Senile

He sits silent in his favourite armchair. No words, nothing ever comes out of him. One so famous for order and discipline, now sits crouched in a corner. His senses have discarded him.

Now and then, he poses a question about the time, place and welfare of his kids. Some pretend not to have heard him. But when a fond face steps before him, though it has grown much in age and in pain, his dispassionate face breaks into a smile and he asks: “When did you come?”

Once more an era steps before him when he danced to the whims of a fatherless little girl who watched television sitting in his lap, for whom he bought sweets that vanished in a few minutes and with whom he wandered in this new city.

All the stories that are told about his partial loss of memory, his absent-mindedness and lack of consciousness are proved wrong when I, who call him Bapu, may be the first grand-daughter who named a grandfather (with a name that he used to sign his letters) steps into his view.

Hurt

When I look at my friends who move around crowds with the ease of chameleons and get admiring glances from others, I understand that I have none of this charming nature about me. An ordinary face that provokes laughter, some weird actions that create contempt and a strange nature that does the wrongest things at the right time.

Not that it was always like that. A few days were there; when love was everything; when sky was the limit but who can blame one who was hurt by the beloved. For life has never become the same again; the hope has faded; trust in people has disappeared and all that is left is a little irony and a lot of skepticism and a lot more of silence.

Aftter the break is over

Who founded the commercial break? Well, earlier it meant that you can hurry, ease your hunger or thirst and run back to your favourite TV show or movie. Now it means that you are exploded with advertisements coming one after the other, some as meaningless as Beckett's Waiting for Godot or some as horrible in their portrayal of reality. Some channels even show a recap of the ongoing movie after each commercial break. Good for the viewer, because you often forget which goddamn movie you were watching till the break came. The same advertisements again and again till you forget not just the storyline, but even the fact that you were watching a movie.

Oh, you might advise me to swap the channel till the commercial break is over. Well, that's an option you can try when you are sitting alone and have the remote and the TV watching space to yourself. A single flip of the remote can bring about wars that can last till the end of the world. For then, the status quo is retained: who wants the remote game, where the fittest survive. Even more, elders are often irritated when youngsters keep on swapping channels tone after the other. But still that does not change the situation most viewers are facing everyday, when they are bombarded with all kinds of illogical advertisements for products they don’t use or need while waiting for that final moment when the movie they were watching and have half-forgotten emerges after the commercial break.

Not that I don’t enjoy advertisements. But still I cant bear watching movies especially in channels that don’t show any recaps. More important than that is the need for having a review for advertisements, something that can change an advertisement based on viewer reviews.

Life

The songs have changed with the seasons. All songs now taste of that sweet sense of expectation- the wait for the rain cloud and its joy on caressing the earth.

This earth that was dry and parched has signs of new life sprouting everywhere. No longer, the days are spent eyeing the cheerful faces around a new wonder.

The wonder is here finally; in its time; not too fast nor too slow; right at the time when it can bring about new bursts of pelting affection from all around.

Good Reads

Four books that I read this month are:

• The Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
• The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
• Moving on by Shashi Deshpande
• The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

Surprisingly, Moving On was amazing in its gradual unravelling of the story that was both touching and awesome while Lahiri surprised me with her evocative style and beautifully constructed stories.

Playlist of the day

These are the Malayalam songs that I'm listening to right now:

• Vikaranaukayumayee from Amaram
• Athmavil Mutti Vilichathu Pole from Aranyakam
• Etho Nidrathan from Ayal Katha Ezuthukayanu
• Amma Mazhakarinu from Madambi
• Madhuram Jeevamrita Bindu from Chenkol

Hope you enjoy them as well!

Celebration

When life started each morning was a blessing; each hour a time to celebrate. The sacred chants held a great mystery that could elevate the soul from its drabness. Now, every moment is a long drag, a step heavily drawn, from habit to habit, from place to place, without energy.

For with all its idealism, life was real from the first few years. Then you came along with your positive messages and need for miracles. Somehow, my touch with reality was lost in the same moment. No wonder, I prayed for wonders spending sleepless nights hands spread before the holy icon.

Nothing happened but a slow withdrawal into silence and a coldness that replaced the early joviality. At times, when the heart forgets its long lost desire, the one dream that mattered more than anything else on earth and rejoices in whatever has fallen into these little hands without asking.

Only on those moments, this life comes real and turns into pages of quite happiness quite unlike the loud but blessed ones who celebrate their happiness in the streets with splashes of colour and loud music. Here, only a smile shines quietly to fade again.

Blue hues

Everything is blue, this evening.
It's been a time of recollection,
To remember with sharp regret,
A broken dream from yesterday.

A string of unforeseen words,
Suddenly sprinkled on a page,
And in its shadows a dream hid,
Holding together its angst.

The blue of a showy bracelet,
Hung with minute stars and shapes,
The blue of the galloping waves
That cause you to tremble

A dream remembered upsets,
A heart that remained too placid.

