Homecoming (I)

 “Time is little more than just that cruel passerby, unfolding as it passes, perhaps a grand canvas, littered with vignettes, colors, emotions, grey and memories, among a thousand other things. In its eternal, dispassionate search for a destination, they say, it barely pauses for a breath – a moment of compassion, a minute of anxiety, seemingly endless passages of desperation and fleeting joy – nothing ever seems to bother. It is in this canvas that life sketches some of its most every day-looking stories, in juxtaposition with some remarkably strange ones.”

“I wish we could step out of that canvas and paint a world of our own…”

This was “the” thing, he thought. Against a mildly chilly October evening, sipping his tea, he sat on the sidewalks of the “busy” street, smiling, sometimes mumbling. “Busy”, to him was not bustling with people, but rather bustling with theatricality. Colors, silence, props, and a busy backdrop. It was one of those days when he thought he would be the next big thing in the local theater scene. Struggling to contain his excitement, and the tea from spilling out of the mug, he would break into a spontaneous celebration, and sometimes, majestically, at least he thought, would let his hands waltz, as if his stage persona had seamlessly mingled with this world.

It had been growing darker, and the quickly fading dusk was given some space by those street lights dotting the horizon. That scant neighborhood somehow seemed to be the perfect canvas – lamp posts jutting into a not so grey sky sprayed all over with dull stars, and an artiste, in a somewhat restrained expression of his art, struggling to disturb the order of things, poking as if to produce ripples in that reflection. Swaying gently, even as darkness encroached over the trees, he picked up a stone and was about to throw it in the vast emptiness, when, a window over the sidewalk opened. Instantly, he slipped the stone in his pocket, wore an awkward smile, greeted the neighbor and walked on, measuring the success of his latest “theatricality”.

He was someone who could be labeled a trier. Yes, he was not a maverick, not someone who could lead a revolution, not someone who could / would / chose to do things differently. Call it the lack of choice, or its abundance, whatever he had chosen for himself since the last spring, was theater, in any capacity. Not that he had an innate talent, not that he was (not) good at any other “profession”. He was the kind that had no choice but to try a hand at everything he could. More than half of his life was spent trying to convince himself that he was a gifted athlete, a talented musician, a bright scholar and a fluid writer. Unbeknownst to the rest of the world, his gifts "developed and reached a prime", till he got bored of whatever he was involved with, and with a “been there, done that” attitude, shrugged off the little recognition he received from humankind.

He was a family man, something which he did not enjoy - may be because of the responsibility that came along with it, or perhaps because he was all too occupied with himself. By his nonchalance, one could have mistaken him of having gotten bored with his family, though was not so. His wife was pregnant with their third child, although his daughters were not particularly fond of him. They were too inquisitive about why he would not get them that candy floss from that shop. Sometimes they insisted on a particular doll in the marketplace. The father tiredly tried to dissuade them, while the mother used to get them substitutes in the form of lozenges. A family dinner every weekend was a given, and was that bit about being a family man that he would not complain. Not because it was some quality time with his family, but because with every outing, he thought he absorbed something of that external world. Of late, he had developed a keen eye for detail. Saturday evenings provided him with ample. Through all his years in toil, all he could manage was to stumble through the labyrinth of his desires, giving up midway in pursuit of something he thought was his higher calling, and yet, he took enormous pride in recounting his days of yore. Saturday evenings were profligacy for him - a new joint every week, and a new story at every joint to keep his daughters interested in Saturdays.

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Until that Saturday, when he would simply disappear.

Everything else can wait.

Except time. Which, I assume, anyway, does not matter.

What matters, though, is a dream waiting to be dreamed. Day in and day out, through the struggles of everyday chores, what gets lost is not time, but the sense of being in that time. Somewhere in this din, the magic of a few quiet moments gets strangled. Railway lines, shiny and spiraling, a bustling crowd, moving in unison and oblivious to the individuals in it, a screeching halt, a mad rush, an android, a moment or two of condescension, submissiveness and complaints, and on, and on. Tireless hours without being true, tiring hours in afterthought. Somewhere, someone is lost. Somewhere the excitement of a dream is lost, the excitement of having dreamed one, and the restlessness after not having remembered one. Everything else can wait but a dream.

What matters though is a life waiting to be lived.

Tumult

So after a brief moment of struggle, can I afford to sit back and ponder over "that animal" getting off my back? I think I can't. There too much left to be desired, after all. Moments ago, a state of limbo and moments after, another. The difference - one "leads" to the other; a series of incidents leading to another, a series of thoughts triggering another and a moment of resignation ushering another. Dominoes. The good thing is that I can afford to do what I was doing all this while, with that extra little peace of mind; the bad thing is that I can't do anything about it, now. So, I sit back, after a long spell of denial, and try to put things into place. A Hampton Maze, a jigsaw puzzle, but without any story to connect, so that every piece would fit into every other suitable one. Does it give me reasons to rejoice, with choices galore, or does it indicate a general loss of objective, since one way or the other, the puzzle would fall into place anyway. This is what I am thinking. Drifting.

A quick glance at the clock throws back 0118 hours. I have seen many of those. I laugh back at the clock, "I am not at your mercy." But how wronged I am, because in the end, the clock always has the last laugh. Time beats all. It is the "clock" that "strikes away" every hour. So what is it that leaves me struggling? Too many to be contained here. Time. Perhaps faineance.  I am not a man of too many words, but I am not a recluse either. I may not be the first mover, but I am not a martyr either. I fancy my chances. Everyone does. So, what am I left with? Let us try and explore.

