patio, feeling slightly demented.

Rant!

I rarely give things more importance than they deserve. I rarely give things even the minimum importance they deserve. Mostly take life as it comes. Many times I have thought about disabling comments on this blog, or blocking it altogether. But then, what the heck. It's not as important, is it. Life should be taken as it comes. I am never more concerned than I should be. I somehow decide that optimum level of concern by introspection.

But now, I am scared of everything. Every-thing. Fear has such a paralysing power, what do I tell you. I am afraid of all my future bosses, all those interviews I have to sit for to get a job, all those future co-workers, all of whom are gonna have that attitude, all those people I would never be able to strike a friendship with because I would never sincerely try to. I am afraid of all those first meets with so so many people. Life looks very uncertain right now. I have no idea where I am gonna land up. I am scared of living totally alone in big cities, staring at choked roads not knowing where to go. I am afraid of living alone, without friends, without love. I am afraid of all those failures that are just waiting to make my life worse. I am so scared, I can't think but cry. I have been needing to cry. All this is happening because I am just pushing things inside me. Deeper and deeper. I need to scream and shout and cry, for God's sake. I do not talk to people because I can't share my problems with them. I know I will never find the one I will share my problems with. They just have a panache for leaving me. My personal problems are affecting me professionally. I absolutely despise myself for letting that happen. Why does life always look like it's at an all time low?

Why? Why me? Why this? Why here? Why now? Why? Will someone please tell me? Please!

Again I thought of disabling comments on this one. But what the heck!

Oona

For the umpteenth time Oona stared out of the window. Quintessentially lost. The remaining part of the night looked like a quagmire she wished not to untangle. Twirls of smoke hung in the air, between patches of darkness and smoke, the mirror wouldn't recognize her. She blew on the window pane, wrote random letters. Random letters.

She loved not a vampire. Oona loved a man, almost fatally. The night echoed with pangs of this furious love. She battled brutal truths, till her last breath. Hung to hope, and then killed it herself. Trapped herself in the vicious cycle of loving and hating the same man. Oona loved a man, who couldn't love her back. That was the caveat. Caveat.

As the night deepened, all she did was wait. Nothing but wait. Wait has a venomous bite. It's a slow poison for the spirit. Every minute that passed by, killed Oona a li'l more than the last. Fatal love takes a toll. Unrequited love. Unrequited.

The man, he has long fingers. She knew by heart the shape of his nails, when he did away with stray strands of hair from her face before a kiss. He had an aroma that sat between her nostrils, it never left her alone. Never.

Her eyes began to burn, sleepless and loveless. Buried in smoke, it wasn't her in the mirror anymore. Cold and numb, she pushed the windows open. There wasn't a storm outside. All her thoughts paused at the very thought of the man. He was etched deep within her, she fed him her sorrow and made sure he lived there.

Yet, not much of the night had passed. Has passed.

Walks To Remember-7

I am not good at goodbyes. Often, they carry a lot of awkwardness along. I didn't know what this one was gonna  be like.

The night was unusually cold and we were out on a walk. Our last. Though nothing about it made it feel like a last walk, it was just another day, though colder, rain in the skies had been waiting for long. We weren't clingy or anything, rather effortlessly impersonal, I was my obvious self and he was letting me be. It was way past midnight, must have been. I didn't care to check, wanted to lose track of time, wanted not to keep record. Memory is bad luggage. Old trees flanked the road from both sides, there was not a soul anywhere. Like the night was lost in sleep, pretty much.

Just to remind him that we were still together, I screamed..

'Icecream!'
'What??'
'Let's have icecream!'
'Now?'
'Yeah'.

There was a store at the other end, needed a lot of walking.

'Can you go back all the way..?', he paused
'I could walk till the world's end tonite.'

For the icecream I meant. I din't know what he understood.

We would walk on the right side of the road, normally you walk on the left, don't you? But he wouldn't understand. He'd say, only if you walk on the right side would you see vehicles approaching. If you're on the left, how're you even supposed to know what's behind you. And hence I would surrender and we would walk opposing the whole world. Whenever an occasional car passed us, headlights would zoom right on my eyes and he would place his hand on them, like the light was hurting me or something. There were a lot of other things though, inside and hurting, the ones that he couldn't see and I wouldn't show.

At the store, I jumped at the sight of chocolate. While he was paying I broke the silence again.

'You won't have one?
'Nope, I'm good.'
'Ah what? There is no flavor manly enough? C'mon men too eat icecream!'

He stood there, smiling, letting me pull his legs, letting me be, before picking up a cone for himself. And then we began the walk back. It had gotten colder. I was shivering and licking the icecream, and he was staring, amazed. I wanted to take a screenshot.

'How can you do that?', he said trying to look shocked.
'Do what? I'm absolutely loving this. Cold beats cold.'
'Sorry, I can't finish this, would help you beat it better!', he gave his to me.

And so we began walking again. He lit a cigarette. I had devised this strategy to make him quit. I would ask for a puff whenever he smoked. And he obviously would throw it away. But that one time, he didn't. May be, he was trying to get used to noone stopping him henceforth. He immediately placed the cigarette between my lips and said, take it in.

And there we stood. Me, both hands full of icecream, lungs full of smoke, shocked, feeling really stupid. He was laughing like we'd actually reached the world's end.

Just then the waiting rain couldn't wait anymore. It gave in.