Reality

It was in the shadows of this morning that you appeared in a dream, once again. Reassurance, remembrance and reciprocation, you promised while I held your hand as easily and gently as I've always have, in my dreams.

For it was easy to be us in the dreams as opposed to the dreary reality that drew borders and boundaries in our minds every day. How else can you explain how a love of a lifetime faded in ten seconds of doubt and months of hesitation?

That sense of your face so close to mine or your mere presence in my life has ceased to be miracles; for they are as far and away as lost friends and childhood memories. But these light years have covered more distances in the long wait for an expression of love.

In the meantime, the world has crumbled, shook with quakes, burnt and thrashed yet has come alive with every baby step or baby smile. Still we walk together in dreams with the same spirit and hearts brimming with love as on our first walk in the rain.

Blogger is back!

Right now, it's raining outside. Somehow, my fascination with the rain has kept me awake. I don't know how longer I'm going to stay awake at this midnight hour listening to the sound of this heavy rain. It's a great feeling of being one with nature.

This blogger was for a time ill; sick with diseases probably interesting only to my own doctor (no intentions of boring anyone with inessential details). Yesterday, I seriously thought that my blog, my favourite sacred space for a long time has stopped being so and has died out.

My day was not that interesting. The only excitement was the run to rescue the clothes left for drying from getting soaked almost completely, while the whole running exercise and the quick bath in the rain did a lot of good to cheer up my "I'm ill- not upto to anything" spirits.

Friend

It took no longer than a minute to see how you have changed from my dearest friend to the snob you are. Your every word reflects an arrogance that to the unobserved eye is like obedience; your mouth full of advice that you don't think twice before delivering.

How can I be so cruel as to judge you when I do not judge many who are lost and confused. Well, I can see through your pretenses because you can never pretend to be someone you are not, with a friend who has listened to your ramblings unedited.

Not just that, I hear though in silence, whatever that goes beyond that cunning eyes of yours. No wonder a friend one advised me to be wary of you and I never heeded. It is a shame that you speak highly of yourself before me who is the only one who is aware of your shortcomings.

But stranger is my heart who always defended you before everyone and fought hard to be friend in spite of all your big talk and our differences, trying now hard to put my hate to words, hard words so that nothing is erased from my mind.

Happy Onam

We celebrated Onam with a home-made feast of over 2o tasty dishes, prepared by my mother-in-law. It's my first Onam at the new place and I was given charge of cutting vegetables and setting the table. Interestingly, this is the first time that I have followed the traditions of Onam and it was great.

Baby Birds inside nest

Here is a view(though dark) of the baby budgies inside the nest. If you look closely, you can see a tiny little bird moving around.

Ignorance

Genuine ignorance is... profitable because it is likely to be accompanied by humility, curiosity, and open mindedness; whereas ability to repeat catch-phrases, cant terms, familiar propositions, gives the conceit of learning and coats the mind with varnish waterproof to new ideas. ~John Dewey

Well dressed, well-spoken and with a tone that might put to shame the ancient serpent that charmed Eve are the fashionable people around me who boast of anything and everything, from a tidbit of knowledge scrapped from the edges of a ten rupee quote book to the new brand faith that they propagate in the virtues of the previous generation.

They speak hours about nothing closed in rooms that reek of some artificial scent or the other that brings a bout of sneezing or a cold. The words are worse, praising ones who are absent while closing the eyes deliberately to the ones who slug hard to keep their work-worlds intact. A good word for a good deed is the last thing; but lapses, quicker to find than a daisy in a room full of laptops.

Led by charm, they live and die, lives of exasperation, when the strange lady with cat-like eyes and a lousy mouth comes with her beauty and eat their brains right away. Held transfixed in gazes across those closed rooms, all you need is a call from a friend to distract you for at least a while.

Red rose

“Life is like a movie, if you've sat through more than half of it and its sucked every second so far, it probably isn't gonna get great right at the end and make it all worthwhile. None should blame you for walking out early.”Doug Stanhope

You were like a bird who wanted to fly high;
But your wings were clipped quite early enough.
Your heart wanted and demanded freedom,
But those around you stifled you in four walls.

For love was an addiction, his sweet words solace,
From the cruel world that blossomed your form.
Yet he could not liberate you from the four walls
That ate your happiness and killed you day by day.

Your innocent smile stares from a beautiful picture,
Your perfect face set against your dark shiny hair,
And a pair of glasses only one used to you can spot,
As you stand clad in red, a colour that you'd loved.

You could crumble those four walls with outside help,
But you chose to show your freedom to do it yourself.

Spring is here!

According to the Malayalam calendar, today is the first day of the New Year and the beginning of Spring here. Falling after Karkidakom month that signifies poverty and illness,this month of Chingam is the time of harvest and propserity.

The arrival of Chingam is celebrated with floral designs called pookalams and by dressing up in the traditional handwoven dresses interlaced with gold threads. These simple handlooms give elegance to its wearer.

