She

She was what her friends called a naivete, a chatterbox who wore her heart on her sleeve. But when she fell in love with him,  she withdrew  into her shell and started choosing her words carefully.

In her dark kohl-drawn eyes that looked up to his warm searching eyes, you could find desire and a strange reticence to be what she was before she knew him. She talks to her friends like earlier but smiles as she speaks, thinking of him.

Those who knew her earlier finds her new behaviour strange for she was a chatterbox talking without restraint about what mattered to her. But she was not the same after she tasted love and she forgot herself in his first embrace.

She spends her days dreaming about him and the secrets that togetherness brings and this is one sacred space that she does not want to share with anyone. Her friends tease her about her sudden transition but she smiles and changes the topic as if she does not want to talk about him and what he means to her.

From that moment when their souls had mingled in a sweet ethereal melody beyond any words, she has become an earth woman celebrating her newly discovered feminine nature, a woman who is one with nature and its rhythms.

She talks to her friends but not candidly like before and in the midst of her conversation with them, she falls silent as she dreams of him and the emotions that memories of togetherness brings.

She dreams of the sweet nothings that he whispered in her eyes as she sat next to him and the love-light in his eyes that makes her bloom like the jasmine she wears on her hair. She keeps flitting to a secret world where being one with him- mind, body and spirit- is her only thought. 

The serious and the trivial

In the midst of this summer tedium, we meet once again in the same old park that we used to spend our young days. In those days, you and I would enjoy roaming around the verdant campus talking of everything under the sun. 

The sight of the tall trees made us curious about the names and we were curious about the carpet of pink blossoms as well. It was with the same thirst of knowledge that you discovered the name of the tree to be tabeubia. 

Then there were the pink and white magnolias whose smells could make us forget everything. You and me shared serious thoughts about the angst of life and trivial thoughts about books, movies, music and us. 

When we meet again, it is like a springtime of memories flash before our eyes and your words fill me with so much of happiness. The shade of these  ancient trees forget the rising summer hear and the weariness that comes with it. 

You and I speak of our common love for words- poetry that has stayed constant throughout the years. You and me chat about the serious and trivial in the old hangout near the tabeubia trees.

positive thought

When you wake up in the morning, you can think of the ways in which you can be creative with the day. Most of the time, people are worried about the past or the future and they are not fully open to the present.

Today is a new day and then only then you will be able to understand the meaning of the word present, which also means a gift. That means to be fully open to the world of possibilities and like the poet says to wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving. 

A lament about lost love: K R Meera's novella Meera Sadhu

Love is like milk, with the passage of time,it sours, splits and becomes poison.

The novel portrays the tragic life of Tulsi torn between duty and love and she chooses to run away with Madhavan instead of marrying her classmate Vinayan. She finds that though she loves Vinayan, she gets carried off her feet by the kind of love that Madhavan gives her.

She runs away with Madhavan on the eve of her wedding though she knows from his own mouth that she is his 27th girlfriend. Soon, she recognises that she does not have a role in his life and the story is a lament about lost love.

Through lyrical passages that describe the desire that Madhavan arouses in Tulsi, the author captures the beauty of love buy equally descriptive are her details about his treachery in love, the countless women that he has relations with. This wounds her and she grieves how she sacrificed her career and her life for the sake of the man she chose to be with in life.

The novel details the transformation of Tulsi from a loving wife to Meera Sadhu grieving her life and serving others in the ghats of Varanasi. The frequent shifts in time cleverly portray her memories about her marital life including the good times and the bad times.

Learning Curve

You read and study about the world and the things that you have an interest in. You never cease in your pursuit of knowledge and you do not rest for even a minute.

Whatever task you lay your hands on, you want to learn it and do it in a better manner and that is an your understanding of learning and becoming an expert in your daily tasks or bettering your work or learning how to cook your meals or learning how to please your lover.

