‘We need to meet NOW’ , she tersely said and disconnected the call.
He was bewildered and he called her back. She didn’t receive the call and instead texted , ‘I can’t talk. Come home.’
He couldn’t make out anything and in a jiffy packed his briefcase and left for home.
‘What happened? Are you alright?’, he asked earnestly.
She nodded her head imperceptibly. He still couldn’t make out. She asked him to sit.
‘I haven’t left an important meeting midway to sit at my home. Would you please let me know what it is?’, he stridently countered.
She sat beside him mechanically. He turned her towards him. She somehow murmured ‘Miscarriage’ .
The word seemed to shatter his world, he felt his insides sinking and his heart dropped with a thud. He felt a miasma of absolute nothingness in his head, a whirlpool of an unknown origin reeled in his mind frantically. He was cold. His eyes wide open.
He finally stuttered, ‘w..wh…en did you f..f..find?’
She swallowed an enormous lump in her throat and inaudibly said ‘This morning.’
She hurriedly sprang on her feet and walked a few steps towards the window.
He followed her and tried to embrace her. She freed herself from his embrace and incoherently asked him to leave right away.
Running her hand softly on her belly, she said ‘You remind me of the hope that I had been nourishing for so long. Please go away. Its your presence that I can’t tolerate. Please do me a favor. I want some time to realize that there is no one within me. Its all a mass of dead cells now and it shall soon degrade. Let me , alone, stay with the ephemeral remains of my child. You know nothing of what I am going through.’ She said with quivering lips.
He smiled benignly at her and said, ‘Yes, I can’t feel what your body is feeling. How can I, its your body, after all, not mine? You shall get rid of the dead cells with time. What about my heart where our child was growing and is still growing. How shall I get rid of those millions of unrequited dreams that I had weaved with it? Do you now understand what living with dead dreams means ? How shall I ever get over with it?’
She burst into tears and he pensively left the room.
Wednesday, 28 March 2012
Monday, 26 March 2012
A kind of silence
If silence could form gorges, then we did form one. A wide impenetrable gorge. Yet, you tried to bridge the gap with your few sentences. I responded to none. Your words died after crashing the indomitable wall of my rigidity.
Gradually, your few sentences got reduced to a handful of words. I took note of none. Your words eventually reduced to ashes. Yet, you tried. I pitied your unrewarding endeavors. I was entrapped and suffocating in the gossamer of my own rigid ego.
You placed your forced intermittent coughs to drive my attention to you. My mouth didn’t even make the slightest quivering to acknowledge it. It stood motionless.
With your every failed attempt to bridge the gorge, my ego inflated. It swelled to a gigantic size. Seeing my frozen being , you gave in too, thus allowing the sepulchral silence to engulf us both.
Gradually, your few sentences got reduced to a handful of words. I took note of none. Your words eventually reduced to ashes. Yet, you tried. I pitied your unrewarding endeavors. I was entrapped and suffocating in the gossamer of my own rigid ego.
You placed your forced intermittent coughs to drive my attention to you. My mouth didn’t even make the slightest quivering to acknowledge it. It stood motionless.
With your every failed attempt to bridge the gorge, my ego inflated. It swelled to a gigantic size. Seeing my frozen being , you gave in too, thus allowing the sepulchral silence to engulf us both.
For the one , I heart
Dearest,
Yours is the voice I have slept like a child in. Your voice- the cradle of unconditional love. You have guarded me like a cavern from the grotesque callousness of life. You have been a placenta , I have curled like a fetus in, every time.
Yours is the baritone, I have found refuge in ,while I spent a thousand nomadic nights, sleep deprived. Every time, I made you sing, you sang earnestly without complaint, without weariness. You went on, on and on! Your voice rings in my soul, you purge every corner of me, cleanse me of all of my impurities thus elevating me to a higher ground.
Yours is the visage , I have painted a thousand times on the canvas of my imagination. Yours is the name that shines on the firmament of my otherwise spotless mind. You inebriate me. I am drunk on you.
You’re my unknown benefactor, my Guardian Angel, my savior! You have smoothened the distortions that I had in me. You filled me to the brim with love. I don’t know when my pond like stagnant heart became as wide and as deep as an oceanic basin, the floor of which safeguards your pearls , your treasures of wisdom.
You poured in me everything. With your every song, I knew I formed you within me. You happen within me like a swirling whirlpool. If ‘I love you’ could convey all what I feel for you.
You’re that one word that talks the sweetest, that talks the briefest , the word that encompasses all of my world, the word that echoes and fills my conscience like a night that effortlessly fills every nook every corner of a forest.