There are sprouts of opportunities, bouts of indecision, followed by moments of madness, ending in spells of desperation. What good is the anvil without a hammer? The iron would still remain unshapely, laying waste to the effort gone behind arriving at that preparation. January Night, Premchand, teaches a lesson or two. Reality, after all, is your consciousness, shaped by the desires you harbor and molded in the fashion you want things to be. Laying waste to all that you have strived for, all the while crying foul over some flawed structure of construed pragmatism, or seeing an alternate universe, where all that is real are your desires, and accordingly carving your consciousness, are just mechanisms to define what you are going to be. Desperate or content, you define your zone.

Tumult. This is something undeniable, after having decided to write as much. There are too many things going around in my head. If I can afford to digress, “Paranoid” would be an ideal statement, sans the opening clause. I wonder whether it comes naturally to me, the tumult, or whether it is a product of so many assumptions; whether this is a result of a diverging, almost escaping, reality or a converging, almost overwhelming, hallucination. So many times have I thought about so many things, so many predicaments, and an equal number of times have I experienced strong explanatory undercurrents, only to have let them drift in time with the flow, punctuated by scattered, insignificant efforts for roadblocks. At times I have been plain reluctant of taking charge, and at other times confined myself to complaining, limiting my will to react.

React. Yes, reactionary is what I have largely been. But does that solve one bit of the puzzle, the assumptions bit? By laying a claim to being reactionary, can I say this tumult is not at least the result of too many assumptions? No, because regardless of the assumptions, I keep deferring action. This only builds a massive block which some or the other point in time has to be dismantled to be able to see any further. And within that unorganized megalith, breed many tumultuous thoughts, nibbling away at every bit of organization within you. Like the domino effect, these megaliths keep regenerating all around you, colonizing within themselves, a largely productive brain, rendered rather ineffective, consumed, all the while, in battle against an imposing, but invisible, foe. The key is how soon you condition yourself to circumvent this entrapment, and get back to being what you were. Still better, don’t wait for the garbage to pile up.

Pre-empt. Act.

There is so much to see beyond every wall, so much to read between every line. The question is, am I up to it?

Just a Someone?

Once a moonlit night and scary, midst the howling winds and dreary

I was riding on the back of memories, a lonesome street

Strutting past the ashen spaces, smirking at the empty faces

Thinking to myself how ugly and forsaken lives they lead

Here a drib and there a splatter, ringing through that numbing chatter

Hanging on the flapping rim, the dancing raindrops on my hat

Crashing through those molten pebbles, seeping 'neath those dusty rebels

Yes, it was a moonlit sky and why it rained, don't ask me that

I kept walking, peeping, staring, almost running, almost swearing

Learning every now and then that I was someone they ignored

But I still tried to control my desperation, screaming well nigh

Telling to myself that place was dystopic and way too bored

So once again I pulled my wit, took note of time and of that "pit"

And called out to someone who I thought was soaking in the rain

But fell my cry on those deaf ears, and I heard mocks and I heard jeers

Or so I thought, feeling antsy, sketchy, and at best, so plain

Who was I, I thought, in this den, was it not my so own world then

Trying to escape from it, that memory laden, lonesome trace

Falling through the narrow causeway, picking splattered bits to convey

My submission, my surrender to this ghostly, haunting place

But not to find the gleaming light, but not to overcome this might

That rendered me tame and put me in a corner so obscure

But reconcile to all around, and to come to terms with ways abound

That I am just a "someone" and nothing less and nothing more

Here Begins...(I)

Ok, so this one is going to be a collection of a lot of things...stuff that should have been written long before, and perhaps some things that do not even deserve to be written about. But such is life and so are we, bloggers

The past couple of weeks have been eventful, quite eventful, for me. I travel with a guitar and a laptop bag in the 0800 local from Kalyan to Mulund; People who are familiar with Mumbai locals would know better. I leave my office at 0600 hrs in the morning (redundancy) to reach Mulund at 0700 hrs, and come back to office at 1030 hrs; I work on 3 bits simultaneously in the office (I know this could have been left out, but such are we bloggers); I arrive at a dear friend's place at 0130 hrs in the day, all the while unaware of his birthday, which I learn only from his mother; I am awake till 0330 hrs just to record a song with the same friend. Now I am getting Tarantino-esque with my timelines, but it was the same day when I had the guitar and the laptop bag. I also boarded a 1520 hrs train from Thane at 1530 hrs, somehow managing to jump in the train through the last open door, fortunately. I learnt that I have a liking for every other girl in this world, something that I was unaware until someone told me of this. I bought new shoes, in the meanwhile, when I learnt that my old shoes were not leather, neither rexine nor any other shoe material, when they gave way in the Mumbai rains and I am not one bit sure if my new shoes are of any better material. I went to a random rock concert in the deeply distressing city of Pune. I composed two starkly different melodies on my guitar. I met a likeminded person, a rare breed, through another friend. And again, random stuff about myself. The timelines might be nonlinear because I am deeply distressed at the time of writing this blog, but such is my wont.

