Eto chaoa niye kotha jai?

It's been a long time since I've have been struggling to express myself. How can one express oneself coherently if one's head is a mess of jumbled thoughts? I know, I know, writing is the only way out. Writing incoherently if necessary. I'll do that one of these days. Right now, I'll just share this song and say, "What she said."

…There is a road, no simple highway

Between the dawn and the dark of night

And if you go no one may follow

That path is for your steps alone…

Silly Midnight Musing about a Song

A few days ago, I was on a bus when this song floated out of the speakers. Automatic smile across my face. There is something about these songs which tenderly bless the even more tender woman in the song. What makes it even more special is Rafi's voice caressing your ears. Naazuk words made even more naazuk. Nothing can smoothen your ruffled feathers at the end of a rough day like this song. I know I am exaggerating, but it really is a lovely song.

Like many of the songs of the 1960s, this is one of the songs I heard a countless number of times before actually seeing its picturization in the movie. As usual, once you see the picturization, the quaintness of the song unfolds. It's only when I saw it that I noticed that the song starts with soft regular guitar strumming. Why so? Because there is not a single guitar in that scene! Now, that's not unusual in a Bollywood movie, but a guitar replaced by a sitar which the actor is not even playing? Well. And then you notice that the ambiance that the intro creates is nothing like the scene in the move. It's supposed to be a song about a singer serenading a princess in an ancient royal court. Thankfully, as the song goes on, you realize that it does not jar that much because there is actually a lot of sitar playing in the song and you go, "Hmm. Guitar and sitar. Interesting combination."

The songs of that period had a certain lilting quality, which my mother describes as "songs which make your heart fly." She says new songs don't have that power. This is a song which reminds one of flowers under the open sky, and for some reason, also reminds me of moonlight. At the same time, it does not quite gel with that imagery which I'm calling romantic because I can't think of a better word. The sitar makes it sound too royal for that. Really, what a strange mixture of images in my head. When he sings "Naazuk ho naaz se bhi..." I imagine Saira Banu or maybe Sharmila Tagore walking in a garden in a saree or a salwar kameez, playing with her plait. And let me also add a Shammi Kapoor following her around. But then the really complicated sitar and the powerful tabla playing in teentaal takes my mind straight to a Mughal-e-Azam type of scene.

Anyway, maybe I should actually stop dissecting this song. No need to spoil the memory of that bus trip when I gazed dreamily at the gulmohar against the blue sky and thought, "Ah! Bless the driver. He's got good taste."

Haiku: Red

water on petals
pearl upon a bleeding heart
throbbing song of spring

Haiku series: Blue

flows out like lifeblood

a languid soul spilling out

a pool of desires

like a lotus bud

eagerly waiting to bloom

tenderly restless

dreams forgotten

lost in a chaos of voices

drowning my own

caught in a deluge
I'm losing sight of the shore
half wishing to drown

rainfall upon leaves

soft footfalls on wet pavements

silence in my soul

... a friend says, blue is the colour of December.
  
  ... "It's blue. Blue is the colour of love." -Disco Pigs

For Pt. Ravi Shankar

dragonflies dancing

sitar notes sparkling like water

soundtrack of our lives

Winter in Delhi

A cold rainy day.
No thunderous drama in the sky
Just pale grey clouds weeping,
Moaning as winter creeps into
My rain soaked soul.

On dreary evenings

Ever since I woke up this morning, an incident from Brecht's play the "Good Person of Szechwan" is coming to my mind. The one where Shen Teh tries to stop Sun from committing suicide. Sun is trying to hang himself from the branch of a tree, and Shen Teh comes and tries to distract him. He asks her why she is so eager to stop him from killing himself and she says,

"It frightens me. I'm sure you only felt like that because the evening's so dreary.
In our country
There should be no dreary evenings
Or tall bridges over rivers
Even the hour between night and morning
And the whole winter season too, that is dangerous.
For in the face of misery
Only a little is needed
Before men start throwing
Their unbearable life away."