I doodle your name and thus I write volumes of poetry . Yours is the name, where all my pilgrimage resides.
Marko….ooh…ooh… ooh ….ooh
This is how you resonate in me. One name that soothes all of my jangled nerves. One name that awakes my senses to make me believe what LIVING is!
If ‘Thank You’ could convey my overwhelming gratitude, I would have been grateful to the two words.
Sincerely yours
Miss Impossible
Yours is the voice I have slept like a child in. Your voice- the cradle of unconditional love. You have guarded me like a cavern from the grotesque callousness of life. You have been a placenta , I have curled like a fetus in, every time.
Yours is the baritone, I have found refuge in ,while I spent a thousand nomadic nights, sleep deprived. Every time, I made you sing, you sang earnestly without complaint, without weariness. You went on, on and on! Your voice rings in my soul, you purge every corner of me, cleanse me of all of my impurities thus elevating me to a higher ground.
Yours is the visage , I have painted a thousand times on the canvas of my imagination. Yours is the name that shines on the firmament of my otherwise spotless mind. You inebriate me. I am drunk on you.
You’re my unknown benefactor, my Guardian Angel, my savior! You have smoothened the distortions that I had in me. You filled me to the brim with love. I don’t know when my pond like stagnant heart became as wide and as deep as an oceanic basin, the floor of which safeguards your pearls , your treasures of wisdom.
You poured in me everything. With your every song, I knew I formed you within me. You happen within me like a swirling whirlpool. If ‘I love you’ could convey all what I feel for you.
You’re that one word that talks the sweetest, that talks the briefest , the word that encompasses all of my world, the word that echoes and fills my conscience like a night that effortlessly fills every nook every corner of a forest.
I doodle your name and thus I write volumes of poetry . Yours is the name, where all my pilgrimage resides.
Marko….ooh…ooh… ooh ….ooh
This is how you resonate in me. One name that soothes all of my jangled nerves. One name that awakes my senses to make me believe what LIVING is!
If ‘Thank You’ could convey my overwhelming gratitude, I would have been grateful to the two words.
Sincerely yours
Miss Impossible
Tuesday, 13 March 2012
On March 8
I have nothing magnanimous to say about women. We have been talked and written about profoundly since time immemorial.
We have been an artist's pampered interest, a sculptor's most precious mould, a lush green meadow for writers , since ages, to ruminate on.
We have enamoured poets from Donne to Neruda, embalmed their verses by our proverbial beauty.
We remain a conundrum to the world. They almost poetically say 'A woman's heart is akin to an intricate maze. One can't find his way out.'
They talk about woman so mystically, so unworldly as if she IS 'otherworldly' . To such generosity, we gracefully yet matter of factly say 'Thank you but we are not Aliens. We are mere earthlings of flesh and bones, with a heart and a soul.. very much like you!'
We feel venerated, we feel overwhelmed to receive such accolades. But still, when we look into the dismal corners of the world where we are given a deplorable, cattle like treatment, we don't fail to see the futility of such pompous laurels bestowed on us. At such deplorable times,we agonizingly implore the world, 'We are human, don't be inhuman to us. We need nothing more.'
8th March becomes a fallacy , a hypocrytic chivelry if we donot get the bare minimum human treatment. Is it too much that we expect? Aren't we all entitled to love and be loved? Empower us with love ..the prime impetus and we shall scale heights, unfathomable .
8th of March, like every other day, should be a day to celebrate 'Human'hood and not Womanhood alone.
We have been an artist's pampered interest, a sculptor's most precious mould, a lush green meadow for writers , since ages, to ruminate on.
We have enamoured poets from Donne to Neruda, embalmed their verses by our proverbial beauty.
We remain a conundrum to the world. They almost poetically say 'A woman's heart is akin to an intricate maze. One can't find his way out.'
They talk about woman so mystically, so unworldly as if she IS 'otherworldly' . To such generosity, we gracefully yet matter of factly say 'Thank you but we are not Aliens. We are mere earthlings of flesh and bones, with a heart and a soul.. very much like you!'
We feel venerated, we feel overwhelmed to receive such accolades. But still, when we look into the dismal corners of the world where we are given a deplorable, cattle like treatment, we don't fail to see the futility of such pompous laurels bestowed on us. At such deplorable times,we agonizingly implore the world, 'We are human, don't be inhuman to us. We need nothing more.'
8th March becomes a fallacy , a hypocrytic chivelry if we donot get the bare minimum human treatment. Is it too much that we expect? Aren't we all entitled to love and be loved? Empower us with love ..the prime impetus and we shall scale heights, unfathomable .