Trying to put the first things first, I begin with the Kalyan Story. So a dear friend comes from Bangalore to Mumbai to celebrate his birthday with his family and I am unaware of the latter part of the story. We decide to meet up on a certain Sunday, but my employer (if you are reading this post, you need to look up Deloitte in the urban dictionary) was thankless enough not to allow me any time on the weekends. The fun is that back then in the college, my friend used to tell me that he lives in Mumbai. The day he was here, he said his place is in Thane. Upon telling him that Thane is not a difficult task, I came to know he lives in Kalyan, and when he called me in the morning to give his local number, the STD code was that for Ambarnath. I was forced to tell him my hometown is Patna (for beginners, and to make it sound funny, if at all, I am from Bhagalpur, a place ~200 Kms east of Patna). 

So on a Monday evening we decide to meet up. He starts calling me from 1800 hrs in the day and I keep pretending to be hopeful of leaving the office "pretty soon". Upon realizing that by 2030 hrs there were hardly any encouraging signs from my manager, I decide to tell him the truth, finally, that we would not be meeting. He is distraught, but so am I. And I know my readers would not give a damn to it, but such are my readers. He asks me to stay at his place and the music enthusiast that I am, agree, without thinking that it was so ungentlemanly to barge into someone's place late in the night and stay there overnight. But I did. In the process, I assumed that the friend I was staying with then would allow me to take his guitar from Mulund to Kalyan, but it was not to be, and he had his reservations. To compound matters, I had just changed my place, but left my guitar at the previous place, in Chunabhatti. So, I had to get down at Kurla and get my guitar, and all this while, that 3 Kg laptop bag on my shoulders. That I also got some money that the local grocery store owed me is a small matter considering it was already 2230 hrs in the night (redundancy). 

I took my guitar, and with the two bags, boarded the slow local from Kurla. I should have known that I made a massive mistake. Yes, I already knew that. So the train slowly chugged out of the station, stopping at every station (redundancy), and at least once at every non-station between stations. I was getting frustrated, as should be normal, at the weight on my shoulders and the speed of the train. Now the mobile that I have did not help either. My friend was trying to call me and I was not able to listen to his speech due to some issues with my cell phone, which would require another post to detail. The only ray of hope was a fellow passenger who told me that it would take only 20 mins from Mulund to Kalyan. I knew that the guy was new on this route. It was more than 40, by my watch, and that is discounting the time it took me to from Parel to Mulund, and that entire Chunabhatti detour. According to a consultant's (yeah, that is me) estimate, it was around 120 mins.

I reached Kalyan and could not have any auto-rickshaw driver agree to take me on the meter charges. Several attempts with the “wretched” cellphone (notice the frustration growing…this is 3D effect in written literature) I finally reached his place. A quick glance showed that the day was already past. His mother was kind enough to have taken all the trouble to stay up late in the night, and give me some food. Now I am fond of sweets and on a random mention of sweets, came to know that it was his birthday. So much for a good friend, I thought, and pitied on myself. (But such is my wont.) We had a good time, playing guitar and flutes and all those nice sounding instruments till late in the night, 0330 hrs till I remember correctly. We also managed to have a decent recording of the guitar bit of the “Iktara” song from Wake Up Sid. He was supposed to do the flute bit, but we thought it would not be civil to play the flute loud to have it sound clearer at that hour and left it there. I had a good sleep.

But then, people who are employed with private firms do not have much of a choice in the mornings. I woke up and was already in the train by 0800 hrs.

Lewis Hamilton. Seriously?

Oh yeah, I registered for that indiblogger thing the other day, and yes, only after listening to someone winning a Nokia Lumia. Now Nokia sucks, as people say, but nonetheless, it is a smart phone, and at least one up than the brick-slab (read cellphone) that I have. Hell, I would not mind giving driving instructions to that nut-head Hamilton. Mumbai roads are not F1 racetrack for one, and he would need an escort to steady him all along when a "somebody" cuts him out of nowhere, or a BEST bus takes a brushing swerve against his McLaren. Hamilton may be the champion in Canada and the States and Hungary and Japan and Britain and hell, even Monaco, but 'course, I AM MUMBAI, as that newspaper ad screams.

Anyway, I would do anything for a Lewis Hamilton autograph, but the sad part is no one I know would know who Hamilton is. So the exercise is waste. But I think I still should be the one person to sit beside Lewis, when he scorches the Mumbai roads, because I have to discover Mumbai as much as he has to. (Okay, I admit I have not seen Mumbai.) Because, at the risk of sounding as unoriginal and as hackneyed and all that, I think I was one of the very few children in my town who know what F1 was...who Schumacher was...and who Hamilton was. For the sake of knowing Schumacher, I think I should be the lucky one...for the sake of following F1 back then, I should be the one and again, for the sake of Lewis' safety I should be the lucky one.

Now I will get to the details. As a F1 driver, I don't think you need someone interesting as a companion, for safety of course, and I am as dry as they come. The cactus jacks I mean. I certainly know that there has to be a wheel for steering the clear of potholes, and that there is a brake for preventing accidents on Bandra pavements, and that there is an accelerator to speed across the sea link and that there is a Vivek Sharma, if you fall in trouble with any mahila police (remember, handsome Rob, Italian Job). Of course, Lewis is no Rob and Mumbai mahila police is...(yeah feminists, I am not your prey...not today). So you see.