WTR-6

Hoopla!

What's with virginity anyway? Why is it that big a deal? Why is sex tabooed? Why is the the truth censored? Why do we not talk? No wonder we have perverts running on the streets. Perverts, right amongst us.

Why is the excuse of culture brought up everytime we sit down to discuss the real issues, everytime we try to adapt to the times, to become more real human beings? Why do we live inside the closet? Why do we banish the ones who speak their mind?

Culture is not what was, nor what its self proclaimed keepers claim it to be. Culture is what is becoming of us.

Why can't sex be just dismissed as just another need of the body and/or mind? What is the big deal?

Did the IIT R student community plead guilty and apologize, I do not stay updated enough, but apparently they did. But why? Why are such undeserving issues blown out of proportion by a grossly irresponsible media? They are consenting adults, intelligent enough obviously, they could make whatever they want out of their lives. Why should they be banished for doing so? Why are they being judged? Is it just because they did it out in the open? Huh!

Here, we have co-ed hostels. Who knows what happens behind closed doors. Rather, we all do! But no way is this being blown out of proportion. It's someone's personal life, and we the people, do not have a say in it. Absolutely not any.

So what's the difference between the two instances? The former happened out in the open and the latter behind closed doors. Is that the big deal? That we can't be more open-minded? Did our culture prohibit us from becoming so? Why are we such parochial a society? Why the hoopla over this trivial an issue? Gimme a Break!

Unfuckwithable

I miss home, I miss storms and windy nights. Home is where I be. Where I am me. That place is warm all the time. In summer afternoons, I miss the way storms engulf my home and it rains in torrents. Like it wouldn't stop till morn. After the heat of the day, I miss the way, the rage of storms aroused dormant emotion. The way it awakened the dead of memories from their grave, made me sit beside a flickering candle and feel. Helplessly thrown back and forth in time. The way I danced, unaware of who was playing me, those forces, shadows, blacks and whites and grays. The wind stayed throughout the night, scaring, beating rickety windows, threatening to break and enter. How those storms roared and raped the earth of its last ember of stability, I miss that. Home was the place where love had the power to move and hurt.

This place is cold. It's beautiful, yet it's nothing like home. Here the trees have burst in full into pink flowers, there are insects making fleeting noises, like they would go extinct any day. The cold keeps me from feeling, the fog keeps me from seeing. Hence, I am numb. I am numb, and hence powerful, away from the storms, I don't go back to memories anymore. Here the wind hangs like dead, their silence is unfuckwithable. When I sit out alone in the cold, I realise that there is nothing in this world that even comes close to being as good as being alone and being at peace. My days are devoid of emotion, there isn't a hint of yearning. I do not dream. Defeated by destiny, I have taken refuge in this dark. My patience has solidified into a rude rock, nothing can thaw it. Sorrow gave way to tears, and now tears have made way for something I can't name. I choose to call it peace.

But still, my heart hunts for an excuse to get hurt.
I miss home, I miss storms and windy nights. 

Life is understood in retrospect. There was a point of time when I was sick. And I was ready to trade it off for absolutely anything else. I would be anything but sick, I thought. Now when I think of that phase what shocks me is that I had everything I could ask for. Mom used to look after me like I was a baby, I used to feel at home, be at home. And then you were always around. I realize it now when I have lost you. Shit, I had you and I din't even know. Why? How could I be that ignorant and silly and ask for that phase of time to pass? My days used to be spent in the most usual of ways, except that the hours had your caresses..the nights, your voice to talk me through to sleep. To keep telling me that I would be just fine and this is just a bad time. In no time, I would be back on my feet. I remember how I had just drugged myself with you. I held your hand and prayed that I get well, recover. Because beyond that illness was a tomorrow of you and me, our tomorrow. You made me see the light of day, you filled my mornings with joy and I had no idea. There was this undercurrent of happyness and I couldn't just realize the presence of it. I had everything I ever wanted, and fuck I wanted to get past that phase? What was I thinking? Seriously, what was I thinking.

Throughout this time, there have been many things I haven't been able to tell you. The most of inane of things, the most mundane of things, the minute details of you that have struck me, my perception of you, of us, my childish dreams, and more so the list of things that I feel are wrong with you, the tiny faults in you that I find adorable, but could never tell. But could never tell. I have written these notes to you that I've never shown you. And now, would ne'er be able to show you. While writing them, I had this promise to myself that someday I will watch you read those. But if that would not happen, I would publish it on my blog and sell my sorrow. Selling it helps getting over it.

My Heart

I owe my heart an apology. I have always taken away from it the people it has so badly wanted. And it hasn't stopped beating still. Kudos to its perseverance. But the heart doesn't even exist does it. It's just bloody pumping organ to the left of the chest. And I have no evidence that it is empowered to think/feel. The mind does all the thinking, evaluates options and tells us when to give up on things. Nevertheless, my sympathies for my heart. It has done one hell of a job. I would have called it quits long ago, had I been in my heart's shoes. But my heart doesn't wear shoes anyway.

I owe my heart a thousand apologies, having given it away to people who din't keep it well. For making it travel so much, back and forth, all those tumultuous days of mind boggling confusion. For all those ego clashes, silent battles that I fought and my heart had to be witness to. For swallowing all that violence, for bearing the unbearable and continuing to be with me, within me.