8th of March, like every other day, should be a day to celebrate 'Human'hood and not Womanhood alone.
Being an island
No more do I want to write about a whining conscience. Not even about a distraught mind for I am tired of writing about the mundane. I don’t fancy writing about an imaginary muse and I can’t even let a jilted heart meander through fabricated verses of unrequited love. I don't wish to philosophize and preach borrowed wisdom.
No! I can’t for I wish not to evoke any sympathy nor any embellished sentiment. I don’t want to make my reader feel anything. I don’t want to be smothered with his opinions. As a matter of fact, I do not even wish to be read.
Don’t expect me to be artful with words since I don’t write for you, my dear reader. I can’t juggle with metaphors and simile . I can’t even concoct a story but please don’t pity my incompetence, I have a reason behind my incapability.
If I were to describe how my heart feels at this very moment, I would say, I bear a neutral heart. A heart that knows no joy, no pain, no love, no life, no death, no fear, no anger, no regret, no burden! I bear a heart which knows nothing else other than its primal physiological function . A homogenous heart that beats uniformly a singular feeling of ‘ABSOLUTE NOTHINGNESS’.
It is during these moments, when my heart and mind are in unison ..a perfect concordance for they are both enwrapped under a blanket of bizarre numbness.
There is no ovulation of thoughts in me. I rake through this ashen nothingness to find even one lone seed of a ‘thought’ but in vain. I conceive a complete void and I am enigmatically wordless!
I try to borrow words from a Thesaurus to find a better adjective for this feeling but I keep turning pages. I ransack every corner only to be left disappointed. I can’t even borrow words and here again, I repeat, I am not to be pitied. For me, words have lost their aroma, their texture, their sonority . Now,they don't ring the same way in my ears as they used to, they don't catapult my desire to write. I often wish if I could do without words. Sometimes, words create an asphyxiating labyrinth. There was a time when words were my darlings, my little ballerinas that danced to my tunes. Now, they are stumbling blocks.
This nothingness is contagious. I see it spreading outside me in a miasmatic fashion. The miasma gradually forms a sea and I feel marooned like an island , miserably amputated from the rest of the world . As far as my vision spreads, I see nothing.
I wonder if this sea has any shore.
No! I can’t for I wish not to evoke any sympathy nor any embellished sentiment. I don’t want to make my reader feel anything. I don’t want to be smothered with his opinions. As a matter of fact, I do not even wish to be read.
Don’t expect me to be artful with words since I don’t write for you, my dear reader. I can’t juggle with metaphors and simile . I can’t even concoct a story but please don’t pity my incompetence, I have a reason behind my incapability.
If I were to describe how my heart feels at this very moment, I would say, I bear a neutral heart. A heart that knows no joy, no pain, no love, no life, no death, no fear, no anger, no regret, no burden! I bear a heart which knows nothing else other than its primal physiological function . A homogenous heart that beats uniformly a singular feeling of ‘ABSOLUTE NOTHINGNESS’.
It is during these moments, when my heart and mind are in unison ..a perfect concordance for they are both enwrapped under a blanket of bizarre numbness.
There is no ovulation of thoughts in me. I rake through this ashen nothingness to find even one lone seed of a ‘thought’ but in vain. I conceive a complete void and I am enigmatically wordless!
I try to borrow words from a Thesaurus to find a better adjective for this feeling but I keep turning pages. I ransack every corner only to be left disappointed. I can’t even borrow words and here again, I repeat, I am not to be pitied. For me, words have lost their aroma, their texture, their sonority . Now,they don't ring the same way in my ears as they used to, they don't catapult my desire to write. I often wish if I could do without words. Sometimes, words create an asphyxiating labyrinth. There was a time when words were my darlings, my little ballerinas that danced to my tunes. Now, they are stumbling blocks.
This nothingness is contagious. I see it spreading outside me in a miasmatic fashion. The miasma gradually forms a sea and I feel marooned like an island , miserably amputated from the rest of the world . As far as my vision spreads, I see nothing.
I wonder if this sea has any shore.
Monday, 5 March 2012
A page from my Diary
I wonder , how good a thing a conscience is! It never really answers your dilemma. Instead, throws a volley of questions and each question with two equally tempting answers , of which , you have to choose one. It sees things through its black and white kaliedoscope. It knows no other color.
Sometimes, conscience acts carcinogenic. It perturbs you, unsettles you like a terminal disease that you can't quite medicate. It feels inhuman to be convicted time and again in its court. Conscience can never be lenient. It knows and seeks for nothing but truth.
