Meera and Akash

Where were you all this time? These months?” asked Meera. Akash said with a smile, “I was travelling in many lands, through deserts, over seas and oceans and learning more of life. “Did you ever think of me?” Meera persisted.

“All the time. You were with me every moment with every beat of this heart. When I crossed the rivers I took you in my arms so as not to wet you. When I traveled through deserts I kept you hidden in my heart away from the scorching heat. When I slept I dreamt of your soft hands caressing my face tenderly. Meera, you were with me every day and every moment.”

“You sweet talker! All the butter that you ate has gone into your words”. Akash burst out laughing. Meera pouted her lips. He was amused by her anger and kissed her. Then he took out his flute and played a melody she loved the most.

The evening sky was bright with a red light. The huge banyan tree they sat under was filled with chirping birds who were settling down in the evening. His melody calmed her and she sat near him with her arms around his dark body. Then she was strangely silent. “Why are silent today, Meera? Why are you looking at me like this?” She said nothing and went on looking at his face as tenderly as a mother would look at her baby.

“Don't ever go away from me, my dearest. Being away from you is death for me”, she thought of telling him. Her mind formed many more words but never said it aloud: “I love you. I need you. I promise you that I will love you, respect you and cherish you till the end of my life”.

“I am always with you, my beloved and I can hear your each thought, each sigh, feel your each tear too”, he whispered in her ears. “Then why do you go away from me?

He rested on her lap and played his flute. She moved her face close to his and kissed his eyes. Strands of her long hair were falling on his ecstatic face. His eyes were still like a calm lake. Then suddenly it started to rain.

The earth was dancing under the touch of rain. So was she dancing under Akash's touch. Neither of them moved and they sat under the banyan tree with the rain dripping through the branches and soaking them.

Akash got up to go and as he was about to go she ran to him. “Don't go away from me again” and started crying. His head was wet from the rain and she felt a strange desire to hold him close to her heart and never let him go any where.

 

After they made love, they rested together underneath the canopy of the huge banyan tree and dozed off.

But when she woke up, she saw that her beloved had left her and she was alone beneath that huge banyan tree. She sobbed “I am always yours Akash. Never to be touched by another”. Tears ran down her cheeks and in the twilight, her face looked so forlorn. Then, she recognised that it was just a dream and that her Akash was right there near her fast asleep. She snuggled against him and kissed the stubble on his face.

Lost Love

Music washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.  Berthold Auerbach

What could I do then, the singer croons delicately,
While tears fill my eyes, as I think of a life gone by,  
For I knew you never were mine; but another's
Yet this foolish heart worshipped you like a God.

You were the one whom my heart searched for years,
But when I loved you, it was only existing in my fantasy;
For it was not your fault that this love could never be;
Only mine that I knew it well and loved you more for it.

It was my own folly that made me love you so much,
To wreck all chances of happiness in your name,
Then wander in strange places looking for your face,
And write songs about you read by strange eyes.

I wish I had told you how much I adored you then, 

So that you could have become my only love forever. 

Word Addiction

I think during my childhood and growing years, I have had this strange habit of reading while having food. It was an interesting habit especially of savouring the food and the words at the same time. At times, this was a way of getting past the reality of bland food during Lent times. Staying vegetarian for around fifty-six long days was unbearable in childhood though one had to do it out of obedience. However, on growing up, this religious habit of staying away from non-vegetarian food became completely out of fashion.

Even in my twenties, I would reach out for pickle jars on the dining table just for reading the print so that I keep myself occupied while eating. It's not that I don't know what's in the pickle; I guess it's a habit or rather an addiction to printed words. This might extend to the information on creams, food products, cleaning solutions, toothpastes and so on. There are some curious instances where one might encounter an error and burst out laughing just like when I read the label on a face cleanser: Apply on a cotton pad every morning. Or boards on the road like the one for the Dry-Cleaning Shop that reads Dying, Cleaning and others. 