Sometimes, you might learn a subject just out of pure interest without having any particular aim in learning it except for the pure fun of understanding what it is about.

People might ask you: What is the use of learning this now? Will this serve any practical purpose? But you tell that learning your area of interest is necessary for the purpose of developing your understanding of it and whatever you need to know, you need to know it urgent.

You have your idiosyncrasies and your quaint tastes in reading but you for sure that your knowledge will come of use someday sometime may be in another world that might be made complete by your deep understanding.

Your life gets meaningful by the very task of simplifying all tedious work through an overall understanding of how to make it simpler, better and easier.

My roots strangely

Sometimes, you learn how to feel this sense of belonging to an unreal world and I belong only to you, my love. 

I have never felt this sense of belonging to this place that I left as a child where my brother and I stood in the cemetery every year praying for his dead soul. 

I do not belong to my father's family since its all dead and gone, with a few bones scattered in a churchyard long and far away though you get occasional visits, calls and messages from people who look just like you. 

I  do not belong to the place where I grew up in my mother's native place beside the River Green, where it was always fun to be playing in water yet there were rightful inheritors who belonged just because they grew up there. Then there were homecoming that were full of affection from your grandparents or their visits to our city that were memorable. 

Now, I belong by marriage to a family which calls me my own though the blood that runs through my veins is hardly theirs and sometimes I get the feeling that I am home, finally free from this sense of not belonging. 

Do I belong to my co-workers who call me my formal name and I am a familiar stranger who does not have many stories to tell but nods and smiles and passes them by. Yet, there are times when you connect with someone and you feel that you have always belonged there and you sense this bond that goes beyond words. 

Then, in an imaginary realm, my love, you are the one who star in my all my dreams, the one whose thoughts occupy this arid life and I long for your presence just like one longs for rain in summer. 

You know me inside out like the palm of your hand or like the page of a well-thumbed book and what makes me a woman when I am with you. You know my

feminine spirit and tenderness and not my occasional clownishness in trying to belong to some name, some family, some tribe, where I do not belong.

It is to you that I belong, your complement that fulfills and completes you,  in the melting down of the barriers between you and me, and the all engulfing tenderness that follows our lovemaking. 

That is the space where I see myself as feeling belonged and as having a pet name that you call me an

Mogra

Do you remember the first Onam from your days of togetherness when your bed was bedecked with the intoxicating scent of jasmine flowers and you whispered sweet nothings in my ear. 

What do you want, you had asked me and I said I wanted you. You looked at with surprise and had laughed when you muttered, " you already have me and I will satisfy your desire whenever you want me". 

The jasmine plant had bloomed out of season and I had plucked the jasmines from the yard. It was the first time that they had bloomed and I kept them in a bowl of water throughout the day. 

Do you remember how you and I used to talk to each other about everything under the sun and how we spent our days of togetherness learning more and more about each other. 

Then I remind you every year on this special day how you and I will share our lives across ages and across time because I chose you to be my sun in all the worlds known. 

Like a creeper entwined on the tall mango tree, I wish we will stay together till a thousand moons. 

Celebrations

You could never celebrate this life fully for you were always weighed down by your worries. You could never let your soul soar to the skies for sadness cast its shadow like skeletons hung amidst sumptuous feasts to remind you that this too will pass. 

Every year, your birthday was a celebration of the mixed life that you had, full of joys and sorrows though you had to learn how to treat it with equanimity: for one learnt this bitter stoic attitude quite early in life. There was no better teacher than my grandmother who sang the way of the cross in her sweet mellow voice during Lent. 

For it was never an easy life; always a loss between the cup and the lip and when the ancient scale of weights is checked against feathers by the god of the underworld, he will not let you inside for its soaked with your tears for losses that you have suffered. Your heavy heart will never let you through. 