Ok, I think this is enough of writing shit about shit I don't know shit about. Yes, I know Hamilton and yes, I would know F1 more than the most, but the fact that I have been trying too hard to please the organisers by submitting this entry, forcing some humor into it and making a fool of myself, trying to show that I know this shit and writing well after the deadline is past is proof enough that I am serious Lewis fan and I am as serious about driving with him as I am about...

Friends and Strangers

So this one was a draft for quite some time, and so, perhaps, stinks stale. 

Until recently, I did not know that friendship came with a best before tag - a tenure, best defined by what frame of mind one is in; a friend for every mood, if I may. Now, whenever I am sad, I have a particular person (read friend?) to go, talk to; whenever I am happy, I have another person or set of persons who I call up. A great way to organize you contacts, isn't it, instead of the usual Friends-Acquaintances-Colleagues-Bullshit-Who Cares-Stranger segregation, except that barring the first category, all would still hold good. My bad. And of course no, I have not had a brush with a bad friend. Just a few instances when I have been at the receiving of the tantrums these friends throw, and no prize for guessing. Friendship day and the social networks littered with friendship dumps goad me into thinking all this pointless stuff. But that is exactly why I would write a blog.

I was loitering around in the office corridor, unconcerned with whether or not I have a companion when someone calls from behind. I look back; force a smile and wave at that person. “So, Sharmaji, what’s up?” was the question, with an ugly smile and a bad breath, almost suffocating me to death.

“Dude, step back can you please, and God! Are you some scavenger, with that awful stink of yours.”

Now this is one question you cannot possibly escape in the office atmosphere. And perhaps this is one question I can give multiple answers to. “Whatever concerns you?” with a smug, condescending look or “I am good” with a pleasantry exchange or “What left to be up dude, Deloitte downs everything, from our spirits to our career graphs” with a dry grin. The noticeable part is that neither party is remotely interested in this conversation. I once remember a manager asking me, in the same vein, “Hey, hi, how are you?” and I was taken aback. The previous day we had a workshop by the same man-age-r, and I think I said a few noteworthy things as a contribution; yeah, whatever. So, the next day when I saw him, I just threw a cursory glance, a customary smile and got back a question in reply. I was actually taken aback, and for a moment, kept looking at him, all the time, continuing on my way, and then, with a quizzing look, turned away. He still had that transgender smile on his face, expectant. And not long after, I learnt that people feel it is difficult entering into a conversation with Sharmaji.

I am not sure how I got this name, yeah, but it was definitely my office friends. I think they deserve at least one mention in my blog. So, we are five analysts who joined in the Strategy & Operations group in Deloitte. One among them, born and brought up in Mumbai, is from my college and we did not quite know each other until we came here. He thinks he is cynical, pragmatic and understands music. I would quite agree with the last one, before adding that I think he is quite earnest, at least when he attempts to start a conversation, in trying to ensure that the other party to the conversation feels wretched and miserable for being a part of this world. But he is a good chap. The other guy has quite the flair for gossip. Now there are things perhaps the EA to the partner would not know, and you would be ears-full of what is going to happen in the firm and who joins and who leaves and who has what background. One of those who boast a claim, with pride, of being a rascal. Methinks…well, there always is fire for a smoke. The third one is perhaps the most networked analyst in the firm, and perhaps the one who feels the need to stress upon the “friendship” thing every now and then. ‘Course, you have to talk to be networked, right. I have not had much of an interaction with the fourth one of us to write about, except that he goes out for lunch with a different chick every day, has a real passion for chatting and enjoys office parties (read sharaab and shabaab), however few they are, more than the others, I guess. Anyway, this was about the office atmosphere.

I think I have been fortunate enough that people still hang around me, in the office or otherwise, despite my crass, unapologetic and rather indifferent attitude. I somehow have cultivated this feeling that maybe I do not need anyone, maybe I already all by myself and all those sorts of ideas. I even try to be an iconoclast, questioning the very idea of friendship and companionship, demanding a checklist for a qualification and all that heretical randomness. So one day this person asked me if I deliberately chose to be a rebel, trying to create an image for myself to gain some distinction or was it the natural me, and you would have guessed by now my response. Looking back upon it, “Whatever it is, should not concern you, right, because it has nothing to do with you” is perhaps not the kind of response I would have appreciated were I as the receiving end, when I am generally a skeptic. I call people varieties of names, with or without any reason, form premature opinions about people. Sometimes, I question myself about this disdainful behavior and then brush it aside with “This is what it is” trash. I have been criticized by my friends for calling a spade a spade, but again, sometimes it has meant humor and more often, it has been matter-of-factly. I think I can cite one interesting incident here. Someone once asked me who would I call a friend, and rebuking, I said we are not children to call someone a friend and leave the others out; that everyone we know now becomes a friend, everyone we have talked to, even once, is now a friend.

That was meant to be a mean reply to a stupid question. But upon retrospection, I feel somewhere that I might just have spoken something of great consequence. Not everyone is a friend, not everyone you like to talk to might want to be friends with you. Again, I am straddling the fence of “friendship” here, but let’s leave that for later. I have a great friend who I talk to only when we meet; I would not share a great camaraderie with someone, but still have a lot to talk about with that someone. I have, myself, taken one time contacts too seriously for friends, only to realize the contrary. More often, I remain all too consumed in myself and have found myself wanting in making efforts to make new friends, and often trying to wriggle away from any eye contact with most people I know. And sometimes, I have to prepare myself for an animated conversation. Lately, I have been thinking about escaping into some world where I live all alone.