Then there are some days of reading spree, when one might abandon connections with the external world so that one might step into the magical world of books. After buying a kindle reader in 2017, this habit of reading spree has become so addictive as one can read whenever you want whatever you want. One looks with pride at the verbal worlds explored and the journeys made, all sitting at your favourite armchair.

This act of stepping into the unknown can bring unexpected delights, such as feeling the touch of earth on your feet, remembering the feel of how the bark of a tree or your lover's limbs felt like on your soft hands or relishing the game of lovemaking with the one you love. It might bring unexpected delights from nature such as the pleasant full moonlight night or cascades of flowing water or the fresh life-giving air of verdant canopies. But the memory of a world full of adventure that you read in a book beckons you  to a world similar to the one  Lucy stepped into right from her wardrobe. 

Us

I have a self that knows years of sense and more nonsense. I stand alone in crowds yet walk with you in green fields at the same time. I run in many new paths sitting at my armchair though I never leave my  world but for fresh signs or old paths.

You are my other self, whom I do not know for I have never seen you as you really are, for I was struck blind by your light. Yet I know you were with me in each and every circle round the holy fire and will find you near me in every dream. 

You are my favourite daydream that I return to time and again just to hold your hand in an unreal realm where rules don't matter and hearts speak only the truth. In another world, in a different circle of life, you and I will win our eternal game of love. 

Togetherness

It was good to see them together after their scars faded away. It was forever, she thought when she had etched his name on her heart, the palms of her hands in a mehndi design or on every scrap of paper that she came across. 

Destiny said otherwise and the one that smiled with love at her was even more smitten. In the meantime, this first love was forgotten. But after a lapse of a few years,  look at their chemistry, it looks magical, like out of a dream. 

In her eyes that look up to him, in his smile slightly older but contented, in their perfect blend together, there is this miracle that after a battle of egos, the magic that makes a breakup look unreal. 

Forgetfulness

We have sang so many songs of silence
Though all our hopes were lost and gone,
While time has erased whatever we sang
With new memories and quiet forgetfulness. 

Like the earth that celebrates the monsoon
With fresh green sprouts of pulsating life
That peek through the tiny little spaces
Found on walls, chinks, floors and ground. 

You are like the monsoon that fed the earth,
With plenty of positive thoughts and beliefs,
With rare dreams and fantasies of being alive,
Though they were never said aloud or revealed. 

May be it's the meeting of the earth and rain,
That retrieves an era erased by forgetfulness.

Earth, Teach Me an Ute Prayer

Earth teach me quiet ~ as the grasses are still with new light.
Earth teach me suffering ~ as old stones suffer with memory.
Earth teach me humility ~ as blossoms are humble with beginning.
Earth teach me caring ~ as mothers nurture their young.
Earth teach me courage ~ as the tree that stands alone.
Earth teach me limitation ~ as the ant that crawls on the ground.
Earth teach me freedom ~ as the eagle that soars in the sky.
Earth teach me acceptance ~ as the leaves that die each fall.
Earth teach me renewal ~ as the seed that rises in the spring.
Earth teach me to forget myself ~ as melted snow forgets its life.
Earth teach me to remember kindness ~ as dry fields weep with rain.
- 

Earth

Book donation drive

The NSS Unit of MMS Government Arts and Science College is organizing a book donation drive in order to promote reading among the tribal community of Podiyasala. Those who are willing to donate used or new books may send them to the following address. 

The NSS Programme Officer

MMS Government Arts and Science College Malayinkeezhu 

Thiruvananthapuram 

Kerala

India

695571

Kindly help us in spreading the reading spirit among the needy.

Another remembrance day

Years of absence and years of loss,
Words that could never bring it out.
Not really knowing what is missing,
Stifling up private grief for ages. 

Missing a warmth that was hearsay,
Love, talent and words in stories,
While not even a leaf was left behind
Of a life lost so many decades ago. 

