Christmassy Overpourings

Ho! Ho! Hahahahee.

It's Christmas Eve. Its also a friend's wedding, another's third exam day and one far-off inconsequential pretend-relative's death anniversary.

But Ho! Ho! HO!

Its also a friend's bithday eve. He's going to be 2039 years old, I'm presuming.

Jesus is a good friend. he's not like Kris (Krishna) is to me, the high-five, butt-smacking, fart contest kind of friend, but Jesus is a special friend, nevertheless.

His last birthday, I had put presents under a tree, made cards for others, recieved cards, drank myself silly and said a brief 'Hi' to the stars, hoping my poetic gesture would convey my regards to the resident of the heavens.

At dot twelve, I ran to the tree with my Christmas spirited friends and we all hugged and sang, "Merry Christmas!" like indisciplined children and opened our gifts in a frenzy.
"This is the best Christmas, ever!" we chimed in synchrony.

Then, I realised.

There was a gift was Renee, there was a gift for Max, Tory, for Kari, for Dada, for Stiffy, for Daisy, for Dolly and it made the tree very full and its decorators very happy.

There was no gift for the birthday boy.

Jesus was right there. I couldn't see him, but I'm sure he was, next to every Christmas tree or every well deserved corner for one in the world. I'm not sure if he smiled an 'Its ok!' or showed me the finger, but it stayed with me.

This Christmas, I'm excited. VERY EXCITED!
I've got my decorated tree, and I've presents under it, too. Amongst the lot of little boxes of gift that will be lost by the 25th December, 2007, there's a little chit I know my reciever will never lose.

It says,

"Dear Jesus,

I'm sorry I get carried away with the reds, greens and carols of celebrating your day every year. I know you wanted nothing from us in return for the love you've given us, too. But this year, I want to give you something. Not much, but a trinket of my appreciation for being who you are. I'm going to give you my trust and my love. I promise you that everytime something goes wrong, I'm going to do the best I can to better the situation, and then I'm going to believe in my love for you and trust you will tell me what to do next. And if I go wrong, I will not be angry with you or God.

Happy Birthday, Jesus.

I love you!"

I'm sure he'll love my present. And the poor guy really should get more.

Merry Christmas, everybody!!!!

Anoxia

I've got irrational fears, too, you know.

For instance, I've always felt the next moment, I'll plop. I'll be dead. For no reason.
Just.. Game over.

I've tried to visualize what people behind me would do then. A gazillion tests, autopsies.. but no one will know how I died.

That's the fear. But there's more.. Probably a death wish.

I've always been fascinated with the sound the air makes, especially when you're racing down a highway at kill or die speed, and you can hear nothing but the wind spiraling into your ear.

I wonder what the air would've been like if it was human.
If she was human.
Air's definitely a she.

Why else would it come rushing down on you when you raced into it and play dead when you don't make a move towards it? Why else would it be ready to be inhaled knowing well it'd be exhaled, would fill a room and leave too, entering every time the doors opened, keep streaming in through spaces, in and out, out and in, and after all that ruckus, still be there all the time?

I've always believed I will be the air, someday. Not in its frantic indecisiveness, but in form. The former I've quite successfully achieved, without trying too hard.

The concept of death, is somewhere, too in your face. It just happens. BANG! POW! SWOOSH.... rigor mortis. How unvaliant!

For all the havoc I've created in others lives and in my own, the end of me can't be just froth and stiff veins.

So, I've decided I will not die.
I will just cease to exist.

Sometime, any time now, actually, I will just dissipate, evanesce into thin air. Like Maya memsaab, I will not die. I will just evaporate and I will float around for ever with no form or shape.

But then, I'll miss being an individual. And if I'm around floating about and no one really tries more than one autopsy, I'll be shattered. I'll feel extremely insignificant and unimportant, forgotten in the chaos of everyday life and worries. I guess that's what its like for the air, though.
But I'll still be around. I'll come rushing down on you when you race into me and play dead when you don't make a move towards me. I'll be inhaled knowing well I'll be exhaled, and will fill a room and leave too, enter every time the doors open, keep streaming in through spaces, in and out, out and in, and after all that ruckus, I'll still be there all the time.

You know what?
The air and I'll do just fine.

Ok, death! I'm ready!

Nothing means Nothing

Have you ever wondered why women say 'nothing'?

You're at dinner, you've had a nice day, you give bits of your experience to her. She seems down, uninterested and is torturing her dead chicken with her fork.

"You ok?"
"Yeah."
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."

Uh oh.

The moment a woman says 'nothing', you know the red naked man downstairs is polishing his pitchfork, kicking at his cauldron in ecstacy.

Nothing, is not even a real word. But how true is any other word to its derivation!'Nothing' means nothing!

But then again, do women mean it that way, really? I'm trying to find out myself, actually. I know women don't find it necessary to tell a partner or a potential anything about how they're feeling, unless it is the object in question that has donated in any way to the change in natural state.