Sometimes I think, I should send my heart away for a few days for a therapy or something, it's broken so bad, like totally shattered, it should be given sometime alone to convalesce, to breathe. I feel genuinely sorry for it and  bow down before that degree of patience.

I have taken away from it every single thing it loved. I have trained it not to remember things and people I've wanted to forget. I have deprived it of its right to feel. I have drugged it with the survival drug every now and then. I have sent it off to concentration camps every once in a while, tortured it to unhealthy extents, never obeyed it. Rather I have fought and trampled to death its every wish, reasoned against it. I have cried and wailed. And my heart, it has only succumbed, succumbed to me. My rage has murdered its free will.

And tonite as I do it all over again, my conscience wants me to apologize. So, I am sorry. But there isn't much I can do about this.. the show has to go on.

N

I have a middle name. Of the many names I call myself, my middle name is the one I never use. Somehow I am ashamed of it. No, it's sounds beautiful. But I am so unused to it that it rings too many bells and puts me on guard. My middle name scares me. I don't like being called N. But it's so sonorous, and feminine, some strangers don't give me a  chance to choose my name and call me N.

And I don't particularly dislike N, it's the prettiest part  of my name. Just that I like it being used only by the creme de la creme, the very special ones, the ones that I want to keep in my life. You know who. I am very possessive about it i.e. I don't appreciate it being used in public places, for the lack of a better word, yes public places. Lingering intimate conversations are just fine. I even remember the way N sounds in the voices of those creme de la creme.

N, strings together all my secret qualities, only those who have the slightest inkling of who I am could call me that. And no, this is not narcissism. To even have the faintest chance of calling me N, you need to know me in all my shades, the gloomy insides, the maddening passion, the stoic indifference, the end of hope. But if you're just an acquaintance, and not here to stay, you have to choose from the other offerings, D, just the letter D makes me the most comfortable. I love calling people with their initials, nicks are so passe'.

But N is ominous you know. I know if you call me N, you're gonna leave me very soon, desert me. And you're gonna be the reason behind a lot of my tears. So yeah, there are just too many terms and conditions involved. You could just chuck the whole idea and call me nothing. You could alter a few lines of fate and not meet me at all. That way, you would save a lot of my exotic tears, thankyouverymuch.

On a parting note, don't call me N. Please. Now it hurts beyond that point. You know which.

Notes of an Endless night

The night doesn't end. It just goes on and on. Sleep eludes. Eyes open wider as the night gets deeper. The irony is, at no point is the darkness impenetrable, impenetrable darkness being the only thing I yearn for. All the time, there is some or the other source of light and I can see myself. And when I see myself, along with I see a void. The void is so obvious that it looms larger than my person. And I can't see anything but it. It is in a place where I used to keep you, untouched, unharmed, like a delicate dream. You were the summation of all that I wanted to become. But that was not to be. It all broke and broke very fast. I ended up empty handed, with a lot of pain caged within. And of course the void that created itself after you left. I had very few options. Just two, rather. I had to choose between love and life. And I am trying to choose life over love. I had to choose between you and me. And I am trying to choose myself over you.

Getting over you is the hardest thing, you wouldn't know. Every moment has become this constant fight to think of things other than you. Every passing hour, to engage my mind in something that takes it away from you, as away as it could. Days remind me how we were and how we could have been. Weeks, of how long ago I saw you last, heard you last.You wouldn't believe if I tell you the sort of things I do, just to not to think of you. But no matter where I go, I come back to where I was, to where I left you, to where you abandoned me. All this isn't taking me anywhere. Take my word for it, it's really feeling harder with time. Getting over you has been the hardest thing.

I am failing at loving you, I am failing at getting over you. Tell me, what should I do.

I run around, lunging for fresh air, I lock myself between four walls, trying to curse myself to sleep. It doesn't work, I try getting lost, try forgetting things, but no that doesn't work either. One moment I sit alone, I can't help crying. When I am with others, I just pretend normalcy. Yes, that's it!

This pretension has taken me a long way though. I have become a pathetic human being. I try to convince myself that I am this stone cold woman with no emotion, no warmth. Who doesn't miss anyone, who doesn't need anyone. I picturize a life in the future with just me in it. But it's not working. One moment of weakness, and I give out those soul shattering wails, begging you to come back, take me along. It's unbearable, you wouldn't understand.

..

Men in my Life -5

There is a sense of shame that I associate with this particular title. But mostly as about other things I am shameless and on your face, I would stick to that. Men in my Life -5. 


I had moved into a big city, the lights scared the hell out of me. I often lost my way. Also, I had this terrible habit of getting on the wrong bus and reaching the place I never intended to reach. Having done this many times, I was getting used to my foolishness with time, enjoying it in a way. Living alone, not yet all alone. In my mind was him. Almost all the time. 


It must have been Friday night. You know how people in big cities go crazy on Friday nights. TGIF and all. I mean I totally understand that kinda crazy outburst after the weeklong suffocation and empathize. But when that chokes all traffic, and you literally glide your way out in an hour out of a stretch of road that could be walked through in ten minutes, you say happen to say a lot of things inside your mind. I didn't. I was a good girl, apparently in love. I was enjoying stuff, strangely when you think you're love, the moods are better, aren't they? You seem to have a happier outlook towards life. 


