One fine day

Were there expectations in your eager mind
As how exactly it is going to be like in real,
With you and me meeting each other to find
What the years have not taken away or heal.

Didn't your heart beat as loud as mine today
When walking down the street you saw me.
Not like in the days of beautiful togetherness
But like a pleasant surprise hard to contain.

For me, I saw you only for a few moments
But enough to keep counting even the time,
My face that cannot hide what it feels like
Or my words that might reveal what I want.

One fine day, this might become so unreal
This longing to have you beside me a lifetime.

Reading for fun

Can you measure the time it took to savour,
To taste bit by bit and take in your words?
Not that you have left them behind for me
They are all over the place, wherever I go.

The hourglass on my table marks the time,
Though it looks still apparently, obviously,
But the words grab my complete attention,
And it's more like reading a first love-letter.

The words glide across the page at this hour
Be it the ancient stories or lover's quarrels;
The slow-burning desire of lovelorn youth
The ambitions of the powerful and the strong.

Nor do I count my life in terms of big events
But by the tomes that I've read daily for fun.

A good ending

She was like many of us, driven and strong
Who travelled not the well-beaten paths
But made it on her own through the foliage
In the process, lost old loves and found new.

The journey was never the same throughout,
There were really tough times that broke her
She trod step by step, day by day all along
Till she got what she wanted throughout life.

But when she met him again, her childhood mate
There was a spark of affection, pure unlimited
It was as if she wanted him to stay with her
With all the force of her childhood prayers.

It's with the same sense that we see her again
Beaming her childhood smile with him around.

Perfect match

How long have we belonged to only to each other?
That day since we took a quiet walk of togetherness,
Though it is as though we have always belonged
To each other across the ages in a sacred sense.

Coffee kisses, pasta lunches, candlelit dinners,
Shared moments of togetherness well-cherished
The perfect wine that we tasted last and so deep,
Not first love nor the first riot of purple passions.

There might have been others before you and me
Countless love-stories that taught us heartbreaks;
The many roles that you and I played across lives,
The sense of having known each other all along.

But I do remember us walking around the holy fire
Quietly chanting mantras of eternal togetherness.

Us

You and I were the best together
Those who spoke without  words.

We could hear each thought
And read the hurt whenever.

So alike in nature that each
Would suffer than confess love.

One day of absence was like eons,
One look enough to warm a day.

The good things were too good,
The bad never even known.

There were no barriers to climb,
Only our reticence to love.

There was only love and life,
With the life-spirit to guide us.

There was harmony and peace,
Like the blend of river and sea.

Magic like fire and water,
Miracle of the best possible life.

Still we said no magical words that turned
The disparate you and me into us.

moment

Eternal love

Your love was a treasure I should have held close,
Without a word uttered to anyone about what we'd,
Without a soul to know the magic that we shared;
Yet what I did was to sing from the rooftops.

Time went by ruthlessly turning all love into dust,
Shrouding this love with absence and forgetfulness,
Causing much heartache and jealousy for this heart
Who cannot bear to lose you to another any day.

The piece of earth in me loves the rain of memories,
The way the love light in your eyes could bring life,
With the positive energy that only you could bring,
Rare fantasies, hardly said aloud or acknowledged.

However, this love has its days of life and death
What makes it special is its stubborn refusal to die.

Good Vs Bad

In Friends, when Joey writes a letter of reference for Monica and Chandler, he writes in broken English and substitutes each word in his letter with synoyms from the Thesaurus. Each and every word, until Chandler finds that even Joey's name is subsitituted as baby kangaroo. Now from Joey's basic written English skills to our topic!

Who can say that he/she is a good writer? I cannot claim that I'm a writer. When somebody asks about my work and what do I write, I generally evade the question. Some of it has to do with my awareness of my own limitations. Then comes great writers who can make you enticed for hours and hours without stumbling across any word or thought in their writing.

Then comes this need to simplify everything. When I see bad writing, my gut instinct is to change it into a better form. I have read bad writing that has an antique taste, as if it was taken out of some English book written two hundred years ago and happily copied by a lot of people as good writing.

What I feel is that writing is an internalised process; you cannot study a style and emulate it in writing just by following how the words go. Rather than that the message has to come in clear and sharp terms and many good writers re-write until they get their ideas clearly in writing.

This might be dismissed as plain rubbish; but if you can become a good writer by imitating the style of 'good writers', beware dear writer, you might be centuries behind!

You and I

What brought you back to my mind, I do not know

But I do not like the hot surge of tears that arise,

That still rise though it’s been so many long years

Since we walked away from our future happiness.

Words, reasons, explanations I cannot find at all,

But the heart wants to scrawl a few more words,

In that curious hieroglyphic that we had invented,

To encode a secret message just for your eyes.

But then the long years have made us so apart

For so long that I do not know you anymore,

Nor the heart’s language or its silent desires 

Even my own self I hardly recognise anymore.

You have a good mirror to look in, so do I have

What we’ve had once is more than what'll be.