Delhi is such a dreary city, it takes courage to wake up in the morning and face the world. Perhaps all cities are like that. Perhaps life is like that. It's not often that a Shen Teh comes in to distract a Sun from the dreariness of life. Most of the time it's just someone crying out into the dark night, unseen, unheard.

Golden autumn sun

Playing on my eyelashes

Gone in a moment

Sweet songs floating in

Speak to me of tender love

Linger in silence.

Aami chini go chini tomare

My take on Rabi Thakur's song. (An Assamese inspired to translate a Bengali poem):

I know you, oh yes, I know you,

Maiden from a far off land;

You live beyond the oceans,

O maiden far away.

I’ve seen you in the autumn mornings,

Seen you in the summer evenings,

I’ve seen you, within my heart,

O maiden far away.

I've lent my ear to the skies

And I have heard your songs;

And I've offered to you my soul,

O maiden far away.

My travels have come to an end,

I've arrived in this new land,

A guest standing at your door,

O maiden far away.

I know you, oh yes, I know you,

Maiden of a foreign land;

You live beyond the oceans,

O maiden far away.

Yeh Duniya Agar Mil Bhi Jaye To Kya Hai?

This world of palaces, thrones and crowns
This world, the enemy of humanity
This world which hungers for riches
So what if I were to win this world?

Each body maimed, each soul thirsty
Confused eyes, sorrowful hearts
Is this a world or is it chaos?
So what if I were to win this world?

Here we are nothing but toys
This is a world of dead idols
Here even death is cheaper than life
So what if I were to win this world?

Youth wanders like a sinner
Young bodies dress up for sale
Here love is nothing but a business
So what if I were to win this world?

This world where man is nothing,
Love is nothing, friendship nothing
Where love means nothing at all
So what if I were to win this world?

Burn it, burn it
Burn it to ashes. 
It's your world. 
Keep it for yourself. 
Do whatever you want with it. 
Take it away,
Take it out of my sight.
I don't want it. 
It's your world. 
I don't want it. 
How would it matter? 
If I were to win the world?

Have you been writing?

You ask me

If I've been writing.

Well, kind of.

What do you do

When something is, so to say,

At the tip of your pen?

You write.

You write everything but that.

You search for it

In every line,

Every gap, every curve,

Every comma, every period.

They say,

Life is what happens

When you plan other things.

If that is true,

Then yes, I am writing.

Well, kind of.

Traces

It was lying there.
Hiding among the pages
Of an old xerox copy,
A dusty yellow envelope.

How is it possible?
Hadn't I rummaged every corner
Of every trunk, every drawer?
Box of gifts
Gloriously flung into the garbage dump;
Green coffee mug
Deliberately smashed to smithereens
On my hostel floor;
Black pullover
Deliciously cut up into pieces
So no one would have to wear it again;
Every tiny little trinket
Hunted down, mutilated, destroyed.
And now this.

Remove every trace.
That's what she said.
Remove every trace
And all will be well again.

So I set it on fire.
One page at a time.
I watched it burn
Till the red embers turned black.
Like they do in the movies.
A proper ceremony.
A trace removing ceremony,
With maudlin violins
As background music.

One more trace removed.
So how many more to go
Till all is well again?

Taking a Stand

One of my favourite expressions is "l'esprit d'escalier" or "staircase wit", obviously because I happen to be an excellent example of this kind of wit. Except that in my case, that wonderful comeback doesn't always come at the bottom of the stairs, but waits till years have passed by and everyone is on the verge of forgetting that conversation. The good thing is that it often comes to me in the form of poetry. So here is another instance of my absolutely sparkling staircase wit! Or rather, the-decade-after wit.


You tell me
That I'm weak
And so I can't be yours.
I've never learned
To take a stand
And so I can't be yours.
A ready-made feminist:
That's what you want.
Ready-made and fitted
To suit your demands.

