An inner turmoil

An unsatiated page, the ink dries up in the pot;
the pen fails to bridge the gap; a world of monologues I have bought
and the stage stands witness to my insane ranting.
When silence was got, it wasn't sought,
and it's not being got when it's being sought.

War of Words...

Prologue: Diya is a friend of mine from school. She is doing her PhD in the US. When I was in Zurich, when my time zone was closer to hers, we had got engrossed in this game where we had discourses using rhymes (some of them can definitely be called poems). She is settled in the US with her husband.

Diya said...korbi naki ektu rewind?
Anekdin holo I need to refresh my mind!

I said...For long you have marketed silence.
It will take time dear to clear a fog that dense.

Diya said...Dark clouds cover my witty grey cells,
yet I want to make poetry again and ring those good old bells.

I said...
Was it my absence which brought in the clouds dark?
I must admit too that your long absence made me walk alone in the park.

Diya said...I cannot help but agree,
I have missed those ready wits of a supreme degree.
Strange but you flatter me today.
I feel honored to have been missed in a park far far away!

I said...The beauty of distance we have defined.
On a platter of words we have dined.
Night after night we have hit the keys,
and stayed awake as busy bees.

Diya said...How do you frame a picture of words so fine?
I confess I envy you and wish your thoughts were mine!
Looks like this darling bee in a far away land,
needs a few more sleepless nights to retrieve her lost magic wand!

I said...
Appreciation for each other has always been the undertone.
So I say to you, "your words too can move a stone".
It's a web of words we have woven as two souls lone,
but as a single star we have shone.

Diya said...
Good you are back! How are you today?
And how is my lovely Bengal that sits beside a bay?

I said...
I was always there, I never left.
I know in your coffers I am an object of theft.
Bengal is just the way I want it to be, with a blemish here and there,
but I still stand with the strongest conviction that as always, very well it will fare.

Diya said...
I wish I could leave my miseries and despair,
go back to Bengal and do some career-damage repair.
Nothing against you my friend that brought in the shadows of silence.
I had been strangulated by over ambition, subjected to unimaginable bouts of mental violence!

I said...
The variables Get and Want never in an equation fall.
It's spring again, lets usher in the new leaves and make your spirits stand tall.
Just know, for you Bengal has her hands extended,
with which for years you have been tended.

Diya said...
Send some spring vibes to the west.
Let it warm up my frigid soul and put my mind to rest.
I feel so lonesome, helpless and dumb.
At times I wish I could curl up and hide inside Mommy's womb.
I hope someday I stand up tall,
kick my apprehensions and look beyond the wall.

I said...You reside in the flux of my vibes,
but still if you insist, to the dry soul of Stony Brook, I will send across some bribes.
And an albatross in that stretch will play,
which no mariner will ever try to slay.

Diya said...
Grace my sensibilities Shelly, show me the path to thrive,
Show me a "pista de baile", where my words can salsa and jive,
This man here I see , beat his best performance that used to be,
Call it humility, call it surrender, call it whatever you may,
You enrich my soul, forever I shall say!

I said...Wreaths of appreciation become too heavy to carry,
when my lines are so simple and not like you, starry.
I tend to be satisfied if I succeed in hitting home,
when in the Garden of Eden I help you roam.

Diya said...
Alrighty boy! We both lose, you win and I win too!
An evening like this, I had encountered few and all what remains down the memory lane, converge in you!
I wish I could continue,
but tomorrow is a brand new day,
I need to work, such is life's way.
Good night my friend, take care and keep up the smile.
I'll join you in a bit, maybe in another mile!

I said...
It's not about what we win,
just the virginity of our thoughts that we choose to lose over and over again with a grin.
In your company I find my elixir.
An earnest request, from me do not go far.

Prologue...

My fascination for Germany stemmed from what, I still do not know clearly. Probably it might have grown out of my undying admiration for the German national soccer team, Steffi Graf, Boris Becker, Mercs, BMWs', Audis' and very many things with the German stamp. Can I include Hitler also or shall I have to leave it out for the world's sake?

I still remember while in school I had picked up a book on Germany from its library stock clearance. It had glossy pages full of details and photographs. I have spent many a night turning those pages over and over again, feeding my obsession.

Well, I satiated my obsession to some extent during my recent visit to Duesseldorf and Cologne, as I left my first footprints on the German soil. Before traveling to Switzerland, I had pledged that among the countries I would set foot on, Germany would get the first honour and it did happen so.

It had been three weeks since I had arrived in Zurich and in none of the weekends I had absorbed the sights and sounds outside Zurich and my inner self had started questioning my bohemian instincts. With the start of the fourth week, things had to get moving and it got too. Pen and paper in hand, I could see scribblings (my slang for itinerary, here) coming fast and swift. Where to go, how to go, modes of transport, places to see, must sees', all had their presence on my three sheet travel plan.