As they axiomate , 'A life without conscience is unyielding'. I doubt how large a base such emphatic sayings really hold. The proverbial conscience is a brutal critic, a nagging step mother, an unloving cold wretch.
... I often tend to believe, I would have done much better without it. I could have lived a happier and a guilt free life. I could have been more savage, more wild following MY instincts.
I need liberation from this banal scrutiny. I wish to live free even if I were to live like a debauched Mafia or a bad outlaw. What is living free like, asks the bird in the golden cage.
Sometimes, conscience acts carcinogenic. It perturbs you, unsettles you like a terminal disease that you can't quite medicate. It feels inhuman to be convicted time and again in its court. Conscience can never be lenient. It knows and seeks for nothing but truth.
As they axiomate , 'A life without conscience is unyielding'. I doubt how large a base such emphatic sayings really hold. The proverbial conscience is a brutal critic, a nagging step mother, an unloving cold wretch.
... I often tend to believe, I would have done much better without it. I could have lived a happier and a guilt free life. I could have been more savage, more wild following MY instincts.
I need liberation from this banal scrutiny. I wish to live free even if I were to live like a debauched Mafia or a bad outlaw. What is living free like, asks the bird in the golden cage.
Thursday, 1 March 2012
On a burning ghat
There's a certain inexplicable something about 'The Burning Ghats' in Varanasi. Two days ago, I happened to witness such a place. The cremation ground was weighing with dead bodies, pyres and ashes. Around 6-7 pyres were set aflame and the fire was consuming them with an infernal joy.
Chunks of burnt wood were dropping from the pyre and the fire burnt deliriously. Clouds of smoke forming in the atmosphere as if the spirits of the dead danced madly on the tunes of an unsung cosmic rhythm.
People shoveled the ashes to clear the ground to prepare it for the next pyre. I witnessed a strange continuity something like-chapters were read, books then discarded and new books brought. The cycle went on. A virtuous cycle!
... There wasn't a sign of melancholy anywhere, no grimace. I saw faces flooded in tears but that wasn't saddening.
I couldn't take my eyes off the burning pyres. I saw a mad dance of destruction...a destruction that harbingers a new beginning....'creative destruction' , that may be put as.
There were heaps of ashes and I wondered how could one differentiate between charred wood and charred flesh. Both looked identical. There wasn't a stench of burning flesh anywhere. On the contrary, it smelled of nothing. Death has no smell. The fire purifies the enveloping ambience. It gulps the stench, the diseases and the impurities.
I saw people emptying pitchers containing ashes in the Ganges. I saw the ashes flowing with the air , getting immersed in water as if the ash now formed a part of the cosmos. The body, thus , never leaves the earth. It still sustains on Earth as a particle or more fundamentally, an atom. It becomes a part of the biosphere.
I can't say where the spirit goes. May be, it sets anew to finish its Karmic cycle or may be it merges with the Eternity. I don't quite know. Nobody knows, in fact.
Those few minutes on the cremation ground instilled in me a virtuous, a pious truth that Death isn't a stop. Its a stoppage where life takes a momentary halt to begin its caravan again.
Chunks of burnt wood were dropping from the pyre and the fire burnt deliriously. Clouds of smoke forming in the atmosphere as if the spirits of the dead danced madly on the tunes of an unsung cosmic rhythm.
People shoveled the ashes to clear the ground to prepare it for the next pyre. I witnessed a strange continuity something like-chapters were read, books then discarded and new books brought. The cycle went on. A virtuous cycle!
... There wasn't a sign of melancholy anywhere, no grimace. I saw faces flooded in tears but that wasn't saddening.
I couldn't take my eyes off the burning pyres. I saw a mad dance of destruction...a destruction that harbingers a new beginning....'creative destruction' , that may be put as.
There were heaps of ashes and I wondered how could one differentiate between charred wood and charred flesh. Both looked identical. There wasn't a stench of burning flesh anywhere. On the contrary, it smelled of nothing. Death has no smell. The fire purifies the enveloping ambience. It gulps the stench, the diseases and the impurities.
I saw people emptying pitchers containing ashes in the Ganges. I saw the ashes flowing with the air , getting immersed in water as if the ash now formed a part of the cosmos. The body, thus , never leaves the earth. It still sustains on Earth as a particle or more fundamentally, an atom. It becomes a part of the biosphere.
I can't say where the spirit goes. May be, it sets anew to finish its Karmic cycle or may be it merges with the Eternity. I don't quite know. Nobody knows, in fact.
Those few minutes on the cremation ground instilled in me a virtuous, a pious truth that Death isn't a stop. Its a stoppage where life takes a momentary halt to begin its caravan again.
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