I know I'm not the one
You are looking for.
Not quite a feminist,
And far from ready-made
Or well-fitted
To take ready-made stands
On your behalf.
No, no, that's not me.
A bit unsure and lost,
Groping around,
Forever searching
For a firm footing,
And forever digging
At its very foundations.
That's more like me.
Yes, I know I can't be yours.

You tell me
That I'm weak
And I can't take a stand.
You tell me
That I'll learn, but for now,
I just don't make the cut.
But what would you do
If I finally learnt
How to throw it all away,
And took a stand
Pointing my finger at you?

Procrastination

I know.
At the core
Of all this commotion
There is silence.
Silence that soothes
As soft as moonlight
Silence that scorches
As hard as the desert sun.
It scares me.
So I skim at the surface,
Splashing around with the waves
Adding to the clamour,
Crowding my brain
With a cacophony of voices.
But how long?

Like a dewdrop

Falling soft and silent

As someone drifts

Into the world of dreams,

I whisper

Into the dark night

Unseen, unheard.

On writer's block and other things

Of late, I've been suffering from a severe case of writer's block and I've been feeling nervous about it (not that I'm much of a writer, but still...) Horrible thoughts have crossed my mind. Is this the end of my writing streak? Am I running out of things to write about? Did I have only so many poems in me? Am I like a one movie actor? Well, I've decided to take desperate measures, to overhaul my way of functioning. I've been doing some research, looking up websites on writer's block, reading what great writers have to say about writing, and have finally ended up with the idea of scribbling in secret notebooks for my own joy. 


Kerouac in his "Belief and Technique for Modern Prose" says, among other things, that you should have "scribbled secret notebooks, and wild typewritten pages, for yr own joy." I know he's talking about prose, but a lot of what he says is true of other forms of writing too. And at this point, the reader will probably say, "Duh! That's obvious! You mean you didn't have any scribbled notes?" Well sometimes, as one goes through life, one needs to be reminded of the most basic, obvious rules, what with the world changing so rapidly. And Kerouac helps a lot with that. Always go back to it if you feel lost. Have you missed out something? I had. I did have typewritten, or rather, computerwritten pages, but I no longer had too many scribbled notes. The notes I had were the ones I scribbled at times when I didn't have the computer around me. Now I have realized, they are both indispensable. One can't replace the other. The feeling of having a pen in your hands and drawing out letters on a hard surface cannot be the same as pressing keys. The very pace of your thoughts changes when you start using a pen. And this may be taking things too literally, but maybe the typewriter can't be replaced by the computer either. The typewriter has a different tactile quality and the very force required to press down the keys so that they can make an impression on paper must surely affect the process of writing. The noise of an old rackety typewriter is irreplaceable too. The experience of typing things that appear on the screen and come out on paper only if you print them out is very different from that of typing things that are instantly spewed out by the typewriter in concrete form. And I love the fact that Kerouac actually typed on long rolls of paper instead of sheets, like a long road. MS Word does create the virtual impression of typing on a long roll, but seeing this loooong black and white roll of paper oozing out of the typewriter is definitely not the same as seeing only five inches of that roll appear on the screen as you scroll up and down. The link between life and art is completely destroyed by the process of typing on a computer.


Now, why did it take so long for me to realize that? Blame technology for it. I was not this dumb when I was younger. There was a time when I was suspicious of computers and refused to type my papers directly on MS Word. Moreover, I had this favourite pen that my father gifted me, and there was a time when I was terribly dependent on it. My ideas would flow only if I used that particular pen. I remember there were so many times when I'd misplace it and spend hours looking for it, refusing to resort to another one. And here I am, transformed into this techno-savvy writer who only types on the computer and sometimes, even directly on the blog (you see, there was a time when I used to write on MS Word and then paste my writings onto the blog). I don't know how and when this happened. I just vaguely remember 'wise' people telling me to get used to technology, learn to process information on the computer, because soon, there will be nothing available outside the virtual world. I don't blame these 'wise' people. I half agreed with them too. But now I wonder, is the current of history so powerful that we can't determine the way it goes while we are a part of it? Surely we can keep alive the physical side of life. There is still so much world out there.