During childhood, Chingam stood for Onam holidays that saw all of us children running to see the snakeboats gliding across the River Pamba to the beat of the traditional vallapaatu. It also meant onasadyas and waiting for the thiruvona thoni at midnight.


This year, the shopping sprees and festive atmosphere is very much marred by the swine-flu scare. Still, the Malayali spirit in me, decided to remember that it's spring here and Onam, the traditional festival of Kerala is only a few weeks away.

Vande Mataram: Happy Independence Day

This is Sri Aurobindo's translation of the Indian National Song "Vande Matharam". On this occasion of our 62nd Independence Day Celebrations, this song that celebrates the glory of Mother India.

Mother, I bow to thee!
Rich with thy hurrying streams,
bright with orchard gleams,
Cool with thy winds of delight,
Dark fields waving Mother of might,
Mother free.

Glory of moonlight dreams,
Over thy branches and lordly streams,
Clad in thy blossoming trees,
Mother, giver of ease
Laughing low and sweet!
Mother I kiss thy feet,
Speaker sweet and low!
Mother, to thee I bow.

Who hath said thou art weak in thy lands
When the sword flesh out in the seventy million hands
And seventy million voices roar
Thy dreadful name from shore to shore?
With many strengths who art mighty and stored,
To thee I call Mother and Lord!
Thou who savest, arise and save!
To her I cry who ever her foeman drove
Back from plain and Sea
And shook herself free.

Thou art wisdom, thou art law,
Thou art heart, our soul, our breath
Thou art love divine, the awe
In our hearts that conquers death.
Thine the strength that nerves the arm,
Thine the beauty, thine the charm.
Every image made divine
In our temples is but thine.

Thou art Durga, Lady and Queen,
With her hands that strike and her
swords of sheen,
Thou art Lakshmi lotus-throned,
And the Muse a hundred-toned,
Pure and perfect without peer,
Mother lend thine ear,
Rich with thy hurrying streams,
Bright with thy orchard gleams,
Dark of hue O candid-fair

In thy soul, with jeweled hair
And thy glorious smile divine,
Loveliest of all earthly lands,
Showering wealth from well-stored hands!
Mother, mother mine!
Mother sweet, I bow to thee,
Mother great and free!

Friend

Many distrust a bond made across boundaries; for the same can turn into a ploy for infiltration. Though my self is not the high walls of Troy, when my security levels were low, you lured me into accepting your offer of friendship.

You asked me questions that I could not but refuse to answer while you wove lie upon lie to create an image of reality. When you had your fill, the life that I had in me was no more; the faith I had in others and myself had vanished and then you disappeared without a trace.

But by then, my life had degraded into empty words and need for somebody to survive. From independence, you brought me on to mass dependence on lies. An addiction, your lying words often lifted the gloom out of everyday though it ended as fast as it started.

Ernest Hemingway

Every man's life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.

You, eager reader, must have read quite a lot of material on how to improve your creative writing skills. While I was attending a writing workshop recently, I had this brainwave. I actually hit upon a brilliant place to generate creative blog ideas.

The professor was discussing Ernest Hemingway’s writing habits. Hemingway chose a quiet room in his house that was neatly cluttered with his typewriter, foolscap sheets for pre-writing stages, an oversize slipper wearing which he stood and wrote and his wastebasket that contained shreds of initial drafts that he improved upon.

On the third day of the workshop, the writing exercise was on visualizing and describing the scene. For me, who is just a hack writer, the writing exercises were a disappointment. At that moment, I could not write anything more than a drab piece of prose that just rephrased what was originally in the article that the professor read out to us.

First, I asked the professor, “May I stand and write?” He said “If that helps”. Then I produced some poor quality writing whose only good point was that I described a person’s bland face coming alive when he smiled. The professor applauded that and wisely ignored the rest, while I sat expecting a word by word analysis of my writing. Well, nothing happened.

In the next twenty minutes, everybody read out their versions of the writing exercise. One was exceptionally well-written and I really saw how good it was, with good illustrations and cleverly planned. Then the clown in my mind started dancing and making faces. He showed me an image of The Carpenters in concert half-clad and inspired.

So to cover my embarrassment of being a writer and not being able to produce a good piece of writing, I started narrating the example of the carpenters and that I needed a good shower to start working on any writing job I have. Bogus or not, I went home and enjoyed some special time in my sacred space and came up with this piece on Ernest Hemingway.

27: Happy Birthday

When the multiplication tables were in
Twenty-seven stood for three raised to three;
Now it stands for the age of this old wine,
The spirit, inside a big barrel called me.

No humble words, the barrel loves to expand,
This spirit grows mellow people say (God knows)
Though it was only yesterday that I was a kid,
Splashing for hours in the mighty river green.

Now the wrong side of twenties beckons me,
For it’s a freefall that all women go through,
From where you slip into the 30s, 40s and 50s,
Wrinkles, complaints and hassles of old age.

A lousy bunch of thoughts on my special day,
That’s me on my twenty seventh birthday!