She told me this to bring a tear to me;
For I had long forgotten this grief
And learnt to live without it long ago;
Than miss someone gone so long. 

Too young to have remembered you,
Too fond to love one through hearsay.

The Unsent Letters

Strangers

Coffee

A happy life

Soul Friend

This heart has been a wanderer who loves to ramble and find ways where none existed before. It never understands the wisdom of other’s words nor can it choose anything other than what it wants for itself. Sometimes, it creates raging fires in places where a soft little word would have done.

Not that there were no mazes in the olden days. There were many that it burnt down or flew past, though not with a victorious smile or swelling pride but with quiet equanimity; it didn’t have much left behind to boast of.

For years, it has searched for beauty in all places- in the serenity of nature, in the spontaneity of a child’s smile, or in the most beautiful thoughts where it has always dwelt. It has often wandered in the serenest places on earth, where it took in with amazement, the feeling of being so minute in a huge beautiful world. Sometimes, it has wandered alone, partly to its dismay and partly to create a pride in solitude. There were also times, when in another wanderer’s eyes, it read solace, warmth and strange delight.

A new strength came from a kindred spirit in whose eyes, the world was made anew or paths made merrier with zesty songs and bright sunshine. With a soulmate, an anam cara, it has often dreamt of wandering again through the same mazes differently.Though there might be new invites from around, the cascading waterfalls, the beautiful mountain-tops, the endless beaches or beautiful fields of green delight, it needs a soul friend to listen to its endless amazement.

Though there might not be many words and many hurdles to jump over, this heart still wants to watch the stars fade away all along with its soul companion.Often it dreams of flights across all its mazes just to find solace in the comfort of a friend and at times, it feels that the time has passed and the magic gone. Despite of constant mistakes while wandering, it seeks within itself an answer, to wait patiently for its dream to come back again.

May be this heart would hum a new song or dance a new dance, a never-seen wonder of rejoice when it comes home, all safe in the arms of its soul friend. Till that day, this wanderer searches on weary faces a semblance of its dream, feels down when it finds nothing familiar and ends every journey with heavy feet and grim thoughts. Yet, with a spring of delight, it waits on every corner to see what surprise life holds in its sudden trips and turns, turning a deaf ear to the noises that are around it the whole time. 

Life in Small Pixels

A life in small pixels,
For an eye that has loved
To wander and stare at life,
As far as it goes,
Without any inherent fervour
Or the joy of life.

Joy of life,
The much-quoted joie de vivre,
Common among all cousins,
Friends and the young,
Somehow found missing,
From the beginning.

Yet the mind knows
And understands fully well;
That this life is mine alone
A sum of all experiences,
Yours and mine,
Bitter sweet.

Your eyes trailing on words
Splashed across the page,
Ah! the magic of that smile,
Cryptic, heavenly and mine,
A moment too momentous,
To capture in small pixels.

What we try to do together
Is to find beauty in the gross
And loveliness in the wordless
Limitless boundless blue skies,
To still the flowing river
Sip the magic of togetherness.

Many more days of silence wait,
Till this rambler can set forth
On faraway adventures across seas,
To watch the red-orange sunset
To feel the foaming waves dash,
Once more against our feet.

Till then, life goes around,
Prisms that capture moments
Made from minutest abstractions,
Versions of beauty around,
A mind in pastel shades
Capturing a life in small pixels.

Wanderlust

For a heart like this full of love for wandering in the serenest places on earth, each and every picture of natural beauty is an invite. The cascading waterfalls that astonish, the beautiful mountain-tops, the endless beaches and patches of green everywhere.

May be on a day like this, looking at this beautiful earth, I may not write a word but only sigh and think; for what to write about a work of art that is more beautiful than any word can describe. Yet I sit at home and dream of visiting all these wonderlands after looking at their pictures.

It might happen that one fine day, I will be able to wander as long as I please and as far as I please. But right now, the travels occur in dreams that carry me to these imagined places of delight.

Travel

Travel

Travel