So in this mad rush of chasing some deadline, somehow I hadn't realized that I had stayed longer than usual. Then someone screamed, dude it's Friday night. Go home and sleep! And I thought, I should get going. Mom had pestered me on the phone too, a couple of times to leave that place, but somehow I get so used to not listening to her that it's become a habit. So there I was, stuck. Waiting for a bus, beside the highway. And none of them came my way. There were a lot of indifferent others too who were sensible and could wait but I got into a bus which dropped me at some crazy place. The place looked familiar but I had to literally stop strangers and ask them what place was that! 


Then after a lot of coaxing and cajoling I got a rick. He wasn't even close to giving any assurance. Bleh, another risk! Some fly-overs were totally choked, the traffic was redirected and this guy, the rick guy i.e. kept taking me up and down the same way for like twenty odd minutes and the meter crossed like a hundred bucks. I decided to take a call. My place was near a lake of sorts and I could see that lake already. So I trusted my instincts and told myself, I would find my way if I walk.  


But I had edged closer to my tipping point. I was kinda getting a li'l scared. The road beside the lake was pitch dark and there were lot of strange men. Also, I tipped over and hurt my ankle a little. I am really good at such things. There was no point in calling mom up, she would get more scared than me. I just needed someone to talk to and walk.And walk. So I sms-ed him, 'I am lost :('. He called back immediately, which was cute. Then followed a conversation, I don't much remember. I was so much in it, I didn't make it a point to make a note of anything. For me, that was so real, I almost saw the future in it. I was foolish and I don't enjoy that kinda foolishness anymore. But he was asking me to stay careful and be fine because he was there, you know, giving that protective touch all the time. It was weird, unexpected of sorts. Very caring and loving, might I sound more cliche'-d. The darkness and the strange men didn't matter to me anymore. I hadn't felt that cared for in my entire life. It just struck me in the wrong place, my heart! 


And then I took many modes to reach what I called home then. He was there with me all the time. It was almost like he had walked down all that distance with me. Brought me home. And I think I should stop right here! 

In the Land of Women

Waiting alone on a Saturday afternoon, resisting to order a cappuccino right away is not the most pleasant thing to do. Worse, when one has a slightly tremulous mood to deal with. I was looking beyond the glass walls, trying to catch a recognizable face in the crowd, between erratic intervals of time, wondering if she was stuck in traffic, or if she had forgotten the meeting altogether. I rummaged through my purse, fished out the cellphone, almost clicked the last dialed number which was his, to ask if he had taken the pains to remind her that I was here waiting, not ordering cappuccino. But promised myself a deadline of another five minutes and placed it on the table, waiting for it to beep or something. That's the problem, I always wait for a call, rather than making it myself, it isn't as a big a deal as I make out of it, or is it?

Meeting his sister was the first big step. Rather a leap. Getting to know her was the first tick in fulfilling the Terms & Conditions for marrying him. And we are very particular about our T&Cs. She, being the younger sibling, must have been the more pampered one. When it came to me, he was no good at pampering you know. Calling me 'sweetie' was all about it. But she was brought up like some princess, I was made to assume. So was I expected to treat her like one? I hadn't the slightest idea, as I fidgeted and watched her enter the cafe'. The many photos of her that I had seen, all those mental snapshots of hers, embedded with his dictations of her mannerisms, left me momentarily. She wasn't as tall as her brother, thank God! The walk was no less suave though.

Smiles felt more than obvious. It was supposed to be all goody-goody. Except that I was a total carnivore compared to her religiously vegan habits. And I wasn't told so, unfortunately. The man always skips intricate details, rare trait in the family considering his sister's carefully manicured nails. I began hunting for the color of her nails in her dress. We do all that, don't we? She too must have been toying around with ideas and visions, colors and emotions, and me in her mind. Now that I was stealing her brother away, or so we felt.

Too Soon

How fast is not too fast?
And how slow is just alright?
Tell me,
which one is
Just about the right pace
To fall in love
with You

Because, tomorrow
I don't
want to cry alone regretting
That I gave in too fast
Or have that question
in my heart,
If you deserved some time
a few days more
and Love, a second chance

Because, today
I am insane
and all I do is cry
Darlin, darlin..

Just about the right pace to fall in love
Is this too soon? Too late?
What would you do
Had you been me?

Also, I feel
shaky and lost
Vulnerable, like never before
Powerlessly, in love
May be

Yeah
So tell me..
before I sleep off
tonight,


..

Cold's here, again

All the light is turned off. What appears is a faint shadow of the tree on my window pane, and I can't bear to look at it. Months ago, in a similar time I had written something called Misanthrope looks for Misanthrope. But that's not true. A Misanthrope doesn't look for a Misanthrope. She doesn't look for anyone. A misanthrope is always lost in narcissistic despair. And what scares her/me now is the faint traces of daylight that have entered the sky. Yes, day light scares me. It tells me that though the day is still away, the night has almost come to an end. And if I don't get sleep in the next few minutes, I probably never would. I start counting minutes and this chase inside my mind, puts sleep further away.

The best part about winter is the long nights it brings along. They give better alibis to people who want to hide behind their ownselves. To dream longer, to stay away longer, distant, pretending ignorance and convincing themselves of it. The one other thing about winter is the easy anonymity it brings along. I could just hide under layers of jackets and sweatshirts, pull a scarf over my face and walk down into unknown streets, without the fear of being recognized. But the one fucking thing bad about winter is that it's so fucking cold. It doesn't let me do anything but hibernate, and sink deeper and deeper into my apparently non-existent sorrow.