And still, I have so many people around me, providing me with hope, asking me to hang around for the better, lending ears to whatever I might have to say and patiently filtering out the trash, people who have exulted with me and sulked with me. So I think it is high time I cherish my friendship with people, gems of individuals, who have stood by me in times of joys and distress, in passages of needs and celebrations, through successes and misfortunes, in egoistic overtones and in careless mirth, in mischievous winks and gargantuan anxieties. I have been blessed to have people I can count on, and in great numbers; people who I can call friends. 

No Title

It is really difficult to find a title for every post and "Untitled" sounds so very uncool.


So it is another Sunday and just about a month and a half since the last post. That sucks. The other day I was wondering what would inspire me to write something. Yesterday did. At the Bandra station, the three of us were standing when a boy and a girl came along to ask directions for the train to Dadar. I must mention that among all my friends here, it is a common opinion that no one knows the transportation more than I do. Something they can do without, but that is for another day. I was on a call when Raju (one of the three) asked me where would the Dadar bound train be. I confused it with the slow train and pointed to platform 1. In hindsight, I was thinking platform nine and three quarters when suddenly I realized that I just gave them the wrong direction. Since then, I have been contrite. To compound matters, when I got on to the Dadar bound train, they were staring right in my face, and like a celebrity (that goes without saying in matters concerning me) convict who shies away from the camera after having been caught for some faux pas, I buried my face in my palm. I think guilt is the strongest of emotions that can happen to a man.

Opeth-o-Graphy

Prologue:

When, stands a moor under the weeping moon,

What thinks he? Ah, but does he think at all,

Of orchid, birds, his forests? And maroon

His land, the moor, his home, as stars befall.

Stays back, the night and the silent water

To stranger lands with promises of hope,

Charges for absent friends, clad in otter,

A silhouette, bleak, fading down the slope.

The drapery falls, bares a mystic sun.

Afresh, they wake up to rid the disease

The weakness, for but good, to be undone

By that horse rider, melting with the breeze.

Yonder he left, say they, yonder he drove

Apostle in triumph, with valor, the cove

Yes. Everything there is surreal. Another still day, beneath the sun. What had the fortunes brought me to? A lasting impression of what should have been, interspersed with the hope of these idyllic images race through an empty mind. Hitting hard with every impact. There had been those war-mongrels, ravaging my lands, and here are these complaisant, congenial folks, welcoming me into their hearts. This is not Karma. I had left for a cause, and here I stand, refusing to accept this denouement. Ways of the world, say they. How am I to tell myself apart from   those I had come for? I need not. In the quest of chasing away my demons, I'd come a long way ahead. In fact, left them far behind.

I tread along, in the devil’s orchard, or so I think, eying every movement with suspicion, every slither with hostility. And in the midst of all this, sparing a moment or two for my place. In every hustle through that harlequin forest, I find a raison d’etre for my presence; and in every tranquil moment, relive a lifetime in the watershed of her love. In this relentless journey for deliverance, I have found a way or two to go back, beneath the mire of this manufactured repugnance, and hide myself in the garment of her passion. Does her love check my advent into the unknown or does it give me a rationale to continue with this pursuit? For little that I know of this pursuit, I find comfort in that she kissed me goodbye under the white cluster of our reveries.

In the mist she was standing, quiet, privy.

Her porcelain heart, absent to the world,

Lay bare, carving patterns in the ivy.

Dew of her youth, silken, as it unfurled.

And smothers, his face, the dripping nectar

Of her flesh, as he lies dumbfounded there.

And finds the moments breaking the specter

Of the smog, into a form that’s so rare.

Benighted, oblivious beneath the sky

They render a touch in credence, in trust

“To bid you farewell”, he whispers his sigh

She chooses silence, and silence she must

April, ethereal, obscures in time,

Those hours of wealth, the twosome, sublime.

Staring down the memory lane, everything comes back a full circle, this is what people say. They say you are always running away from what you were, from what was to what you were and what was. How difficult, rather rare, it is to find newer things and not connect them to things you have left behind! Memory after all is a beautiful thing, although not a twin, but still, a relative to truth; a heritage that leaves you only poorer. And how callous a thing, to betray your true state of mind with wishful longing for the absent.

Coming to think of it, there was no particular reason why I thought I should leave my land. As the harvest season progresses, so does my mind waver from one pursuit to another. I am already a part of this rich cultural exuberance, with only a quaint memory of the autumn when I left for the unknown. And nothing bothers me, particularly. They have taken kindly to me, unknowledgeable of my identity. For myself, I had no reason then, and not one now. As a matter of fact, I do not even know if they are the same demons, of the fall, as my people called them. Every sunset, I sing a madrigal or two with them, and with every folklore, wish to break free of that unkempt feeling of self-condemnation of not having found stable, mental peace. I realize that I am losing any desire of going back to my place, into that forest of October and instead, want to live an unassuming life here, only thinking that the ravager would not be ravaged.

Sonnet XIII: To bid you farewell

In the mist she was standing, quiet, privy.

Her porcelain heart, absent to the world,

Lay bare, carving patterns in the ivy.

Dew of her youth, silken, as it unfurled.

And smothers, his face, the dripping nectar

Of her flesh, as he lies dumbfounded there.

And finds the moments breaking the specter

Of the smog, into a form that’s so rare.

