Trishna

In the sun’s rays,

alarms, my bed sheet,

wishes, texts/calls, the cold,

missing things, the radio, car drives, routes,

couples, the dew, parks, laughter, silences,

yoga, my breathing, prayers, song lyrics, memories,

coffee, mirrors, my earrings, the black bindis, fights,

doors and windows, intellectual musings, rains, the bustle, work,

my energy, chai, red pillars & black coats, my hopes & dreams, meets,

my joys, the stars, shadows, heart-ache, sleepless nights...     

I see you. Now that you’re gone.

'Miracle'

A grihapravesha. A group of chattering aunties. It must have been one of their routine casual (read: politically incorrect, misogynistic, pretentiously caring / funny) conversations. An acquaintance repeatedly chanted the mantra: “Don’t rush… Marriages are made in heaven.” 

Of course they are - by diligently matching religion, class, caste, language... and more diligently mismatching levels of loves, thought-planes, commitment-phobias, political affiliations. 

Then, down here, the society cheers the matches that match, but rigorously takes to task the mismatches that mismatch. To the extent that it squeezes, hard, the love out of the lovers. Love’s voluptuous flow reduces to a stream, then to a trickle, then to a nerve-ending of a crevice in barren land. Then, they’ll force a flower to bloom there, with the nourishment of dead love… 

And ‘Miracle’, they’ll call it.

Chutney Man

He sits sullenly by the corner of Veena Stores, all by himself, perhaps smirking at the gluttons constantly swarming around him. "Swalpa chutney haaki!" some ask. Others just extend their arms towards his face with their hot idly-vade plates. Put, chutney... put, chutney... put, chutney. He can surely smell the vades - does that make him hungry? The first few days of his job, ancient times ago, they'd smelled delicious! How those chatty college boys always bit into them greedily, how those thathas gangs discussed their melting in their toothless inners. To him, the vades have always smelled that way. In fact, he can tell the exact dimensions and crispness of a vade if its smell wafts towards him even in the middle of the night. "Eshtu soft ide idly! Which batter do they use?" May be the women have always tried to snoop to know the Store's batter recipe, while cursing their husbands who always, God-knows-why, praise someone else's cooking and never theirs. He stares through the gluttons into oblivion. (When will my son send me the money order? Are my grandchildren proud of me? Will my chutney-putting diligence take me to heaven or to hell? Where does my wife wait; does she wait? Am I a robot?) Put, chutney... put, chutney... put, chutney. 

The sky is getting darker, there is a soft breeze. But nothing obstructs his gaze. His hand works mechanically. Put, chutney... put, chutney... put, chutney. Does he think while putting, chutney...? Sometimes the chutney lands right into the plate's base and splashes a little to the sides, sometimes it violently drenches the idlys but it always has to put up a fight to soak the vades. His hand moves systematically in and out of the big vessel holding the famous tasty green chutney, palm-up and palm-down. Does he feel pain in his wrist? Does he care if the chutney tastes okay, if it's a bit too dilute today? Do the gluttons like it better today? He stares past the chaos. His tranquility puts the chaos to shame with each passing day. (Will there be a nuclear war? When will the Palestinian children stop dying? Who will solve Bangalore's garbage issue? Why are some people anti-national and some not?) Put, chutney... put, chutney... put, chutney.

Everydayness

We seem to be finding comfort in the mundane, in the mediocre. We seem to be  blissfully disillusioned by all the luxury we're amidst...

"New year sales are here. I'll finally buy that dress!"

"He's online, why isn't he saying hi?"

"Treat me at least now, for your new job, car, house...!"

"I'll beat the traffic today and work from home!"

"Damn, the hangover!"

May be there'll come a day when we'll begin to find the mundane fascinating... May be our eyes will gleam at the everydayness of the violence, pettiness, negativity, backbiting, deaths.

When, then, will we start fighting the bigger fights?

[Context: 

http://www.asianage.com/opinion/columnists/040118/the-year-of-the-missing-wheres-our-humanity.html]

When the Mountains Kissed the Skies

The little Birdie insisted that I hear its tales – Apparently the Mountains and the Skies are green with envy. Watching you and me meet and greet, bicker and unite, gossip and laugh. They seem to be apart, miles and miles away. On some days, when the Birdie flies over the Mountains escorted by its lovers and then up in the Skies, I hear they plead to be linked… to rekindle old love. They plead with the Birdie & Co. to draw lines by their flight, by flapping their wings, creating ripples in the air, just to join the dots between the love-sick Mountains and Skies. Just to bridge their gap and draw them closer. But the Birdie told me it just smirks at their desperation and mocks their interspace. Mountains can kiss the Skies only in romantic poems and fairytales that humans pamper themselves with, yes? 