Freedom

Compassion

Death

Twilight

My dream, in what strange world have you set me free?
As witnesses to twilights, embraces of dark and light,
Holding in arms, lulling asleep, reluctant partings,
Dual dancers in that uncertain zone, separate, leaves,

We wandered, in those green fields, on those blades of grass,
Our lips drinking sweet intoxicating drinks from silence,
Watching the birds that fly in the blue skies, amazed,
To feel the rain that drenches us lying lazily surprised,

As our love, like starlight from distant stars, at night,
From far away, gazes at where we have roamed,
In day as a stretch of rainbow after heavy rain,
Written clearly against the skies, in vibrant colours,

For this mythical bowl of dreams was always filled,
Everyday with love and hope, now with our desires.

conscious breathing

peace

negativity

stillness

breath

thought

The Budgies

Chirp, chirp, chirp. The 14 budgies begin their  racket from early morning until the light fades in the evening, when they turn unusually quiet. They won't let anyone sleep a wink at daytime or night-time. They are the famous or rather notorious pets of my pet-crazy husband. 

Their names are strange. My husband has christened them with names of footballers from different nations (Zlatan, Ruud, Jaan, Juan, Veron)  and favourite characters from TV shows (Cosmo from Cosmo Kramer in Seinfeld. I have named only one-Mousse. 

The star attraction is Budgie with yellow and green shades. Three females fight constantly over him. So the criminal has to be kept in isolation cage and brought back only after it is subdued. All kids belong to him and he's the cause of all battles till date.

The budgies have certain pronounced tastes in music as well. They are fond of Eminem, The Ramones’ My Sharona and my collection of rain melodies. They will shriek at the top of their voice (just like me) when they hear their favourite tracks being played. 

Real love

river

the past

Siesta

You and I share not just a life in common; 

Love of music, readable books and people, 

Fighting for rights of people in dire need

Of living a life together against all odds.

Dreams of sunrises, siestas and twilight, 

Our limbs entangled in sweet embraces

Your eyes that drink me up like coffee

Shared dreams of a life of togetherness. 

At times fantasies of idyllic happiness, 

That turn erotic at the slightest whim, 

Lips against lips, limbs against limbs

A longing to join heart, body and soul. 

May be a desire to lose myself fully in you

And get back to work after a sip of coffee.

@daydreaming

Dan Brown's Inferno

Dan Brown’s Inferno (2013) is quite unlike his earlier books in that here the author turns an environmental activist in that he constantly reminds the reader of the global ecological crisis and the problems of overpopulation. It reads more like GB Shaw’s plays that carry some social message or the other.

Though in the earlier novels, it was possible to suspend disbelief at the kind of code-cracking that Robert Langdon practiced, this time it becomes a little bit tedious with the population problem that is part of the discourse of the novel. He makes use of the character of a slightly eccentric scientist Bertrand Zobrist to offer a solution to the overpopulation problem and this is by creating a virus named Inferno that has got serious consequences to the entire humanity.

The apocalypse is near and the scientist being a fan of Dante has written all the codes in poetry. The allusions and history reveal a lot about the culture and heritage of art work as usual, the fun element is replaced by a seriousness quite unlike Brown. Like all Brown heroines, Sienna Brooks is also quite smart and independent but she turns mushy and cries on Langdon’s shoulder. 

Eat Pray Love

In a very interesting study of the blunders written by students, there is a story about how Milton came to write his epics. According to a very imaginative student, Milton got married and he wrote Paradise Lost. Later his wife died and he wrote Paradise Regained. Though how many times he repeated this practice only history can answer as can be seen from the number of his wives.

Now in popular culture, marriage and love are usually celebrated while divorce is usually represented as the end of your life.  From Jane Austen novels to present day romance novels, there is a long tradition of writing that ties up your life neatly in terms of love and marriage. Then there are as many number of chick-flicks that show how the course of true love never did run smooth.

Eat Pray Love is a 2006 novel by Elizabeth Gilbert that is quite unconventional because of its veracity and audacity. Told in the first person autobiographical mode of narration, the novel depicts a woman’s search for identity after a rather painful and time-consuming divorce. A woman in her thirties, instead of settling down and having a family of her own, is haunted by anxiety attacks. She wants to be free and decides to go on an adventurous trip all by herself.

She feels that she has been floating through life without an identity of her own.  Once her marriage breaks down, she lands straight into the hands of a lover named David. One of her friends makes a remark that if she had resembled her husband earlier, now she resembled David. This turns her inward and she wants to find out what she is really like and what she really wants out of life.

After her brief rebound affair with David, she recognises that another relationship is not quite the answer that she is looking for. She travels to three places that have only one thing in common- the first letter I- Italy, India and Indonesia. In Italy, she learns the native language and finds a new interest in friendship and in the Italian cuisine. A word catches her attention- attraversiamo- which means “let’s cross over” commonly used by her friends when crossing streets.