The City of Love

Take me to Paris, she said, for it is the city of love and light and when you add three letters to Paris, it becomes Paradise, a haven of complete freedom for lovers. Let us explore the city of love together and travel its nooks and corners treasuring each moment of our days of togetherness, enjoying the enchanting pleasure it offers the senses.

Why do we need to go to Paris, he said because you are my Paris and have always been my Paradise and you will always remain my haven. You are and always have been my dream and my Paradise is where you are. When you are around my world lights up with your smiles, my heart pounds a louder music on seeing you and my heart, my body and my soul just loves being around you. It is you that I want whether I am at home or in Paris or anywhere in the world and nothing in the world equals my happiness when I am with you!

Our Day of Love

When the morning light drained through the windows she opened her eyes. Slowly she became conscious of everything around her. Last night, she had fallen asleep crying. Now her heart was empty but soon thoughts of reasoning and doubt would cloud it again. It was a day she had dreaded all this time. Throughout all the happy days the shadow of this inevitable day was on her happiness, on their happiness.

Back from bath, she thought, this one day I can look like an unhappy broken-hearted girl and make him unhappy.  So she chose her brightest smile and her brightest clothes and put them on with care. He would be waiting for her at the usual place, with a smile. How will I hide my heart from him, her mind asked her. She walked to the usual place with a bowed down heart and a bright face.

From the first glance itself of her walking in that resplendent dress, he read through her veneer of cheerfulness easily. How to calm her, he thought. His heart wanted to protect her from everything, make her his, so that she would never have to face her troubles again. Yet he didn’t move at all and looked at her with the utmost attention.
As if to read his thoughts, she looked straight into his eyes, reading deep into his soul with her deep sad eyes. In that one single glance, much was said. Without even uttering a word, he understood that the end had begun and smiled like he expected it all along like a stoic warrior sentenced to death. She didn’t move but went on looking at him with the same calmness.
He moved his hand to touch her cheek. She twined his hand in hers and placed it against her cheek. Slowly a tear fell on his hand. Then more came while she sobbed aloud.

Now he couldn’t bear all this distance. He leaned close to her and kissed her forehead. She smiled through her tears and rested her head against his chest. Hugging each other, they sat for long in silence.

When her tears ceased, she looked at him with a strange calmness and smiled. This smile was from heart where a strange silence took possession of her. When tears had purged the dross out of her mind and the emptiness in the heart was gone, what she felt was hope. Nothing could cast a shadow on their bliss again. As long as they lived, as long as death took one of them away, there was hope for them. An overwhelming love for him flowed in her heart. She took his hand and asked him to hug her tight and not to let her go to a universe of loss. Her eyes filled with tears for an instant. He held her tight and promised her that his love will always be for her. 

Eternal Love

I think love at my age and yours means trying to understand each other's worlds through the medium of words, smiles and touch till you comprehend me and I comprehend you. It might not be possible to fully sense what the other says or does not say but words mean a lot in our relationship. 

That doesn't mean that there are disagreements between us or misunderstandings for we are from two different worlds of understanding and upbringing. I think we often make an attempt to understand what each other's words and silences mean. 

Though you are a caveman who withdraws into your moodiness and a nature woman who has her cycles of crests and troughs, we try to find meaning in our togetherness. It has always been my dream to wander the world with you- go places, find beauty in nature and in simple things and live life to the fullest. What I have always wanted is to wake up early and watch the streaks of dawn across the sky and then snuggle you to wakefulness.  

I have found love once again with you, recovered from the strife of this mighty world and restored the beauty lost in time and I might like to wear daily the colours of holi that you splashed on my face or may be celebrate love with a spot of sindhoor that you smear on my forehead or cherish a kiss that you planted on my cheek. 

And, you and I welcome each day with gratitude for another day of togetherness, hoping in our heart of hearts that we will stay together till the end of time enjoying our mutually shared life of togetherness, where we learn our lifelessons everyday. 

#eternallove

Recompense

For every word of harshness that you hear,
There is equally a word of love somewhere.
For the darkest hours of the wakeful night,
At the end of which is a beautiful dawn.