The Mountains once groaned to me, the Skies wept. They asked me how we meet so often, talk so much… How we hug and part, only to meet again and again… Is that even possible? That fortune? That proximity? The estrangement had made a cynic of the Mountains and the Skies. They now choose fear over hope, dusk over dawn, dissociation over warmth. But you and I! We are basking in hopes, dawns and warmths. But you and I! We are basking in passionate love. Is that even possible? That passion? That love?

May be on that inevitable day, when our lives tumble into that dreaded oblivion, we too will become like the Mountains and the Skies – distant, love-sick, envious. We too will drown in fears, dusks and dissociations. We too will yearn for rekindling zealous loves. Then we will look in awe at some foolish young lovers and wonder, ‘When did we turn so old?’

Avva

A tube splits its way through her nostrils, another disappears into her hospital gown to connect to her heart; tens of them enter and leave her body. Connected to her heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, tugging at her for dear life. Fluids of every kind, smells and tastes of which she abhors, bombard her veins. But there she lay, unaware of the in and out, unconscious to the life-giving and the life-draining. Avva - soft, kind, good-hearted. Our Avva.

Everything and everyone looks the same from the hospital bed - dull, dreary, lifeless, unexciting. The doctors are nice but she quite can't say why they keep shaking their heads all the time. She also can't say which is more painful- feeling the tubes piercing her skin or sensing that look of helplessness in her doctors' eyes. She wants to get up, tear away the tubes and make kadlepuri, chikki and ragi-mudde... But her skin is sore and red, her body swollen, her brain dying and her heart aching. Her heart, aching, to see some love on a familiar face. Perhaps that's why on seeing her grandson, she fought hard against dysfunctional nerve cells and splitting pain from every part of her body, and... recognised him. The fastest recognition goal she'd scored off late - she was ecstatic! Her heart leapt, so much so that the cardiograph lost its way. Tears rolled down their cheeks - his first or hers? - as they held hands and sat in silence for a while. Our Avva.

Familiar face - tick, love - tick, pain - double tick. Kadlepuri, chikki, ragi-mudde - zero.

The disease is mercilessly parasitic - feeding on her bit by bit everyday- gland by gland, nerve by nerve, organ by organ... To test her again that day, the nurse persisted, "Who is that? Do you know her?" She strained eyes to focus on her granddaughter's face and mumbled again. This time it and out a wee bit clearer - "Av-vi-ni". Yes that's her name... Right?... Yes... No?... Of course!... Uncertainty, fear of failing her test, despair in my eyes, splitting pain, the tube through her mouth - none of them could dampen her conviction to recognise me. She wants to ask me a hundred questions - How is thatha? Are you eating properly? When is Anna getting married? Are Appa and Amma still waiting outside? "Av-vi-ni", she called me that day. The sweetest my name has ever sounded. Even with the super-annoying nurse, even with that damn tube through her mouth. Our Avva.

Familiar face - tick, love - tick, pain - triple tick. Kadlepuri, chikki, ragi-mudde - zero.

The Idea of You

The wind that accompanies Your spirit gushes past my soul, fills it with the strongest of passions to brace the uncompromising terrain. A triumphant tale of undying spirit - the Idea of You.

The balm Your spirit smears across my cuts and bruises, soothes also the burning insides of the heart, scraped mercilessly by tempests of aches, era after another. The tranquilizing calm of anesthesia - the Idea of You.

The melodies of celebratory exaltation that traverse miles from the spaces of Your flute illuminate the darkest tunnels of my veins and arteries, make the oxygen in my blood come to life. The expanding aura of positive energy and unending adulation - the Idea of You.

You are but a stranger, of origins and purposes unknown. You may have traveled unknown lands, carrying a glowing ambition in your deeps... You may have touched many a lives, turned rags to riches... You may have helped answer a million questions on wars, peace and love. Yet, you remain a paradox of who may or not exist, like an elusive phantom in the dark.

But, the Idea of You lingers, as tantalizing as ever. The flutters of warmth the Idea of You evokes in my bosom equalizes the unfamiliarity that marks the being of You. The phantom of You is merely an enigma of existentialism... But the Idea of You, the very essence of my psyche.