About what, I don't know. I might just figure it out if I wanted to, I have enough of degrees for that. In my domain, everything almost is supposed to have one logical reasoning. And if it doesn't then well, chuck it. But the issue is that I don't want to. It's quite an oxymoronish thing to say, but may be, just may be, I do not want to be happy. Yeah, that could be it. Because you know, nothing, practically nothing makes me happy for a considerable period of time. And I would rather not fake being happy, it's like faking an orgasm. So let's be sad and let's be me. My foolish pursuit of happyness has been so volatile, and I have been so capricious that sometimes settling for a status quo seems like the more reasonable option.

I never write about beauty. It's been my controversial thing and it freaks me out why haven't I ever written about it here, in the ten million posts I have published since the beginning of time. I always thought, I would be too biased to write about it. Beauty or rather the dearth of it has screwed my entire life up. And that's why I have a lot of bias against it. And I never wrote a word about it fearing that my bias will drip from almost each one of it. But now, I guess things are different. At least, they should be. I am much older, have been through a lot. I have lost some of my bias, some of it yeah. In the process of losing the rest of it. And this cold, this biting fucking cold, makes me want to write my perception of it, beauty hah! So write about it, I will.

yasp 9

At school, I used to have this class from 12:30 to 2:00. I was in that class, staring at the clock, watching the hands of it chasing each other, but not fast enough and I was so losing my patience. I made a pact with myself not to look at it in less than five minutes, but that wouldn't be. I was getting so bored to death. I had this notebook open on my table, some of the ink had spilt on the sheet, white. One corner of it had random designs, that never ended up beautiful. At some other random patches, I had tiny poems scribbled, in illegible italics. There were a few names, written in uncrackable codes and messages to people who owned those names within inverted commas. Some random words heard within the four walls, were noted down too. Anything to kill time. Whispers in the air. Heartbeats heard, all waiting. I was cursing the prof for asking us to down the laptops, how on earth was time supposed to pass? It would skid, slip and fall and come back to where it was, but not move. I would scribble some more on that notebook, I remember the neat spiral binding of it, the ends of which I had twisted, impatience. I had a tonne of things on my mind, a couple of assignments, reports, some competitions to be done away with, presentations ah, the lack of life in life. Normally I wouldn't waste my time thinking about the people around me back then, they wouldn't change anyway, you hate them, you love them, do not consider them to be a participant in your life, they will anyway be. But when locked in a room with them, I would generously spare a thought, some of them I would hate more, some I would love less. And so, it would strike 1:30. The longest half hour of our lives. The hands of the clock would go off to sleep. The prof wouldn't stop, no mercy, incessant she would be. People would laugh, people would understand the big jokes. I would be locked in my own senses, trying to decipher a language none of these had an idea of. Away, scribbling things, spilling more ink, on white sheets, filling life. 


The worries of life look so small in afterthought, funny and silly, funny because silly. Years down the lane, bigger sorrows confront me, bigger failures come my way. Strange how the enormity of life is inflated with time. The past sometimes looks so tiny, insignificant when put beside the present which totally engulfs us. Yeah.


But you know what the good news is? I am still in that class, and that was not a long time ago, it is now. The moments haven't moved. Time is stuck at 1:45, somewhere in the longest half hour of our lives. And I am busy doing silly things, scribbling names, thinking of people, with another thousand things on my mind, away from the commotion of the class, lost, but still in there, in that moment. Feeling every one pulse of time.

Just Friends -2

Just Friends-1

We lived in our exquisite world, scarce of outsiders.Like we had been caged between parentheses. Him and I. He was my last refuge from love. No, I didn't love him. He was the man I ended up with, after hope left me, love failed me. Almost two years of time, felt like a lost layer of life, in afterthought. When he was with me, I engaged untiringly in the process of convincing myself that, it was not him, it was not anyone. After he made a quiet unexpected exit, without an explanation, I was shocked. During our last days I was coaxing myself to believe in the possibility of a life sans him. Later, I gave up. I missed him. Though he left, he probably never did. He became this vague outline of his previous person, my friend, and constantly loitered around my conscious.

We never believed in gifts though, me being the girl, sometimes he pitied my faint craving to be gifted something, anything. Once on the walk back to the hostel, he had plucked out a few wild lilies, tied them with my hair band, put in a few leaves and handed it over to me and started laughing like  he would collapse any moment. It was my birthday, nineteenth. I smiled too. But to make things even, I bought him an ash tray with skeletons and skulls on it, just to remind him that every time he smoked, he was indeed moving closer to becoming one of those skulls. I don't know if he uses it still. Or may be his girlfriend made him quit. I don't know. Has he moved on? I apparently have, now that I'm married.

We didn't call each other except for a first few times. I used to ask him about his art, the reason why he quit college, or so he told me, I never believed him though. I had always loved to watch him paint, how the random colors on his canvas took shapes, and how he never even distantly considered my suggestions for his work. And to avenge that, I never let him read my poems. He mustn't have had the slightest idea what I wrote about. Sometimes, many times, I wrote about him. Things might have been different, had he known. Or, I don't know.

Becoming Me.