Benighted, oblivious beneath the sky

They render a touch in credence, in trust

“To bid you farewell”, he whispers his sigh

She chooses silence, and silence she must

April, ethereal, obscures in time,

Those hours of wealth, the twosome, sublime.

Day in and Day out

People talk about fresh mornings and sultry evenings. People talk about tiring weekdays and colorful weekends. People talk about boring workplaces and even boring colleagues, yeah sometimes a few exciting ones find themselves studded in those jaded descriptions. I am indifferent. To all these talks and to all these phenomena. Only a couple of hours ago was I in the office, staring at my computer screen, trying to concentrate on the Nightwish song the system was playing. And in a flash, I flew down to...nowhere. I was still sitting, still listening and still thinking about the paucity of work through this week. Today is a Friday.

I have realized that just as the spring starts to draw curtains on the inconspicuous winter, the days are growing longer. I wake up to a brighter, warmer morning everyday. A fresh morning though has yet to flare my day. The irksome chores are growing all to heavy on me. Someone who used to wake up at the slightest hint of a ripple in his immediate surrounding now chooses to ignore the dramatic, irrepressible spirit of the milkman, who finds amusement in the cacophony generated by the prolonged ringing of a door bell. Every morning is a painful realization of the fact that now, I am spoilt for choice. That historic question, of course history repeats itself everyday, of what would I look to have just stumps me. On the one hand, I have a choice, and on the other, it is only either potato, beans...yeah, buzz off. No one is interested in what you eat. You were talking about things people talk. Fresh mornings.

After listless days, I wonder what is left for the evenings. Nothing by the wild swaying of my head, sometimes in unison, though mostly in disharmony with the BEST buses. Again, a realization. I have lost control over my powers to remain awake during a BEST bus journey. Something with the bus, or the ride. Something. I just cannot manage to stay awake. Yesterday, I leapt into the empty bus, got a seat and took out Neruda. An exercise to ward off the dozing cycle. As beautiful has he might write in Spanish, I do much better in English. I shove it back into my bag. And the treacherous, villainous siesta encroaches. The observation here is that until Wednesday, I used to sleep all by myself. Wednesday onward, I have lost control of that as well. Once a passenger requests me to sit by the window so that I can rest my swaying head; the second time, when I wake up, I find another passenger, the more amorous one, offering his shoulder for my head. I alight at the next stop, embarrassed. So much for the sultry evenings.

Anyway, another weekend goes by. I am still searching a jazzy one.

Sonnet XI: A Tryst with Midnight

Long due, the midnight presented its face
Into a sparkling form, maidenly mould;
Silver, her skin shone, entangled with grace,
Caressing my breath, I saw her unfold,


I lay enthralled in her arms, staring wide,
Musing, on her muted gestures and more,
Embracing her, all my love I confide
Ask her to stay for me, ardour implore.


Gently, her hands brush my eyelids to rest
Draping me warm, tender feelings enclose
Slumber trespasses, despite my protest
Imposing, her love renders me to repose


Timeless, this tryst with my love, I surmise
We slowly part, the moon melts in her eyes

Deliverance

I will have to repeat many words. Please, understand.

Having been a witness to the surreal experiences of seeing first Eluvietie, then Lamb of God, Metallica, Anoushka and finally, Opeth perform live in concert, I have developed an opinion that none of the fans would return unhappy after the performance of any of the above mentioned artists. That is true, barring the case of Opeth. I am as big a fan of LOG or Metallica for that matter, as they are but then there has to be something that sets Opeth apart. I can thus lay my claim to being the biggest Opeth fan that has treaded upon the face of the earth, and in furtherance of what I said above, I am a disappointed fan after February the 5^th, 2012.

For three continuous months, I had been waiting. Waiting for that moment when I would listen THEM play live in concert. Yeah, they had come to India once, but then I had just started to listen to western music and Opeth (what a shame it is) were relatively unknown in the college, and hence to me. But since then, and as I got into Opeth, they have left an indelible mark on my musical side. I can proudly say that I picked up a guitar listening to Metallica, but Opeth are the ones responsible for introducing good music and the ability to discern between something that is a sun to the million other stars.

For me, if there is one band that has produced brilliant music album after album since Led Zeppelin, it has got to be Opeth. I think there is hardly any song on any of their releases that I can classify as ordinary, leave alone bad. Starting from Orchid and right up to their 10^th release in Heritage, they have continued to amaze their fans with a platter of deliciously rich music, dished out in the most understated, under acknowledged setting. From their heavy metal roots to the genre that conspicuously straddles between something of jazz, the classical 70’s rock and the progressive elements, with a dash of folk and a pinch of Opeth (yes, I consider them to be another genre altogether), they have transcended any modern day band to become the most adventurous, yes, but at the same time, one of the most critically acclaimed bands, musically. Like they say in our country, if cricket is religion then Sachin is God, so I say, if music is religion, OPETH is GOD.

I know I am too diminutive a mortal to try and write something about the virtuosity of the band. But what I can do is present a caricature of what my experience on the night of the  5^th of February, 2012 was. Opeth came to India with Suidakra and Nothnegal. I could not listen to Nothnegal but Suidakra was a musical masterpiece in whatever I could listen of them. They were a judicious mix of alternative, old school, the frenetic 80’s and the Celtic folk influences. I don’t know, I was still looking for people and I think I missed out on a hugely promising band. That is that.