Next, it was time to match words with actions. I headed straight for the Bahnhof (station) to get my tickets. My mode of transport was to be train and I had my research on the convenient train options in place. The lady at the ticketing centre polished my plan a bit more with her invaluable suggestions. I was to start on Friday night after office. A nine and half hour overnight train ride, and I was to see the light of the day in Duesseldorf. The entire Saturday was to be spent at Duesseldorf with a night halt and Sunday it was to be Cologne calling and from there I was to take my train back to Zurich via Basel.

It got my tickets on Wednesday. So the sure part of the plan was that I was boarding the train on Friday. But what about accommodation? I just had a day and a half before the whistles were to blow and I still did not see a place to put up in the horizon. I started checking hostel options since I wanted to travel as a backpacker in thought and action (I was to carry only a backpack). I found a lot of good hostels but none of them would offer me a single bed in a separate room (my first preference), so I thought I would settle for the dorms where I would have to put up with people from a plethora of nationalities. But being tethered by some strings of worry back home, I had to reconsider my decision. That's when my room mate suggested me the bed and breakfast (B&B) option. The next day (Thursday, a day before I was to travel) I searched the B&B options in Duesseldorf and got some good hits. But the one I narrowed down to was www.bedandbreakfast.de. Why and how did I narrow down to this option? Well, two things fed my conviction about the choice. Firstly they had a neat website with all the necessary details in place. That was judging the book by its cover. Secondly, they had offerings of a single bed with a separate room on the date I wanted it. I immediately wrote to them. They took some time to reply back, but thankfully they did and that too with an offering for that date. No prior payments, I just had to fill up a form and send them. I did all that was necessary from my side and by the end of the day I had an address in Duesseldorf. With the nightfall on Thursday, all the vitals were ready and I was raring to go. The day of execution was just a few hours away.

Wait...

What's a wait if an age doesn't pass,
if the green of life doesn't become sparse,
if the wax to make a candle doesn't become scarce,
and if the flowers do not wilt while in the vase.

Colours - Past and Present...

It reminds me of the time when I had started painting,
when I had given life to my perceptions with brushes,
on a white sheet of paper.

When I had painted the nature in its colours true,
and had made its beauty accrue,
with the trees green, the earth brown,
the sky azure and the water cobalt,
when it hadn’t been discoloured by the black of our ingenious practices.

When I had clubbed the saffron, the white and the green,
to portray harmony among the diverse,
without the fear of one smudging into the other.

When I had made the dove fly in pristine white,
without a single blemish on it.

The colours of the past had held on to their significance.
Have the colours of the present become aberrant
or have I become colourblind?

To Ratnesh...

We met by an accident when I was not there.
A sudden spark followed, lay the fuel bare,
forming resonating mushroom clouds of frequency rare.
We converged on things dark and also fair;
our thoughts limited not in a single layer;
sometimes on the floor and again on the chair;
to transcend the shackles of the conventional we did dare.

A sudden recollection...

A day in the Life.
A call to his wife;
to resolve a strife;
only to make her, as a widow arrive.

(In reminiscence of the 2006 Mumbai train blasts.)
(Bibliography: The first line is a famous Beatles song.)

A Red Label-ed evening...

Drowned myself in the amber delight,
by the smoke-filled happiness got embraced,
with the outpour candid,
intoxication got graced...

What was and What is

I have her in front of my eyes.
But still my eyes, in ambush, cries.
Because repeated trials of beholding her,
end in nothing else but unsuccessful tries.

What was and what is;
six years have made a dichotomy out of these.
Thought, I could hold her hand eternally then,
but the hold loosened because of an untimely breeze.

Cherished those moments when she was there.
I along with her were an inseparable pair.
The emotions were her, the expressions, mine.
Everywhere it was green, none of it bare.

I walk alone now with the horizon in sight.
A heart full of mixed emotions, I desperately fight.
To move ahead with time or hold it back;
as my search for her, still doesn't have the cover of the night.

I had wanted to paint my canvas with the colours of her dreams and care.
But still the canvas stands white with a shade very rare.
The brushes are still anew, as I tendered them since,
for my resolve to infuse life into it is still alive in my prayer.

I must and I will,
voids of her absence, fill.
Rest I will not before I enact the script,
of shared dreams and a shared will.

Being an Indian yet not being one

Is this the India I wanted to see,
when I was growing up with all the diversity in me?
To be pulled apart in different directions,
stabbing the soul or Indianness as I knew it to be.

I shouted to all my identities torn apart, "Let's save our soul!".
They replied back, "We are secondarily Indians, so why should we even play a role.".
The alien feeling of separatism was simmering in them,
like the hidden embers of burning coal.