For the loss of innocence of childhood,
There is the growing maturity of years.
For the loss of a life near river green,
There is lot more sunshine to equal.

For the trenches that this life fell into
There are the new scales that it climbs.
For the years lost in search of dreams,
There are these words on a virtual page.

Which brings in daily, strange comfort,
For every friend lost, that of strangers.

Language

Do you mean the words you say?
Do we speak the same language?
Do we comprehend each other?
Do we share the same world?

For a while thought I was fluent in you;
Yet found out that we are from two worlds
Two different worlds of understanding
Where we do not speak the same tongue.

Nor do we comprehend each other,
Not any longer,  since we are strangers-
You come from your dark cave
And I still move in crests and troughs.

We, both having burnt
And trying hard to communicate. 

Songs of Sunshine

When the heart chose its path

And burnt all the other roads,

Reason was silent and sore,

But the heart hoped and loved

More than everything else.

In the days of radiant sunshine

Free and uncensored thoughts,

Effortless talk with smiles,

Laughter, kisses and love,

No bitterness was foreseen.

Now the sunshine is gone,

Replaced by the rainy days

Just like the pre-sunshine age

Each day after the other

Again an uneventful life.

The clock has been turned

Back to the mixed times,

Bittersweet and mundane,

Where no dark clouds were,

It is raining incessantly.

The days of sunshine are over,

With no hopes of coming back,

Angry words and accusations,

No daily downloads of news

Only spite and seething anger.

Yet this heart that forgot itself,

Became rougher and tougher

Day after day remembers,

The melodious tunes it knew

In the days of bright sunshine. 

Written in Absence

The monsoons

After the wrath of the scorching summer, you celebrate the advent of the monsoons along with nature an you forget the harshness of the summer season when you suffered spending counting days tilt the arrival of the rains. You remember the scorching heat of the summer season, the cool  summer rinks that offered you comfort, bathing in the sea very week and the unguents that helped you sleep at night.

You sing the songs of the monsoon along with the rain and you love listening to the pitter patter of the raindrops on the tin roof nearby. You rejoice like someone In the arid lands celebrating the onset of rains and delight in getting soaked to the bones in the first rain so much that your miserable summer is forgotten. 

Your mornings are spent snuggling inside your warm blanket listening to the rain bursting outside an the rhythm of the raindrops pitter-pattering on the tin roof close by.

 

Couple Goals

We have celebrated our days of togetherness as if each day was a special occasion, gone on adventures in the city, explored new nooks and corners in the city or even watched movies back to back on weekends. We have also captured our moments of delight on the lens enjoying the simple delights that life offers on the way.

You and I have woven many dreams of travelling in our days of togetherness and in some of these we have woke up in each other's arms every morning watching the streaks of dawn spread across the sky. We have watched the stars come out and gone to sleep snuggling each other.

You have come to my place of birth, to this house near the River Green and watched the snake-boats glide in the waters during Onam. I have dreamt of this mighty river at times when I have been away for long especially during the summer months and when one thinks of home.

May be we will find love once again and we will beam our childhood smile once again . May be we will dab our lives with the colours splashed from our memories. Once again, we will celebrate holi with spontaneity and with mischief like from a long-forgotten childhood.

Though times have changed, I still want to go on our little adventures with you and watch sunsets and sunrises or chat with each watching the night sky. I remember our good old days and think how your presence was a source of comfort though now the days are gone by and the magic lost from this life. Yet, you long for the same delight that you felt when you recognized a kindred wanderer in him.

I find that this heart might sing a song of delight and rejoice beyond words if you come back as my soul companion. At times, you search every face that you know for a semblance of this same dream, then feels depressed when you find it is nothing but a mirage and ends every such thought with heavy feet and grim thoughts.