Opeth grandly opened with the groovy “The Devil’s Orchard” (Heritage). Breathtaking riff work and some brilliant drumming lend a weirdly eerie feel to this song, with Mikeal proclaiming the death of God. I don’t know what to make of the lyrics, frankly, but in any song, it is just that music that attracts me and “The Devil’s Orchard” has it plentiful. Just as in the album, they followed it by “I Feel The Dark” (Heritage). I know I am going to use this a zillion times throughout this writing, but it perfectly sums up what Opeth has been throughout their musical life. Trying, testing and expanding. With the smooth start to the screeching break right in the middle of the song and back to the mellow ending, they have crafted such effortless transitions that it is impossible for me to ignore the enormity of their music.

“Face of Melinda” belongs to those days when they used to call themselves a death metal band. Can you believe it? I can. With Opeth, the significance of their music lies in their ability to surprise you with the most absurd concepts theoretically, but the most ear-gasmic ones pragmatically. Sandwiched between two expansively composed songs, primarily on distortion, it is one beautiful song that sure does send a chill. I have never been someone who judges songs on the merit of their lyrics but with Opeth, you can rest assured that you will never get any chance. They seal off the easiest excuse, quite gracefully. Such restraint and yet so cathartic a song, equaled only by, perhaps “A Fair Judgement” (Deliverance) in treatment, is enrapturing to the first-time-listener, leave alone who know what Opeth is.

Immediately follows “Slither” (Heritage), that Mikael says he wrote as a tribute to Ronnies Dio James. As towering a personality Ronnie was, and this song might not be the most Ronnie-istic song, but Opeth took me back to the era of the rock music scene. “Credence” which followed, is again a beautiful song, and from my one-of-the-ten favorite Opeth albums, My Arms, Your Hearse. In an epic album which weaves a beautiful narrative into the songs through pacy, silent, racing and heart stopping music, served with a handful of (I dare say) diligently assorted words, “Credence” that song which halts you to a thoughtful stop, before signing off with that final, brutal rush. I can easily say that it is the most context-fitting song in the album. Yeah, in respect of the concert, I think it was a little ill timed, but again, who cares as long as it was Opeth.

“To Rid The Disease” is a nice, jazzy song from their only clean album, Damnation, but somewhat lazy and perhaps carries the risk of losing the concert going listeners somewhere in the middle. Joachim (whose first name is Mother and the last name is Fucker) fucks up the keyboards and we have to wait for the first growls of the evening. “Folklore” (Heritage) acts as the filler between the angel-like-clean-and-the-Satan-like-deep, as they say, bowel-crunching-growls. Okay, as big a fan I might be, I could not recollect that it was “Folklore” and only after they finished playing, towards the end of the song, I realized. I thus wasted 8 minutes trying to figure out the song in an egoistic rush of madness, and foolishly, not enjoying the song that was.

With an hour already into Opeth, I think the wait was worth it. The first growls were “Heir Apparent”. I reckon the heaviest song in the album, “Heir Apparent” is a mix of some pounding riffs and some nice acoustic guitar and piano work sprinkled throughout the song. To just compliment Per Wiberg is a huge understatement to the binding theme that he has provided to Opeth songs. This was just what was needed from, and expected of Opeth. I like them. Immensely. I like their clean vocals but the one thing that leaves them incomplete is the absence of growls (“Heritage”) and they just about made up for the night with this one.  “The Baying of the Hound” is another masterpiece from their most complete album, “Ghost Reveries”. With some nice, tight drumming, it was a treat. They followed it with “The Drapery Falls”, a crowd pleaser, but certainly not their best from Blackwater Park. It was greeted well by the public as expected. That was it. After repeated chants from the crowd, asking Mikeal to fuck off, and Mikeal, asking earnestly, why, getting horny and then again, nonchalantly playing, he really fucked-off.

Now even as I knew, as did every other not-wannabe fan present that he would come back, we shouted and yelled at the top of our voices, and begged  them to continue. We wanted the barrage of smashing riffs and hammering growls to hit us as hard as possible, we wanted the acoustic passages to mesmerize us and we wanted the stage presence of Mikeal to enthrall us for the rest of the night. At least I wanted more. And come back they did. With a bang. Finally, “Deliverance” struck us all. Alright they fumbled a bit, but “Deliverance” was all that mattered to me. Fuck. “Deliverance”. Signed off in Peace.

Now what made me say that I was dis-satisfied with them is that I have so many favourites, close to 50 odd songs, that would have easily left out any 40 and leave they did. Innumerous songs. “Blackwater Park” should have been palyed, as should have countless other Opeth songs. But I think that is the hallmark of an Opeth performance, that is the hallmark of Opeth’s history and that is Opeth’s legacy.

I want to write more. I want to relive that night. but for now, I am too spellbound to be able to write anything. In the name of Opeth, I trust. All I know is that Peter was very good, but Frederick is brilliant; Lopez was perhaps the best fit for Opeth and Axe, thought slightly different, complements the band well; Per was thoroughly entertaining and creative and his absence will be felt; Mendez is as truthful to his music as ever. Mikael is absolutely DIVINE.

Long Live Opeth. Long Live Opeth. Long Live Opeth.