My patience doesn't like being tested. You have to get this straight. My emotions paralyze me beyond convalescence. It doesn't look like it in the first go. I give an appearance of a totally mentally sanitized, mature, peaceful woman. But the truth is that I am burning within. Only I can't show it. The chaos inside me has given up on its urge to settle down. It can never, it can never. And I realize that this is what has kept me going, till this day, till now. My only confidant is me.

I am not an antisocial. I have scores of scores of pals. I do. I chatter, I gossip, I bitch. Sometimes, I am so normal, that I cheat myself. But as the night comes on me, and I am in the dark and I close my eyes, none of these companions are there, absolutely none. It's a curse that I have, I can see beyond now, into tomorrow, I can see people falling apart right from the moment they get together. And away, I run. Chasing nothingness. This is roughly how I have been becoming me.

Aftermath, just a few, one or two, could afford to break into the sphere of my conscious. Sad but true. Everyone but these one or two, has lost their ability to lodge an effect on my being. That's the life of a cynical, misanthropic loner for you, in a para or two. But yeah, the one or two have the privilege of emotionally paralyzing me beyond convalescence, they are always at the back of my mind, tickling my nerves, kidding around with my moods, dictating things to me. Always, always, always. So much so that I am tired,  yet never tired enough. The mission of their lives, is to test my patience.

But. My patience doesn't like being tested.So, let me Be.

Only Be. 

Sweetheart!

I have this certain picture of you in my mind, it's somewhat pleasant and brings a flood of smiles everytime it occurs to me. You are staring into your palm, and I can't see your face. I can see your hair though, the shot is funny in a way and hence the smiles. But you're kind of lost, you look so naive, which is not your usual self I know. The all-knowing-enlightened chap you are, doesn't show. You look like a child and hence the smiles. You are staring at your hand and trying to see beyond time. Like, trying to peek through all barriers of fate. Like, trying to find me.

When you see your hand, don't you see me in the lines on your palm? The lines on my palm, and those on yours, must meet somewhere in time and merge. My left hand is mine, the right one is for you. Your left hand is mine, the right one is all yours to keep. That way, we would have the same hands, do you realize? And so when I place my hands on yours, two obvious soul-twins meet and all chaos comes to rest. Everything is like it is meant to be.

There is so much more I want to write right now. But I am feeling verbally challenged. The best and the worst things in life, are to be written about. But there are few things that exceed those lines drawn of exaltation or put even the most unbearable heartbreaks to shame and cannot be written about. And this is one such. The way you make way into my heart, paralyzes my ability to write..

Mary, Mary quite contrary

Bloody Mary,

Love your name..yeah, it's poetic. Mary would rhyme with quite a few nice sounding words and everytime I comment at your place, I have this constant urge to make it rhyming, I have to stop myself sometimes .. !!
The TAG follows:

3 places I would pack my travel bag for:


--Ladakh
--Venice
--NYC!


3 on-screen characters I love to watch:

--Chandler Bing
--Barney Stinson
--Sheldon Cooper


3 moods that describe me the best:


--Lost
--Lonely
--Lost again!


3 things that I think of doing on a weekend but never do:


--Study, as in reely study!
--Call up granma..
--Clean the junk off my table and my mind..neither's been possible yet


3 things from my childhood I can't forget:


--How scared I used to be of the unknown
--Waiting for my school bus, nausea
--My diary.


3 things I would never say no to:


--A midnight-walk
--Coffee
--Men with intrigue


3 things I can't live without:


--Writing
-- Being nocturnal
-- Best Friend!


My Sunday was bad. Not bad necessarily, it was busy basically. I prefer work over brooding, so yeah I have sort of grown up. My days are cool, nights are cold, full of waiting. I still don't understand how inebriated  I was when I wrote my last post. But I guess I wrote it down, because it deserved to be here..

Elixir

I have always wondered why I couldn't be like you
I have also wanted you by the slightest chance of fate to become like me

Yeah, it's been my secret
Craving for a like-minded soul, sitting with under star-studded skies
Talking, delving into and discovering sorrow
Yeah, that's been the dream
I was looking for my synonym.

Until,
When by a certain mistake of destiny
I found you

You're my anti-thesis
We have one in a zillion similarities
Scared, I wouldn't ever connect with you, the way I wanted to
One night when I bared myself before you
I witnessed, benumbed, believed

Knowing you
is like
Becoming me

So, I want to
Hold your hand and take this leap
In you I have found
Elixir

Encore

He had begun loving her eyes the most. They had in them, an unbelievable intensity of the unknown. Everytime they met and talked, it was hard for him to focus on what she was saying. Those conversations that lasted for over a few minutes, hardly, were cleverly carved out. He had to ensure their meetings seemed purely coincidental and pleasantly unexpected. He began asking her things that would make her feel that he knew her life. But he never made his intentions known enough. There were a few inhibitions.

There was another woman, the one he thought he had loved, so far. Until he met this damsel with sparkling eyes. He was confused initially about the myriad of feelings in his mind. Who was it that he loved? He had this huge sense of responsibility for this previous woman, he had known her for sometime now, leaving her would cause enormous hurt to her and guilt to him. Love had replaced itself in his heart, positioned itself for a new person. He couldn't stop thinking about this new woman, enchanted he was. This enchantment was however interspersed with horrible pangs of remorse. Was it possible, or rather feasible to be in love with two women? And then what was love?