My immortal Indianness has now been mortally injured,
by the splinters of caste, creed and religion, year after year it has endured.
The gangrene of difference has spread too far.
Is there a panacea that can have it cured?

Erased has been the history of ages we have shared.
When we had held hands and for each other cared.
When we showed the world how fulfilling it is to move in multitude
and in breaking us apart had nobody ever dared.

But now the world laughs at us with pity.
For the internecine show we have put up with amazing ingenuity.
With all the glory lost and years of history ignobled,
lost is the principal virtue of our Indianness - integrity.

The Redundant Tale...

It was a red dark world called the amniotic space,

which the two of them inhabited in an entangled way,

it was coexistence at its peaceful best,

and no one was a tad better than the other.

They still had darkness in their eyes,

their brains ignorant of what can happen,

unable to express themselves vocally,

it was the sense of touch they celebrated the most.

They were connected by the same cord of life,

the same food kept them alive and kicking,

they slept on the same soft bed everyday,

with the dream of emerging to see the light of the day ticking.

They both provided the same amount of joy to their creator,

and also the same amount of pain,

she tolerated their mischievous punches and kicks,

but never asked the question with why or who then.

Nine months of darkness was about to clear,

as the day of emergence arrived,

for one of them it was a dream come true,

and for the other a life ending sigh.

The one who lived basked in the glory of a won battle against destiny,

a battle to produce a boy child as against a girl child or an unbearable burden you may say,

the eternal tragedy you may call it, but what's the point,

you need a heart to let the tragedy sink in, but no feeling hearts are left you see.

Religion...

Religion is a dictator,
Extremism it practices,
Losing its practicality,
Inequality among communities it relishes.
Gory crusades it loves to fight,
Invoking hate in the form of a river of blood,
Ogling at peace with lewd infectious eyes,
Nemesis it has become even for the innocent heart.

Away From Home

I woke up in the morning to breathe a never before smelled air,
The first rays of the sun that infringed the darkness of my room had a different shade of yellow,
The birds sang to me the tunes of expatriation,
Among them I felt a lonely fellow.

The trees seemed distant relatives with their partially outstretched hands,
The flowery clouds did not greet me with new formations,
The water in the lakes were placidly indifferent,
I felt intoxicated with an alien potion.

Pondered why the window of dawn was so unknown and uninviting,
Found it to be a nightmare, later,
It came and left without much ripples,
But not without making me feel that home was far and far more better.

AI DS...Still the four letters of hate

Billions of rupees are being spent on research to develop a vaccine against AIDS, but how do you inoculate the illiterate, primitive mindset of people of the even more infectious virus of the misconceptions about this dreaded four letter word?
Its the 21st century and still no sign of coming of age. Experts are using every bit of their breath to spread awareness about AIDS, but still this unreasonable attitude refuses to leave the mind of the masses. AIDS victims are still denied compassion and support and are ostracized to extreme limits. Not even the children are spared from this wrath filled show of the non HIV ones. Otherwise five HIV affected children wouldn't have been refused admission to a primary school. They just wanted to defeat the mental part of the disease by expressing themselves academically. But alas! The axe of denial was on the prowl there too. As for the other students, they got a lesson on how to look down at their affected but full of life, would-have-been friends with disdain alongside their primers.
India has the image of being a tolerant country and see how tolerant an attitude was exemplified by the parents who protested against their admission.
A disease always has two aspects. One is the physical aspect and the other is the mental aspect. To defeat the physical aspect one first needs to win over the mental hurdle.
AIDS is one big mental game and our social circumstances are making it that much harder to win over it by repeatedly reminding us that living with AIDS is still a stigma.

Liberalisation pays off...

The abrupt shoot-out at Virginia Technology University has been a painful piece of news to swallow. Innocent aspiring lives were made to meet their ends in the worst way possible. The suspect a gutsy 23 year old armed with two powerful guns shooting at sight. What prompted him to behave in this way? Perhaps an uncontrollable outburst of emotions which was channeled out the wrong way. Emotions which induced in him hatred against his own clan and forced him to pick up arms which is so freely available in the United States - a liberal show-off they practise. My rage is directed towards this open sale of arms. Is it necessary? Ask them and they will reply, "See, ours is a mature and open market, not like yours. We trust our people. We are and always will be liberals." Quite a bold answer but I guess they refuse to go by the demographics of criminal offences and the sales figures of arms. On top of that they make no effort to find a link between these two. As consequence, we get to see such a horrific history of university and school shoot-outs. Will and should the U.S. Administration still pride themselves on their extravagant liberal decisions?

What lessons do we learn from Nandigram?

