Home.

I may walk down that unnamed road again,
meet those strange faces too.
Or maybe,I'll just stand and look-
at the raindrops drawing patterns on my windowpane.
Maybe I'll see myself on the glass then-
and maybe I'll cry or just silently live the pain.
Just when I'll be down and blue,
a lone raindrop would land on my cheek.
Memories will come rushing by,and
I'll be reminded of you.
Even as the world goes wild,I shall be in peace.
In you I shall find a muse,
in you-a refuge...

P.S: lousy poetry.kindly excuse.

and here's INGY....*drumroll*

yes,that's the best thing about the new year...
p.s: yeah,i am jobless...so there's a new post below this :)

kick ass

right when you think life is going on an ok-ish track,a short kick(with spiked football boots which feel like pins) lands up-right on your ass.
what a "kick ass" start to the new year!
nothing much to write,but dude my ass is an ass and was never meant to a pincushion.i can go on with my sad tale of an important body part transforming into something painful...but who the heck is listening?
just one note-there are people with better...umm..assets,better lives...go prick them.at this juncture i'm compelled to induce the age old question-"why me??!".even i deserve to sit on the couch of life comfortably,so why use mine for your pincushion?
and being the super optimist that i am,i end with hope that if i am,after all,life's "chosen one",the pins remain pins and never become the "achhla baash" we Bengalis are so accustomed to.

p.s: an "achhla baash" is a bamboo pole stripped of its green bark.there's no way i can explain the euphemism it holds through a blog.just ask the next Bengali in sight-he/she shall be too happy to help you out.with the explaining part and the giving part,as well.

The Year That Was

First things first...I find 31^st December highly overrated. Probably because I always end up spending it in the lousiest way possible-feeling like shit myself and crying without any reason whatsoever. Each year ends with me claiming that “this was the lousiest 31^st”, but I’m disillusioned, without fail, in the end of the next year.

Coming back to the topic...The Year That Was.

I turned 18 and passed my boards (Phew! Thank God) and then I left home-with tears and feeling like an uprooted plant.

The plant never found its roots back, but, in a real freak of nature, grew up. I learnt how to not cry over the phone even when I was dying to, I learnt you never have friends-you only think you have them. With so much of learning cramming up my little head, I had to grow up-into a person who broke away from the walls 18 years at home had built. I fought my demons-at least, tried to.

This year marked a year of meeting the most important person in my life. We’ve been through a lot of shit, probably more than we ever dreamt of. But we pulled through it all safely and still continue to create moments of magic which will go on and become the most cherished memories of our lives.

I lost friends and (hopefully) met some new ones. I lost hope that everything will be fine, because they never will be. I lost my belief that after fifteen years of togetherness, ties and bonds will remain the same. They don’t.

And yes, I lost my purse. Twice. My debit card. Once (thankfully!).And my ring (and then, got two new ones)!

In spite of the slaps, the drunken brawls, the high billirubin level and the sinking physics marks, I’m glad this year turned out the way it did. I learnt to live-on my own, without people whom I thought I can’t live without.

Thanks. For teaching me to look beyond familiar faces for answers to questions I never dared to ask before, and for letting me add on to my blue confetti dream...

So here I end, with eyes full of dreams which strive for fulfillment and a mind full of hopes that things don’t get any worse.

To anyone who’s wasting time reading this...Have a great year ahead!

P.S: Here’s to Ingy...the new kid on the block-the last drop of life which fell on a dying year...

winters.

Winters do something to you...whether it’s those five extra minutes you crave to stay under the quilt or the run you want to run to feel a tad bit warmer, winters bring in times which are not lived otherwise.

Winter, for me, has always marked its arrival with the smell of naphthalene balls mingling with the smell of woolens locked up over a year. Like the countless mufflers and stoles, memories come flooding out-memories long forgotten, memories recently lived and memories that will never be lived again...

I don’t know whether it’s just me, but I find colours growing brighter during the winters-the proofs to which are the vegetable markets. The violet of the brinjals, the green of the cabbage-they all grow brighter. Don’t they?

Winters got me my first blazer, my first puff of cigarettes, my first sip of alcohol, my first baking experience and my first gift from Santa! The waft of freshly fried Koraishutir Kochuri, the candy floss in the zoo which melted in my mouth, the man who sells Joynogorer Mowa and the Kashmiri shawlwallahs...tiles which make up the mosaic of my winter memories.

The Nahoum’s Plum Cake with all its glory, the Park Street Santa who never runs out of Éclairs, the streamers on the Flury’s glass walls...I can’t really tell when my winter memories mingle with my Christmas memories and make up the two inseparable faces of the coin which I call “Winter Memories”. The fake Christmas tree at home which is decked up in trinkets every year, the happy Santa whose sack overflows with bright boxes...pieces of childhood which refuse to be put under the spell of Oblivion. Our house doesn’t have a fireplace, but Santa did come visiting every year. No, I never caught a glimpse of red and white hurrying past my bed, but I always found a brightly packaged gift (which always had a note addressed to me, in a handwriting resembling my mother’s)-next to my tree which shined in all its glory-complete with fake cotton wool snow.

