Jan 28, 2008

Will you walk with me in my life?


I just read this beautiful poem by Emily Dickinson. Reminded me of my goals and to be honest I never lost track of them ever. I was never the child who did not know what she wanted to be or the confused teenager wondering what she should take up in High School. I was so clear cut on what I have to do, how to go about it. However yes on the way there have been times I have got so carried away with superficialities that seemed magnanimous during those phases. But some event or the other would happen and I would be jolted back to reality even if I wasn’t willingly inclined to. There I was the 14 year old who almost flunked 9th Grade cos she jus refused to study sciences which she hated from the bottom of her heart. I hated Biology and Chemistry with a passion that is hard to understand. I was such a dunce at Math that I’d practice like a maniac for months but the day of the exam my nervousness would overpower me and I’d mess up the paper. Yeah but the almost flunking bit made me realise I really cannot get away not studying certain subjects that I don’t love and excelling in History, Geography and English won’t suffice. Sometimes in life we have to do something even if it repulses us in order to do something we love later. We cannot do it for the sake of doing cos then it just ain’t enough and maybe doing something we don’t like happily does teach us lessons. Seems it has been 10 years but some things still have to be driven into me. My new job ain’t happening right now. I cannot leave this place as gleefully I thought I would. I have to stick around and maybe I have to do that willingly and happily cos I don’t see any other road in sight. Surprisingly it doesn’t seem to be as horrible as I made it out to be for months and months. I am learning , I am bloody learning lessons. I don’t feel that much at sea anymore. I don’t envy the rest as much as I use to when they start off with their High Court gossip or talking about the latest stance taken by the Bar Council or the scandalizing judgement passed by so and so judge in the High Court. Thats not my world even if I would love to be a part of it and no I am not willing to wait for too long cos I know I love something way way more.

Yesterday was a lovely Sunday after a quiet Saturday. Actually tis wasn’t quiet cos we had a bonfire at home and a charming bunch of comfortably noisy people came over. For a change I did not drink since on Friday I drank too too much and just sulked and sulked in one corner of Morisson and ended up being rude to the two of my most precious people in this city. Saturday I went off alcohol and it was pleasant. We sat all around the fire, chatting, laughing making the silliest jokes on each other, dancing on “Honth raseelay” and baking jacket potatoes while cursing the cold all in perfect harmony. The jacket potatoes were delicious with butter, lime juice and salt. Damn it just so happened that most of the logs had rested themselves on the potatoes and every time we tried taking one out, the logs would get dislodged and come plonking down spreading ash and sparks all over. I slept off at 3 in the morning and later in the day heard stories about how the wood got over and Roomie was contemplating whether to break one of the living room side tables and use it for the fire. Nothing surprises me anymore. They did eventually use an old worn out table lying on the terrace. Amen!


Sunday was fun. I woke up all cheerful in the morning. Had to meet a friend for coffee and my day was perfectly planned out. Roomie was fast asleep exhausted after her looney antics till wee hours of the morning. I was about to go for a shower when phone rang and it was the last person I expected and yes S called up after my rude behaviour on Saturday. I was relieved more than anything else cos many a time I feel he does know but chooses to ignore and once in a while I goof up and I don’t want him to walk away. Lemme walk away one time and see if I did leave an impression in his life. Anyways he’d called to say he was coming over and to order food for him and asking me if I wanted something to drink. We were listening to random songs and discussing Sinatra when I had to leave for a bit. I met up with someone for coffee and all I can say is tis was refreshingly different. I come back home and those two nuts are immersed in monopoly and S beat Raddy hollow while she cribbed and whined. She came over with her boy and then Mona joined too and it was a cosy gathering around our wannabe fireplace and discussions ranged from ridiculous punjabbi jokes to compulsory enlisting in the Indian Army ,the American Elections (Obama or Hilary) and Israel and Palestine. I love politics, I so love reading and discussing the intricacies, the turmoil and all the conflicts. If I don’t do something about this now I’ll always have regrets.
I know one day I’ll walk away. I won’t look back. I’ll walk away cos some things have to be done and I do deserve to do what I love. Everybody will move on. S will go on with his life. I’ll be someone he met along the way and walked with for a little while. Maybe I would have that coveted job I so pine for and maybe I would finally have that one degree I dream of all the time. I’ll be fine, wherever I am I shall be alright. I know myself. Sometimes we are meant to walk alone. Yeah just walk alone........

P.S :- Someone called me a cute drunk after being woken up by me at an unearthly hour . I so hate these drunken dials.

Jan 17, 2008

A random note, a lost file, and hope lost and found



I wrote this amidst an arbitration meeting where I was supposed to be listening attentively to what the opposite party's arguing counsel was pleading and I was also asked to make exhaustive notes but alas this is what I sat and wrote. Sigh! I'll never change maybe.

"I realised today and I think I have been feeling this particular way that more than anything in today's day I want to learn the ropes, wanna be able to master my profession , wanna learn the law, be passionate about it. I want to be happy with what I do, I wanna love my means of living. No I do not want my work to define all that I stand for today but I defintely want it to play a more significant and proactive role in shaping em as an individual. I want to be able to talk about what I do as a living as spontaneously and proudly as I see others around me do so. I don't do that at all ever. I want to evolve as a person into someone who is very calm and at peace with herself and her life. I don't want to be this cauldron of emotions. I hate being so. Seems however calm and collected I appear to be on top it is very different within me. My mind is always racing ahead, way ahead. Wish I could put a rein on to it. I would be so much more in control then.
I don't want my life to centre around another person and my moods to be ruled by the comings and goings of that person. I want to be happy happy, have fun and embrace all that life has to offer. I don't live in a fool's paradise and I think I give myself enough reality checks to keep my feet firmly rooted to the ground. But sometimes I do hope, even if I try not want the unattainable and even if I almost succeed in convincing myself that somethings shall never be but I don't know from where but hope creeps in. But then we can't live without hope can we, faith is what keeps us going, waiting, watching , hoping , wanting are words very close to my heart that all of us could relate to these emotions. Thats me, a large part of me I guess."
Well could you imagine writing all that down when I was supposed to be doing something entirely different. 2008 started on a strange note for me. I generally don't like to give too much importance to NEW YEAR. I'd just be disappointed later if things did not go my way. Anyways the last day of the year was entirely too melodramatic for me. I cried too much, felt miserable about myself and before I knew it this year ended on such a bad note for me. But then someone told me that "even if things get messed up for you they'll turn out alright ultimately". Wonder of wonders I did find that file when I least expected it, when I'd given up all hope. Life's like that. Isn't it?