This blog is taking a toll on me too. Although I know that just a handful of people read this blog, writing on a public forum does make you a wee bit self-conscious. My brain has probably frozen out of self-consciousness. I need a place to write in private, where nobody can see how my mind works. Right now, I feel as if the private space between me and the computer is being intruded upon by these invisible people who glance at what I write and pass on to other blogs because it doesn't impress them. I am paralyzed by the need to impress. It's funny, this process of writing. You want people to read and appreciate what you write, but you can't write if you know they are reading what you write. Another thing Kerouac says, and this is a beauty: "something that you feel will find its own form." (I'm taking it out of context, and my interpretation might contradict the rest of the things he says, but I like to see it this way too.) Maybe the things I'm feeling right now are in the process of finding a form other than a blog entry or a poem. Maybe the form they want is a simple diary entry or a scrawl at the corner of a page in a dogeared notebook. Then so be it. Let them find their own forms. I won't try to force them into a poem or a story or an essay.


So I have started scribbling once again, with my favourite old pen on a beautiful notebook I bought the other day. A beautiful notebook with Madhubani paintings on the cover. My favourite pen, by the way, is a Parker fountain pen. There is a story behind this pen. My father gave it to me on my birthday and told me how, as a child, he saw his own father using a similar Parker pen. My grandfather died when my father was really young, so it must be a memory my father treasures. And he told me he always wished for a pen like that, which is why he wanted me to have one. Yes, a lot of sentiments attached to that one tiny black pen.


To end this post on a less sentimental note, I must say, I love starting new notebooks. Starting a new MS Word document is nothing compared to the joy of putting your own mark on a fresh white first page. And if your handwriting is as untidy as mine, and if you are as clumsy as I am with fountain pens, well then it's just the beginning of a gloriously, deliciously scrawly and blotchy journey.

When the king goes down the street

A young band called ‘Rain of Heart’ has come up with a sad song about bomb blasts in Assam. This translation is an acknowledgement of how much I like it. Many thanks to the person who introduced me to this song….

When the king goes down the street

Happily blowing his siren,

A hungry man on the sidewalk

Runs and hides in a dustbin.

Sleepless lies the dying city,

Shopping malls, discos and bars;

False men, false times, false love:

The birth of a hollow civilization.

O mother! O father! O my children!

In this future of sooty gunpowder,

Nothing seems to make any sense;
The foxes have invaded the borders,

Why is Lachit's sword fast asleep?

A youth lies in a pool of blood

His beloved’s message on his mobile;

The lifeless body of someone’s sister,

The burnt remains of someone’s brother.

O mother! O father! O my children!

When the king goes down the street

Happily blowing his siren,

A hungry man on the sidewalk

Runs and hides in a dustbin.

Invigilators and examinees

There,

Where the silence
Is earth-shattering,

With the scratchings

Of your scrawling pens,

With a commotion of voices

Inside brains

Cluttered
With last night’s crammings,

There,

We will meet

At the appointed hour
Like enemies
On two sides
Of a dusty old desk—

My tryst with eternal boredom!

Raijei Bhaoriya: People are the Players

A Song by Bhupen Hazarika


People are the players
And the world is a stage.
What role do you want to play?
Come, there's no time to lose.


No need for a rehearsal
No need for costumes.
Just come out naked.
Tie your own towels 
Around your hungry bellies
And come out.
That's the way
To make a colourful play.


It's time to ask the director,
How long will you cheat us
With the mask on your face
And your dramatic techniques.


No need for sweet dialogues;
Say it with your screams.
Fight the corrupt men
With your consciousness
And become worthy heroes.
That's the way
To make a colourful play.
What role do you want to play?
Come on! There's no time to lose!