words have come and words have gone..
now,they just fail me.

the post pujo post

like each year,this year, too, the pujos went past in a blink of an eye...it's kind of crazy how we wait with baited breath for these 5 days and they just zoom past like a spoilt brat who has just laid his hands on his dad's car!
the other day,we were discussing which day of the pujos we love the best...i said "shoptomi" because that's the day when everyone is filled up with joy at the onset of the pujos.ashtami becomes too hectic with anjali and family meals and there hasn't been one nobomi when i haven't felt down.
also this puja,i realised i am getting more and more claustrophobic and just the thought of standing amongst crowds,gives me jitters.the only trip i made to maddox this year was in the morning and i couldnt be happier.each time i drove past that place,i saw the crowd and exclaimed how it was getting worse with each year.even when we all started dancing last evening before the bhashan,i found it difficult to stand amidst the damp smell of dhuno,sweat and alcohol.
but if there's something i love about the pujos,it's the dhunuchi naach...i think words like "beautiful" were invented for things like this.the way the sublime smoke rises from that little clay vessel-painting fluid shapes across the night sky...and the way the dancer twirls around the vessel without dropping the coir inside,is nothing short of an art.i also love the sound of dhaak...way more than the "tasha" that plays during the bhashan.
i can just go on...but i guess it's best to keep some memories to yourself-the old friends' lunch,the 5 star lunch,the nagordolna ride...
sigh,all i can hope is "aashche bochhor abaar hobe!"
and before i forget,shubho bijoya to all of you .

i remember when i was much younger,i used to keep a diary-minute details of everything i did,went into it.
the first time i waxed,i wrote something describing the excruciating pain.
and when i got my cartilage pierced last saturday,i was reminded of that long forgotten entry and suddenly began to miss my diary...
the diary,like many other things,has been a part of the childhood i have grown out of.
it's almost been like a cloak which i happened to slip off when no one was noticing.
each time i'm reminded of some old memory..it's like finding some thread,of that old cloak,that was left behind.
when i was talking to a school friend a few days back and planning a visit to maddox,i remembered how i refused to leave the golf green pandal,as a kid when any world beyond golf green refused to exist for me!
when you find these threads,you almost begin to hope to sew back the old cloak and wear it again.
but then,we realise that maybe you could have the cloth back but the tailors have all gone far away-way beyond any distance our calls can reach.
we realise that,maybe,growing up isnt that great a deal after all.

p.s:this is a very impulsive post...the language isnt at its best usage.sorry!

Cotton

to you.for giving me the time of my life!


we met on a crowded street-
amidst a cacophony of honking cars.
and we watched the world pass by,
mixing coffee with fleeting hours.

we drew houses on an autumn afternoon-
on sheets of satin spread over the sky.
in the deep brown of our coffees,
i saw dreams coming to life in your eyes.

through rainy mornings and stormy nights,
the dreams strive,but they survive.
they plaster the walls of the house we drew;
the house believed to see us through...

scared

there are times when you dont believe your own ears and refuse to believe things you hear.today is one...
i really dont have words to describe the feeling of knowing that your favourite haunts are now washed with blood.i really cant describe the stiff feeling of relief over the fact that my sister and i werent at our favourite coffee shop this evening...
there are times when nothing matters except the fact that you're still alive.
weirdly enough,i was in an auto when all this happened...sharing my fear with a muslim auto driver,who was getting frantic calls from his family just as i was.just as that happened, i realised that hindus and muslims arent the ones who plant bombs...it's actually a question of human beings and monsters!i really hope he made his way to his home safely.
2 out of the 5 blasts happened within a kilometre of college-at M block market which also happens to be the place my friends and i go to kill time in between free periods and another 2 happened in CP which happens to be my favourite shopping place here.
i really cant define in words what i am going through as i watch fleeting images on the tv which dont register on my brain and get scared by the slightest loud sound around...i am worried for the friends whose phones are all unreachable and for the sister who cant get through the day without a coffee from DePaul's,relieved that i decided not to go shopping in Janpath today and worried that tomorrow might not be as lucky a day.
Lord,let there be peace.

failed attempts at poetry on a grey coloured day...