In this book of memories, I added a chapter this year-unimaginatively titled “Delhi” .the two degree nights, the four degree mornings; the thick blanket of fog over my college froze my bones which thawed with a sip of the college café noodle soup. The new winter clothes from Sarojini, the draught that slapped my face in the auto, the striped socks, my college sweatshirt-they all added to a major part of my “growing up”.

But no matter how old I grow, I know that some Santa is always looking at me from his igloo with Rudolf by his side, and there’s no way I’m going to believe the “truth” behind the myth. And I shudder to think of the day when the walk down New Market in its Christmas look will stop creating the magic it’s always played on me...

Some places are meant to be Neverlands forever and it’s up to them to bring out the Peter Pan in all of us...for all the winters to come.

P.S: Merry Christmas to all of you, have a great year ahead...

home...here i am

"I'll be home for Christmas
You can count on me
Please have some snow and mistletoe
And presents by the tree..."

i fell down and cut my knee.quite a deep cut.
the dettol burnt the wound.the blood stained my tweed skirt.
i sat through mill on the floss as my socks got wet.
i didnt cry.
the tetanus pinched my skin,the cotton soaked the blood.
i hailed the auto.it stopped at IHC.
the plays that day were good.performance went fine.
the claps felt good,but my knee hurt.
i didnt cry.
walked in at 11.my room was dark.
the night was cold,so was my dinner.
i looked down from the terrace-not a car on the street.
no one spoke.cigarette smoke filled the air.
i cried,i cried,i cried.

fevered ramblings

there i was.writhing in pain in someone else's bed-looking up at the ceiling of someone else's house.the fever split my head and i cried-hoping someone would listen.anyone.
hoping someone would come and put that palm on my forehead,say something to ease the pain.the tears made it even more unbearable,i couldn't get the sleep i so needed.
i called him up.once,twice,thrice.this time he shouted.there's only so much a man can take.
i couldn't go on like that...in an alien land,with a throbbing head,with a burning body.
i remembered what she had written in my diary:
"i'm sure we will always stay this way.even though you're such a chatterbox,you say it best when you nothing at all."...and here i was-crying in pain,howling for some human form by my side-tired of relating my pain to the walls.couldn't she hear me this time?what happened to the promises?forgotten with the boxes of shared tiffin?
out of sight,out of mind?well,maybe.maybe distance IS too strong an opponent for love....
it's amazing how philosophical you can get with a 100+ temperature.of the many things that you realise,the foremost is the fact that nothing stays-love,friendship,promises...nothing.
you begin to find the truth in the age old statement of man being an island.waves come,waves go...the water flows across leaving behind faint trails which get hidden under the sands of time.the waves come again,drench the island with life...and leave.this goes on till there is no island anymore.just one whole expanse of sea-no land in sight,no life around-just an endless and eternal ring of silence....
"...Then the busy years went rushing by us-
we lost our starry notions on the way.
if by chance i'd see you in the tavern,
we'd smile at one another and we'd say,
those were the days,my friend-
we thought they'd never end..."
~Bobby Vinton

that thing i did...

Aisi Rimjhim Aisi Puhaaren

Aisi Hi Thi Barsaat

The sky turned a steel grey,

The clouds had something to say…

The winds tried playing with my hair,

It may rain hard here…

Or leave behind just a fond tear….

Khud Se Judaa Aur Jug Se Paraaye

Hum Dono The Saath

We walked together-our fingers searching for eternity,

Our hearts showed us the way to serenity….

We drank with our eyes-the red wine from love’s grail,

Our eyes met, our desires set sail-

Just the beginning of our tale…

Phir Se Woh Saawan Ab Kyon Na Aaye

It hurts only when I breathe…

Shattering of our blue confetti dream,

Fading away of our little world into the blinding beam.

It rains again today-

The clouds again have something to say….

They cry on me-drenching me with their pain….

Din Dhal Jaye Par Raat Na Aaye…….

P.S:this is something i used to do long time back,i used to take paragraphs of some of my favourite songs and then try creating poetry with what the lines meant to me...this one's from "Guide"

the home coming...

the first step on the city's tarmac and i knew i was home...
i knew that beyond that wall,everyone speaks my language...
i knew that the faces which will greet me will have smiles...
i knew the taxis would be yellow ambassadors instead of those black and yellow monsters back there...
i knew phuchka will be called "phuchka" and not "golgappa"...
i knew "adda" will no more just another "bong" word uttered by those who come from "cal"...
i knew i would be sleeping on my bed...after what seems like an eternity...
its crazy how you take things for granted...
your bed,your room...and even your WC...this is when you realise their worth!
i am back...to where i belong...
and yes,hong kong restaurant got a new banner :)...
and lords' is all done up with airtel ads!

Paper

Colours.Shapes.They make life what it is.
The huge rectangular navy blue sky rained that night.
Colourless drops of hope.
Felt like heaven,or a lot like it.
Our grey city was bathed by the neons that evening.
Me in green.You in crimson.
Little square taxis and long blue buses stopped to see us by.
Smiles were smiled,Zimmerman signed-
On a white cylinder in a white box.
Sands of time drew a shape-
On the land we stand on.
Today,that circle is complete again,
And we are under the same sky.
Blue winged butterflies dance on our palms-
Drawing white lines of dreams-old and new,
And we are glad that,now,they're all true.