You choose the same kindred spirit from the many that you know for its companion, for it has known its many ups and downs, the secrets that you will never say aloud and small talk that never used to run out about everything under the sun. You dream of the same face in every dream and though surprised by your heart's desire to be with your soulmate, you wait for life to resolve your worries turning a deaf ear to the noises around you the whole time.

Home

Home is where your heart goes back time and again, where you want to spend your quality time enjoying the activities that you like. Home is the elated feeling that you experience when you reach the city that you grew up after being away from it. You love glimpses of your city in films or snaps an even recognize locations just by looking closely at the public spaces.

Home is the city that you travel through every day and still feel that there is more to explore, places you have never been to and places which you know like the palm of your hand. It’s always with a sense of curiosity and streak of curiosity that you love to explore its nooks and corners along with your soul friend and you just love the comfort of your favourite hangouts such as the museum campus or the beaches or the coffeehouses.

Home is your sacred space, the altar that you have created for everything that you hold close to your heart. Home is a place where I am comfortable, candid and naughty, real and authentic. Home is not four walls but the familiar comfortable space that you curl up with a well-thumbed book and a cup of coffee.

Home is you. You are my home, the safe space that you return to every time for solace far from the strife of this world. You are my home, a place of comfort that I want to wake up in and go to sleep in and cherish every time your thought crosses my mind. Home is your memory that I carry safe in my heart, safe and sacred like a talisman throughout the years and where I wander every time this world becomes too much to bear.

goat days

Goat Days

Goat Days, written by the Gulf Malayali Benyamin and translated by Joseph Koyillapally, is worth reading and worth remembering as well. Like Yann Martel's Booker-winning Life of Pi, Goat Days captures the ordeals of an innocent man in a hell beyond his imagination and creates an animal allegory to drive home his message. 

Najeeb has the typical Malayali dream, of being in the Gulf and sending money home. His desires resemble the luxuries of a Gulf-returned Malayali: “ a gold watch, fridge, TV, car, AC, tape recorder, VCP, a heavy gold chain”. He lands in Riyadh on a visa sent by his friend's brother-in-law but the life that awaits him there does not resemble his earlier idea of a gulf life. 

He finds himself in a masara tending goats, camels and sheep; working day and night; feeding them and milking them; in fact, living like one of them. He forgets even the simple pleasures of his former life such as wasing himself or even the right to privacy while defecating. However, he finds the company of the animals more comforting than that of the cruel and inhuman arbab. He longs for his homeland, the bath in the river, the presence of his family and for rain.When Najeeb breaks out of his masara and runs away, it is a huge step towards the unknown. Like Pi, Najeeb thanks God for being with him during his ordeal. 

Readable and memorable, Goat Days represents the ordeals of many Indian immigrants across the Gulf countries, the reality of which is glossed over by the glittering opulence of the few lucky ones. It is surely a slice of real life. May be a goat's life. 

I am waiting eagerly to watch the film adaptation and to reread the book to see the similarities and differences. 

Teddy Day: Dreams

Though we may be apart, in a sense we are always together, across all lives, present and future. For this sense of being alone, creeps on you even when you stand in crowds and even when you are with your friends.

You are my other half, my twin flame in this life, for it is with you that my dreams run wild and I weave stories of togetherness in an unreal realm. And, I have become like you in the years that followed.

In a way, when I look back on life, like a traditional Indian bride, I have walked with you around every revolution around the sun, I have stayed loyal to your love and held your name holy like a talisman.

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. 

Even when I dream, you are with me and I return to your thoughts 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 parallel universe, we celebrate our life of eternal togetherness.

It is destiny that brought us together and again we spend our time chatting away about how life has been during these years of absence. I dream of a life of togetherness again, stargazing or soul gazing or learning more of each other.

And, though apart in real, in every circambulation around the sun, you and I will grow together in wisdom and though our lives will remain apart, you and I will find that this sense of oneness with each other in spirit, that itself is a reason for celebration.

#teddyday