What is the point in singing today-
When songbirds lie dead in your head?
What is the point in dancing today-
When the rain clouds have all fled?

In the little sky between your fingers,
You write prose in stranger tongues-
And in the little blue patch on your palm,
You carry skeletons of love ballads unsung.

Your prose speaks of smiles-
Which gleamed like the torch Prometheus stole,
And your palm tells stories that the leaves left incomplete -
Before they got blown.

As the world is lulled to sleep today-
By the soft song of the newborn wind,
Let us not talk of the days lived-
Long ago in a light year now swept away clean.

For, what is the point in talking today-
When poetry has been long dead?
What is the point in living today-
When all our hearts have bled?

amazed!

i am amazed at myself today...
i managed to fall down again and sprain the right ankle for the umpteenth time.but that is not what amazed me...
this time i didnt cry.
the last time i fractured my toe,i remember having wept a river.
in a queer way,i am proud of myself today...
love makes u feel secure,no doubt, but it also makes you weak.
and being far away from the ones you love,makes you this rock which picks itself up and limps its way through a crowded street without holding onto any hand...
thank god,i think i am growing up.
atlast.

its crazy how we call ourselves independent today..
crazy because people still do what they are told-betraying years of education in an empowering environment,people forget they have a mind.
rubbishing all things we learn,we still love to be governed because we know that the world we live in-in the quietest corners of our heart is just in our heads...
in the real world,there is no holden caulfield really.
he never became independent of the trappings of the printed word bound by dog eared covers.

Update

i saw Hazaron Khwaishen Aisi today and have some major problems with the film!after having heard so many accounts of the Naxalbari movement from my Jethu,i felt the film was inadequate in translating into celluloid the real essence of the movement,and thus didnt quite live upto all the ravings i was subjected to,by my friends here.
guess the domestic realities of the movement for the people here and in Cal are very different-here it was just a small fraction of students in JNU who joined in but in Cal,there were thousands of homes,like mine,which saw their sons come back with cuts on their faces and bruised legs...
as i type this post,the MS Word software is drawing a red line beneath the word 'Naxalbari' and in a strange way,it is disturbing.i live in a house which is built on the land which is believed to have served as a dumping ground for bodies of the people who lost their lives in the movement,my childhood stories talked of how my uncle nearly lost his foot because a bomb happened to burst only a few metres away from him and today when i sit back recalling all this,i am told the word 'Naxalbari' isn't meant to be a word at all just because a group of American peabrains is uneducated enough to have never heard of something which changed the way my city looked...
i know,i am losing it but thank God for Amitav Ghosh and Shadow Lines-my eternal provider of solace!

My Bit

this is my contribution to the Spectators Special event by Blank Noise (See previous post for details):

The ride back home from school comprised an auto ride which we got to enjoy after standing in a queue for almost half an hour under the cruel Kolkata sun.
After one such wait,my friend (who is also a neighbour)and i finally sighted an auto which had only one seat lying vacant at the back.Refusing to wait in the sun any further,my friend decided to sit in the seat next to the driver (to his left) as i sat in that one vacant seat at the back.
Half way through the journey,i heard my friend asking the driver to keep his hands off her-to which he said,"brake lagatey gele ektu to gaye lagbei" (which roughly means,"if i have to apply brakes,there is bound to be some physical contact")
Believing it to be a mere accident,i didn't really pay much heed to the incident, until i saw the driver's hand brushing up against her chest-Once.Twice.Thrice. (This was when the auto was in motion and there wasn't any applying of brakes)
Somehow the only thing i could do after that was,to ask the auto to stop and get down along with my friend,even though we were still far from home...
So there we were,on the road again-roasting under the afternoon sun,walking silently down the road.as silent as i was in the auto,as silent as i shouldn't have been.

To Do

so how many times have you seen a sweaty hand climb up the back of the girl standing next to you in the metro,or a bus...or anywhere else?
...and what did you do after that?
slapped the man?
thanked god that it wasnt your back his hands were on?or your sister's?
or just turned away pretending that nothing really happened...
whatever you did,let Blank Noise know.
email them at blurtblanknoise@gmail.com before August 15th and let them know what role you have played as a third person witnessing some form of sexual harassment or the other.
the entries will be published in their blog at blog.blanknoise.org