The Nandigram incident was indeed a spilled bottle of blood on the ambitious plans to transform West Bengal into a major commercial hub. It’s always painful to see unreasonable loss of human capital, but the more horrific face of it is the game of raising fingers at each other, the political masterminds have started, to gain political mileage. The solution is no where to be seen, just a clog of charges and counter charges. The operations of the media being stifled, exact details of what happened are hard to find. With the emergence of the concept of SEZs, the issue of land acquisition was sure to create hitches in its implementation. So what have the administrators learned from this unexpected incident? I feel the primary lesson they should learn is to allow time to help mature the minds of the people so that they can understand the importance of such projects. India is an agrarian country. Agriculture is still the main profession of millions and as consequence land is worth their lives. Seizing land from them for the purpose of implementing SEZs and other commercialization instruments was bound to be difficult. How much you compensate them, loss of land to them is still like the separation of soul from the body. A lot of brain racking is being done at the Union level regarding the SEZ policy but no satisfactory solution has been reached yet.

While acquiring land for industrial development one should take care of the fact that fertile land is not sacrificed. But from the point of view of the SEZs, the area should be easily accessible and satisfy other industrial requirements. Such perfectly positioned fallow lands are not an easy find. As a result a compromise has to be reached where the interests of one camp or the other is sacrificed. And in most cases it’s the camp of the less resourceful that suffers.

I feel the defect is in the grass root. How many policies you frame, if the nitty-gritty’s of it do not reach the ones to be most affected by it, you cannot expect a sustainable solution. When acquiring land, the views of the ones whose land is to be acquired need to be taken into account. It’s just not taking them into confidence by presenting them with a rosy picture, but making them aware of each and every implication of it. Then comes the compensation package which should be sufficient enough to secure their lives.

But with the poisoned politics around a peaceful consensus can never be reached. To gain political mileage and secure their position each and every party is taking advantage of their illiteracy and presenting them with distorted pictures.
But the bottom line is that this bloodbath should not have happened. It was too gory to be tolerated. This incident should be totally condemned and the administration should ensure that such inhuman clashes do not reoccur.

Endangered Existence...

We lived on a spheroidal spread of land and water,

all the biotics and abiotics together.

As mutual dependence was the order supreme

together flocked the birds of different feathers.

The wild beasts roared, the birds chirped merrily,

Man was for man, there were no rivers of blood,

Nature was at its neutral self, neither acidic nor basic

as the ice didn't melt and the oceans didn't flood.

We still live on the same spheroid,

but with all the perfect balances distorted.

Where reigns Hostility as the order supreme,

with the bonds of mutualism busted.

The shadow of extinction hangs over the wild,

the birds have started making untimely migrations,

Man is scripting his destiny with blood,

Nature is at its violent best, unleashing devastations.

Our fate will be decided at the tribunal of Nemesis,

for all the ills we have done to induce this decadence.

Time won't give us a second chance.

Let's turnaround now or be ready for repentance.

The Spirit of C.S.E...

The journey of togetherness

we started collectively as C.S.E

to cross the deep sea of engineering

and set examples for everyone else to see.

Standing by each other in testing times

we learnt it all from scratch

brilliance looms all over us

we never have had any match.

Affairs, break-ups and supplis'

we have seen it all

but at the end of the day, the bottomline says,

CSEians still stand tall.

It has been four long years

and the road of life splits up from here

only to converge again

in the future, someday, somewhere.

9th February, 2002

It's that day of the year again when my age gets incremented by one. It's like the addition of an annual ring to the stem of a growing tree. Well, the day is no doubt special because love and affection pour in from my near and dear ones with special offers like 20% extra, 30% extra, etc. Jokes apart, it's one day you want to relive everyday (but I guess there's something called impossible). I start my day with the much awaited birthday special kisses by my Ma & Bapi. I just long for them. But there's a third kiss which I miss the most. For the last five years I am being denied and will continue to be denied the most coveted presence by Someone's will, which I was so seasoned to. It was the presence of my grandmother. Her presence was all that I needed for a perfect birthday recipe. Now it feels so incomplete. It's a burden of the nullity of her presence that I am carrying over the years and will have to carry in the future too. Her presence meant a world to me.
In my previous birthdays, she used to stay the night of every 8th February over at our place. In those days, the first wish I got on the morning of the 9th was from my grandmother. What bright mornings they were, brightened up by her very presence, leave aside the sun. If it was a weekday, I used to leave for school savouring a bowl-full of the heavenly 'payesh' she used to make, only to return to enjoy the fruits of the labour she used to put in throughout the day to reproduce the delicacies I craved for year and year again. The conclusion to the day wasn't liked by me, as she used to leave me to comeback the next year again to repeat the entire process in an exact manner.
But shielded by her affection - as so used to one, I could never think that while she left me on the night of 9th February 2002, she would not comeback the next year, she would not comeback ever.

I call these JPEG memories...