Wasn't it the rushing hormones, an unexplainable emotion, blinded passion initially, followed by phases of mellow romance, knowing for real the person who you had buzzed around like a crazy bee, followed by a stretch of sultry maturity when you are hanging by the other end of the thread, desperately trying, looking for reason in the face of a dying passion, to convince yourself that you are still in love, but mostly falling out of it.

What does happen when we are given the object of our desire? We cease to give it any value. And then we move on to other objects of desire, desires that hadn't revealed themselves yet, and now are running around naked, not wanting to be clothed, screaming at the top of our voices inside our heads that she is the one and not the one that was previous to this. Deny, if you are a seasoned committed lover. Philanderer, agree with me!

In the later days of knowing this dewy eyed temptress, he began avoiding his ex-, trying to subtly convey the slight change in priorities. Guilt was replaced by complacency, he began expecting her to move on. Focusing his energies on this new game. Flirting with the idea of love, all over again. Encore eh!

Stalemate

And I had supposed that we had moved ahead. We hadn't. We haven't. We are still there, where we were years ago. Holding hands, fingers clasped into each others', the same doubts in our hearts, the faint feeling of longing for each other, growing stronger by the moment, faltering at times, the same questions irking us now and then. We are still here, standing on the edge of the mountain, staring into the valley, trivially confused, as the cold wind blows into our faces. Holding hands, waiting. Possessing each other, yet waiting for each other to arrive, for some kind of completion. Time hasn't moved from years.

And I thought, we had moved along, grown taller and saner. We hadn't. We haven't. We are still the same. We never changed, despite all the change. Never moved an inch, despite all those miles traveled. You and I. I had assumed, all these years, we were on that endless voyage into each others' souls. But now, when I run my hand between us, I feel thin air. The gap hasn't shrunk. Oh.

Just adding a few more pages to our dateless diaries, doesn't stand proof enough for the whale of time that has passed. We could tear those off and tell ourselves, nothing has happened, make those months and days non-existent. Undo all the hurt, that has come along as we have moved along, as I had thought we had moved along. But we hadn't. Unuh. We are still there, staring into the valley, trust me.

23

Right now I have a lot of chocolate in my blood, I'm almost high on it. So I wouldn't write much. I got lotcha goody-goody gifts todae.. one of them being the quote below..

Brick walls are there for a reason. Brick walls aren't there to keep us out. But they are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop some people who don't want it badly enough! They are there to stop the other people. 

~ Randy Pausch

Dyad?

Celine: People just have an affair or even entire relationships. They break up and they forget. They move on like they would have changed brand of cereals. I feel I was never been able to forget anyone I have been with. Because each person had their own specific qualities. You can never replace anyone. What is lost is lost. Each relationship when it ends really damages me, I never fully recover. That's why I am very careful about getting involved because, it hurts too much. I will miss of the person, the most mundane things, like I am obsessed with li'l things. May be I am crazy..when I was a little girl, my mom told me that I was always late for school. One day she followed me to see why… I was looking at chestnuts falling from the trees rolling on the sidewalk, or ants crossing the road… the way a leaf cast a shadow on a tree trunk… little things. I think it’s the same with people. I see in them little details, so specific to each of them, that move me, and that I miss, and… will always miss. You can never replace anyone, because everyone is made of such beautiful specific details. 


Me:Talking of mundane, I am obsessed with the word itself. The sound it creates. But I have been foolish enough to believe in the possibility of existence of a deeper connection between two human beings. And that deeper connection could be called love, I thought. There could be no higher degree to this 'deeper', the two human beings are joint at their souls, they originate from a common being, separated by birth, united again, by love. I had these crazy definitions, and swore to stand by them. And the line between the ones who were my-type and not-my-type was pretty distinct, like I could even make that out when it was dark and I was drunk. Now it appears I was wrong. All wrong about bumping into the one person who would complete the picture of my life like the lost piece of a jigsaw puzzle. Like a dyad or something. 


Now I see the beauty in mundane things, and get so overwhelmed that I cry. The things that happen everyday, are the ones I look forward to. There is no apparent deeper connection, nothing philosophical about these things. But your tiny words of care, my breathless wait for you, the details of  the day we share, our mundane laughter, peals of it, the confusing silences, our conversations about life, the way it is, and not about the way it should be, the afterthoughts that follow, bring in so much joy. They captivate me so much, that I might just fall for you. 


All definitions have failed me. 

The best cure for love is finding love itself.

this moment in time..

There was a girl in my bay at work. She was not a size-zero, somewhat gaunt. The first time I observed her hair because it was wildly permed. The curls fell down gorgeously on her shoulders and bounced when she walked. It had streaks of gold and brown, alternately. But a day or two post that, her hair was its natural self, a thin pony that died out just below her neck, it had lost the sheen that had first attracted my attention. I continued observing her, nevertheless. I liked her patience, the fluency of her words, her accent, kind of sweet, you have to be all that. But yeah then again, I am the last fault-finder on this planet. I don't know what exactly is the problem with me. Everything seems all so in its respective place for me, so much so that it couldn't have been more correct than it is at present. You get what I mean? I don't find a necessary reason to criticize until it is compelling to the extent of killing me. This could be because I am complacent, and I don't feel the constant urge to improvise. I can't see the not-so-obvious faults. This happens to me when I deal with people. I do not hate anyone.