Jan 5, 2008

Aubade




Being in love with you
Is to abandon the piano:
It is to take up the castanets,
The bugle,
The kettle drum.

It is to sleep naked, with all the doors and windows open,
Fearing nothing.

Being in love with you means many days I am so happy
I can barely feed myself:
I laugh or weep or both and set aside the fork.

It means I wake one morning feeling
Such warmth rising inside me
That I am suddenly confident
All snow would melt
Within my steady gaze;
And I dress quickly
To test this
On the crisp, DecemberLandscape.

Being in love with you further means the rhododendrons
Are in bloom, the mongoose
Is mating, the moon is full and the wind strong
Along the western ghats of South India.

Being in love with you sings arias
In my head, hums loudly
In my bones.
It beats the drum.

Some complain that being in love with you is merely an airtight ferocity,
Or a kind of rococo piety,
But we proclaim it
This Resplendent Helmet,
A radical and luminous sobriety.

Being in love with you is crucial.
Everything depends upon it.
In summer, being in love with you is red, raw and delicious.
In winter it is blue, lucent, and shimmers when touched.

Being in love with you is to forget
For a moment the use of fruit:
It is to stare long at the splendour
Of a green pear
On a white porcelain plate.

Being in love with you is old as Laughing Buddha,
And as fat.

Being in love with you is only now,
Cannot be remembered
Or imagined.

Being in love with you is to notice the basic radiance of all things,
And is thus a simple, unarmed, fundamental bathing.

Being in love with you is as well, a small well-kept apartment
In the middle of busy Kyoto,
Where, with great contentment,
A young couple sit
At a low table
Eating their evening meal
Of sweet hijiki
On beds of warm rice,
The silence broken only
By faint, almost musical
Clinks of chopsticks
Upon the oval bowls.

Being in love with you for even one second
Is enough. The big picture changes.
(When the honey jar is opened,the whole kitchen is instantly sticky.)

Being in love with you is a deep thirst,
An undermining hunger.
It is a desperation like that of a barn swallow caught
In a kitchen mousetrap,
Dragging itself with his wings
And one good leg
Towards the dog-door,
His only hope.

Being in love with you is ludicrous and cannot be explained.
Being in love with you sneaks up on me from behind.
It is a kind of ambush.
Or worse, it is an avalanche
In which I am tumbled furiously
For a time, then stopped cold
In whatever absurd position the snow
Finds me - perhaps only a hat
Or a handVisible to the outside world.

Being in love with you sits on my doorstep
And weeps. It calls pathetically
To be let in the house, rants
About my neglectfulness. I runTo open the door but - when I touch
The doorknob - feel a tap
On my shoulder, turn around
And it is there,
Smiling it galling
Cheshire smile.

It is the holy guardian of archways, the faithful steward of
All tunnels and bridges.

It is alpine and religious, naked and fierce.
It is the kiss of candour, and the cherished cup.
It is "the low down" and "the real dope".

Being in love with you is to dream, at least once, that you live inside me
Like a mysterious Spanish town at twilight: you are the red dirt roadThat winds into town;
You are the squat houses with lamps lit and drapes half-drawn;
On the horizon, you are sunset's silent fire;
You, bouncing are the green and orange swirled ball that children run after
Laughing in the street - and on the porch, the old man, head in hands,
Watching;
You are the young lovers in the town square at nightfall, the moon's play of
Light and shadow on their faces, you are their lips, their kiss;
And yet you are also the several dead drunk matadors, drapedover chairs,
Spread-eagled over the hotel bed;
And you, too, are the town idiot on the tavern roof, dancing a pot bellied
Belly-dance to the slender crescent moon;
And at the farthest edge of town, you yourself are the yelled-at mule, who
Will not budge.

In spring, being in love with you is green, resilient, and sways to the rhythms of wind.
In autumn, it is pale gold and fills the sky.

Being in love with you is centripetal.

Moreover, it choreographs
And christens.
It cradles and cherishes, yet
Confiscates as much as it confers.
It clobbers and clocks, then cloisters - but only to clarify
And cleanse.
It seems to cathart then catnap, but later celebrates
And celestializes.
It cultivates and cumulates until it is continual combustion.
Or, saying the same, is a kind of ever spontaneous consecration.
It cures and cushions,
Compels and completes.
If threatened with congealing, it may creep
Aside, churn and circulate,
Conspiring to colour the cosmos.

Being in love with you is centrifugal.

It is hard to believe
Being in love with you
Was once
That tiny space
In my heart
That has since exploded
Into a vast cathedral
Of sky
Under which I stand alone,
Looking up.

It is raining cats and dogs.
I am drenched.
Being in love with you has soaked me
To the bone
And I will never again
Be dry.

- Michael Londry

One of my favouritest poems. Isn't it exquisite? Kaleidoscopic love heheh!

I don't know where I stand with you and I don't know what I mean to you all I know is everytime I think of you all I wanna do is to be with you.