The Marathon Dusk (reprised)

Towards the close of the evening, a tired traveler desires nothing more than a peaceful exile. There is always hours waiting to feed on him, always the constancy of purpose that slowly grows all too large on him. Somewhere in the midst of all this, he buries the satisfaction that erupts from the day's essays, and calmly lays to rest all that is done and dusted. There are always greener pastures, lesser mortals and idler moments. A walk down the memory lane is not a bad idea for him, for a the traveler has nothing but impressions of what once was, that blow into his face, filling up the chapped lips and calming the furrowed forehead. Within these solitary confines, he builds his own mansion, a place so distanced from the trifles of this world and the idea that is purposefully built on the premise of seclusion. While all that travels alongside him sojourns in that figment of his imagination, some silhouettes continue eluding his capture. En-route, he battles day in and day out, each day, to preserve his creation from the unrelenting examination from the daylight; day in and day out he strives to catch up with them, sit down in a tete-a-tete with them, and how he just runs out if time. It is a burden, definitely, carrying the exact same concoction, but a burden he gladly bears the weight of. There is no refuge from memory in this world, they say; in nothing else is one richer, in nothing else poorer.

"...because you are sure you never can tell..." The song played listlessly in his ears. The visibility was growing fainter with the light. The glaze of the dust-smitten sun was no better than the subway bulb he was standing beneath. The sharply outlined form of a twosome slowly broke into a vision, resembling that of a wet stratosphere. There were no more shadows stamped on the asphalt beneath. His sandstone mansion had survived one more day of gruesome battle against the array of sun rays and the sun, finally, was forced to retire. The mauve was swallowed by the leaden sky, the wait still azure.

“You can take my overcoat if it comforts you.”

“No, thanks, I think I am doing fine.”

“So you have not been here recently?”

“Does it make a difference to you?”

“I expected an answer.”

“… (blank)…”

“I did not know silence was still in vogue.”

Sharp. Stinging. Memories. Everything seems to bite back in disgust. Preserving things as they were might not be all that good an idea. Not all memories are pleasant and not everything is averse to change. But the good thing about relations and emotions is that they leave you with memories, pleasant and scarring. For a traveler, the pleasant ones are summoned more often than the more irksome ones. A raconteur finds solace in reprising the more ambiguous reminiscences. The underlying mordancy of his memory was the unaltered play of events that unfolded when he met her. Every act is on a fresh slate, and every action that elicits some reaction is untouched by the past and remains free from the infection of hope for the future, was what he has reasoned out for the way life presented itself to him. And somehow, he sees everything decaying, robbed of its very premise by the cruelty of the precipitating memory.

No. There are better avenues to bury oneself than a displeasing thought. The demonic resurrection of that phantom gets even harder to ignore once you start ignoring it. But there is always the subterfuge of that quaint sense of longing one experiences at this juncture.

Sonnet X : The Apology

And thus, for ever lasting peace to you I swear
And unto death, in tormenting guilt undertake
The vow, the solemn word that never shall I share
My happiness, my deference you so deem fake


And so I will not admire your graceful dance
And neither would I wonder at your knowledge bank
But silently, shed tears and keep looking askance
When ravens, on you, drop their shit and mongrels flank


Or when you trip in gleaming shoes, or dress hip hop
Or when you count the times a person goes to wash
I vouch, shall I not be amused, but instead drop
My head, and acknowledge the kill of your panache


With this covenant I sign off, and with this clause
Now do me good and be mindful of these faux pas 

Sonnet IX : Chair in the moonlight

Behold! there stands, in solitary bliss

A geometric grace, though laden with grief

Jilted with time, it yearns to reminisce

How four of its legs once seated the fief.

Hours in throes, evil moon does rejoice
Sinister, impales all with wax of its light
Hapless cathedra, it has but no choice
Naked, it wears on the plague of the night.


So walks in a rowdy brat, drunken too deep
To notice the desolate chair, to find
A step all too proper, he tumbles a heap
The creaking wood breaks, as he breaks a wind


He walks on non-chalant, reminding my stare
The moon's just the moon, the chair just a chair

Untitled

Are you upset about something? Or rather, pre-occupied with something?


Huh?


I thought a question elicits an answer, and not a “Huh”


Ummm sort of..


OK


Pre occupied


And something that keeps you pre-occupied disturbs you as well, upsets you as well?


Yes it does…very disturbing


I understand...How do you think are you faring on this front...coping with this difficult thought?


Nothing is helping…talking about it will not help…neither will asking why…


I think silence is the only refuge then


But I cannot help wondering…it's unusual I look so calm…and 
I have a hurricane of thoughts in my head...


I would still say that nothing is unusual...had it been nothing and still the hint of a storm in your head, I would have called it unusual for you…but if there are thoughts, they are basically emotions swirling up there


They are...so many of them...and I am not able to sort them out as well..


I do not know in what manner things have brewed up, but I am sure you will get over the disturbing time. Would it help, filtering the thoughts...they would still be there, right?


They might stay.. Oh I don't know…you know what I usually do when I'm so confused? I work... It keeps me from going insane


If keeping quiet helps, I would leave it there


Oh no...I wish I could sort things out enough to get your opinion…


I know I am being "wise" for no reason. Yeah...I am sorry


Sorry? Among the two of us, u r definitely the wiser one :-)


Oh no...I meant I am sorry for thrusting my opinion onto you when you are wise enough to sort them out yourself


U don't have to be... Haven't I always welcomed your wisdom? ;)


Ok...you carry on with your thoughts. Indeed...it is a wonderful world!