She goes to India and scrubs floors in an ashram while learning how to recite the prayers correctly. She meets Richard from Texas who calls becomes friends with her and calls her groceries. Her next place of visit is Indonesia, where she meets an ancient medicine man Kekut Liyer who asks her to enjoy life to the fullest and to laugh right from the liver.

She meets a Brazilian divorcee named Felippe in Bali and agrees to spend time with him. She also helps a traditional healer named Wayan to build a house with the help of financial aid from the US. Her experiences make her believe in the goodness of life once more and she feels that she has finally confronted her inner demons. Her scars hurt her less and finally she recognises that she has become much lighter as she has performed this wonderful act of crossing over. A feel good book about divorce, the film adaptation released in 2010 has Julia Roberts as Elizabeth Gilbert. 

Reality

Memory

You were already gone before this story began.

You were a just a memory that one held close

Every summer, a visit to the faraway graveyard, 

With candles, incense sticks and my family. 

You were already gone before this story began.

With every year, the losses grew in number,

Till it became a stifled cry and a quiet longing

To know you through the words you wrote. 

You were already gone before this story began.

When you became replaced in time by foster

Yet every year you were a memory held close

On All Soul's Day and in the summer vacations. 

You were already a memory when reality began

Yet with a sense of loss I read your words again. 

peace

A City Glimpse

In the morning light the city lies silent,
Slowly it awakes with the rising sun,
And life moves along its streets,
Children walking to school,
Joggers on the run to keep fit,
Vehicles roaring to arrive first.
I walk with you by my side,
Through the lanes and roads,
Turning once in a while to smile,
Laugh or reply to something you,
Just told me with the wonder,
Of a child shining in your eyes.
I love the city in the morning light,
Only when you walk with me.

Our story

On the walls of the street I have seen
Our own faces on Radha and Krishna;
While the busy traffic rushes on roads,
And we search for a life of our own.

When this spring that much-awaited
Reaches us finally after a long wait,
It has taken the leaves of our calendar
And left behind nothing but a shadow.

Radha and Krishna swing and sing,
Play games of togetherness always;
While you and I are gentle and aloof,
Looking at the happiness that drains.

The years we lost will never return,
But hope lies hidden in words of loss.

Ships that pass in the night

I thought you were here to stay always
With the kind of love-light in your eyes,
With that bounce in your quick steps
Or the well-measured choice of words.

I thought you were the kind of true love
That could make a princess out of me,
The one that could make a day magical
Out of the countless songs that you croon.

I thought may be it was a soul connection
To make a bond like this to form so soon
Though from a stranger to my everything
You took hardly a few days to become.

Looking back, I see that you were nothing
But a ship that pass in the night, in real.

On air

The way your memory creeps up before my eyes

The way you croon your favourite songs and mine,
The songs that have stayed despite the long years
Playful, naughty, sad, philosophical or just pleasant.

The songs that bring you back to me wherever I am
Wild dreams of being one with you body and soul
Spending endless hours in embraces like creepers
Despite the long sad years of absence and longing.

Though I long for our lost days with a heavy heart,
Those days of endless sunshine that were so perfect
Your sweet voice singing your favourites and mine
During all seasons and all times, every single day. 

The songs that I listen on the radio this morning
Brings back a smile in this era of infinite longing.

#listentotheradio

Being

When away from you thoughts gather,
And desires like creepers murmur,
In the dark cloudy sky to trees,
Until you come with your silence
And rain bursts in my space,
Where you are is my dream,
That I would exchange my being,
For being the air around you.

Springtime

You were a springtime in this uneventful life, 

Where your promises filled this heart daily, 

Your thoughts played like a chorus in a song, '

And in those days, you were like a demigod. 

When you reach out with your tender words, 

When you return to this life with your bounce, 

I forget that once your absence left me dead, 

And I celebrate your homecoming with delight. 

My fears are about what I'll do if you go away, 

For a promising life had collapsed in a day, 

When you and I parted our lives eons ago, 

To leave behind a life of longing and strife. 

You bring new thoughts and dreams to cherish

And I speak of us as if we are together again.

@ YJHD

Chingam

When the much-awaited Chingam is around
You and I enjoy our days of togetherness,
The scent of sweet jasmines on our bed
Your fingers undoing my long-braided hair.


The long heaps of my kasavu sari all crumbled
Along with your two yards of shiny kasavu mundu
The sweetness of these long waiting years
That finds its way into your limbs and mine.


We rest together after a sumptous onam feast
Amid smells of childhood and old boatsongs
That you sing in your sweet mellow voice,
To the snake-boats across the River Green.


When the spring is finally around for us both
We reign an ancient king and his demure queen.

Meghadutam

meaning

Relationship

A Rose

A faded rose is not a worthy gift;
Yet playfully I offered you one.
A broken heart is not ready to love;
So I waited for time to heal its wound.

 My heart has danced along with the earth
And has blossomed into petals of joy.
It sings melodiously for one unseen
For whom the roses bloom and my heart smiles.

awareness

periods meme

periods

menstruation

love

periods

late period

periods