But I was talking about this girl. I was surprised to know one day that she was married, she didn't look a bit like that. Married women look different, don't they? Married men also do, I guess they do. But whatever. I liked talking to her, and whenever we got time, we talked. I kept guessing her age, yeah I am bad at guessing people's age. It wasn't that she looked young or anything, but even then I couldn't zero-in-on the perfect number..could be twenty-six, thirty? Guess not. Age is an undecipherable language to me. She told me how getting married was a big decision for her, and the schedule at work was not so conducive to have a baby, she wanted to. Sometimes, even in these causal conversations, you get to look into the people you're talking to, look at life the way they do, their dreams and disappointments. I never lose a chance to step into someone else's shoes for a minute or two, just to enjoy the view from their eyes. It's that momentary craze to become anyone but yourself, for the blink of an eye. It erases all mental barriers, removes biases that we have so ingrained in us, those of age, gender, culture, family backgrounds etc. You get what I mean? It's fun. Life is so unpredictable, it could end tomorrow. And we waste all our time being ourselves. You could let loose and become someone else for the heck of it. Just for the heck of it.

The reason I am writing this today? I just felt like saying hi! Yeah, my happyness keeps visiting me, at these odd hours. I was having a headache, so bad, since morning. Disprin didn't work, I was feeling screwed. And then, boom! the headache vanished :) Ushered in happyness. So here I am writing, when I am happy I write, when I am sad, I write. My words taste different on both occasions though.. Hmm..

Have a test tomorrow. See ya then! Muah!! :))

Distortions of a Disturbed Mind!

Last night, I dreamt that we were getting married. It struck me bad, because I got to know what was inside my subconscious. Because dreams are the voice of the subconscious. They say, subconscious is the repository of the things that you have been trying to push down inside your mind, deny, forget. And these make themselves heard in our dreams. We dream of what we have been trying to deny. I am shocked because I thought what I thought was actually what I thought. But apparently it wasn't so. I was trying to convince myself there is not a thing that has a future between us. And I had all the reason to justify it to myself. I was battling myself for days now. Last night before falling asleep I felt that I had tasted success, finally! But I dreamt of marrying you! I couldn't have been more of a contradiction than this.

Ar8! This was the happiest dream I ever had, or remember having. I was, yeah, pretty happy. It was set up in my ancestral home, and I was talking to my mother with a serious face. I think I saw you too, in the dream. Walking about. My mother asked you, for the one final time, 'Are you really going to marry this girl?' I was worried waiting for your answer, trampling my fingers, God my palms are going sweaty even while typing this! And you just smiled. I was so relieved, so happy. When I woke up I assumed that all that had happened for real, for a fraction of a minute. And then the joke of it sunk into me. It's weird, to the extent of being sick!

I don't know how to deal with this. We need to talk!

Unknown

it's true, love is the thing between me and the unknown, waiting to take place, like since forever, between me and the unknown, it's true, it's an unending wait, thank heavens, it's never gonna come true, thank heavens, that this wait lives inside me and makes me live along with, this love, this wait, yeah, it's true, love's neva gonna happen,like i and the unknown are a characters in this old lady's dream, and she is not dying, not living still, and we are there, waiting to come true, between the thin strands of her consciousness and coma, when she moves closer to death, we come alive a little, and then step back into the dark, stay on as characters in her dream, waiting to come true, waiting to meet, like since forever, i and the unknown, yeah, it's true, thank heavens love isn't true, thank heavens love isn't true, and that we aren't flesh and blood, but you are a figment of my imagination, and you live inside my mind, and that you're unknown, unknown still, unknown forever, darlin! darlin! darlin! 


I just felt like writing this.
Also, I would like you to listen to this song, for me.

http://www.foeweel.com/compilations/JustInTime.mp3

Wont you do this much for me? Read me while this song fills your mind, Lemme move across your mind for those few minutes. Wont you do this much for me? Hm?

Now you're here now I know just where I'm going 
No more doubt or fear I've found my way.. 


Now that I have been struggling with the concept of it, (of love i.e.) for so long, I thought I should stop, at least for now. Like you know, idealize it, and shut it inside closed doors and make myself believe that it doesn't happen. Not to mortals. That deep connection, between souls. Mostly, it doesn't. And this wouldn't be a belief, it would be a truth, like you know, you had cereal for breakfast, like that. A truth that would have the surety of the past. This should help put my quest to rest. 


It's not that I wouldn't believe in love anymore, but I want to make it so rare, that it would quietly slip out of my reach. 


Yeah, that way..

big fat lie

with soft steps, you enter my world, break one inhibition after another, without causing the slightest hurt, you tell me that an 'us' exists, without saying a word, you stand by me when i need you the most, bring magic into my life, scoop-fulls of happyness, with each passing day, you know me more, the beats of my heart, stumble every now and then, with the fear of losing you, the want to always have you close, just to look at you smile, create compulsive emotions, this crazy fixation, oh baby, what do i do!

now your eyes are pools, deep in them i can see your soul, and now your eyes are mirrors, i can see my own self inside you, your warmth makes me feel so secure, you make life so much more worth living, you make me want to make time stop, you know like, to hold our moments tight in my hands, and never let them go, like baby oh!

but everything i just said is a lie, my heart has been broken so many times baby, and so badly everytime, i have become too good at lying, at fantasizing, and day dreaming, i would do anything inside my mind, but i wouldn't take the risk of love ever again in life, not for you, not even for me, i have just had my share of crap baby, no more, no more oh baby, what do i do!

oh baby oh!