And women can hide, if you think they cannot. A woman can show you, you are of no consequence to her moods, day, evening or life and go home and unconsciously run head on to the mirror to see what you last saw of her. A woman can show you she is troubled and know that frankly, its nothing she can't handle, though more often that not, its the other way round. (Sorry sisters, i didn't mean to spill our beans.. i'm just curious myself)

So theoretically, the object is disturbed and she has decided to show the object she is disturbed. A woman is always sure of herself. Once she has decided she cannot hold back, she will not. But to ensure the object is genuinely listening and genuinely cares, she has decided she will eventually, after a compulsary push that the object must deliver, speak.

"Nothing".

Nothing?

I also seem to have found a theory to that.

Situation 1:

Man and Woman in a restaurant.

Man: And then I... Are you ok?
Woman: Yes.
Man: Not again.
Man: No, you're not. What happened?
Woman: Nothing.
Man: Be calm, take a deep breath, ask again.. she'll tell you.. its inconsequential.. but she'll tell you..
Man: I know something's wrong, tell me.
Woman: Nothing, I told you.
Man: Ok. if you don't want to tell me, I'm fine with it.
Woman: What?!
Man: Well, you don't want to tell me..
Woman: No.. I do.. but..
Some mushy sounds
Man: Well, tell me.
Woman: I.. didn't like what you did last summer...

Result: Woman's got it off her chest. Man's glad she's gotten it over with. Goes back thinking - Woman! How unpredicatable!

Situation 2:

Man and Woman in a restaurant.

Man: And then I... Are you ok?
Woman: No.
Man: Wha...?!
Man: Oh. Eh.. What happened...?
Woman: I.. didn't like what you did last summer.

Result: Woman's got it off her chest. She's also mad. Man's glad she's gotten it over with. He's also mad.

I have no clue if I'm right, but I've tried both ways. And its not the women, I figured. Woman adapt, and say what they will knowing exactly the effect it will generate. I mean, seriously, women don't do that with other women! They get right to it!

Its the subject!

Or probably just nothing.

I hated everyone at 14

The world will tell all,
Yet will never be told.

Deeds will be forgotten,
Your sins carved in gold.

Don't tell a broken heart to heal when it can.
None know a broken heart but a broken man.

They shall pour till they cannot,
And their tears, they will dry.

They will build a tower of rage
And keep their fire alive.

Don't name their murder for the poetry of angst.
None but them know the words they had sang.

Anti, Matters.

I am very anti-drunk.
I hate their guts and the fact that they let themselves lose their mind over an inanimate glass of foul smelling rotten staple food of some third world country.

I hate the way they talk. How they develop an extreme urgency to let the world know who they are. How every sentence after Peg #3 and Excuse #57 must begin with "But, I.." And how every "I" will and must be stressed, italicized and underlined every single time because the listener must and should know who he/she is listening to.

I hate lone drunks, too.
I hate how they ridicule their existence by getting drunk staring at their ceiling/television/feet/computer screen/pets feeling miserable for needing to get drunk to kill time and find hope or scope for thought in being drunk staring at their ceiling/television/feet/computer screen/pets.

I'm probably also racist.
I am very anti-fairness cream advertising.
I hate how the dark girl is always rejected by the geeky looking, formal clothing clad bastard because she thinks he believes she's too plain. And he always looks like he'd rather marry her father. Or being fair to him, he probably hated the copious amounts of oil the director smeared on her face. Who'd want to marry an exhausted Arab oil ring?

No, that doesn't make sense. I'm very anti face wash.





I've just realised, I'm very anti, right now.


*Hic* to that.

My Lord in the attic.

"We'll manage." they apparently said, six years before my birth, when my grandparents asked my parents what they'd do about their unborn, unplanned (and yet unconcieved) child's to-be religion.

Ms. Mom and Mr. Dad belonged to different belief systems, and each was more in love with their respective religions than the other. Also, their measurement of love for religion was directly proportional to how much they hated the other religion they were marrying into.

When I was eight, every Friday, Dad dropped me at a large creepy gate which led to a narrow staircase to an old blue room where children moved rythmically to noice and reading what they didn't understand. "What does this mean?" I asked once, the result of which was one week of aching knuckles and bamboo ring marks. I blindly followed and believed.
On Saturday, mom dropped me to an organization dedicated to drowning children in undecipherable, sing-song chanting. "What does this mean?" I asked again, and recieved a horde of coded expletives and a letter to my mother, which resulted in losing out on my favorite side dish at dinner for a month. I blindly followed and believed.

Every Sunday, I was confused.

One day, at school, I was introduced to moral science class, where my teacher, a woman with angelic wings on her shoulders and a forked tail in her backside asked me to tell her what God was to me.

Oh, man.

I told her I knew there were two Gods who switched roles on Fridays and Saturdays. And on Sundays he was off duty.

The girl sitting next to me, who once a while treated me to her lunch, then invited me to attend a spiritual gathering on Sunday at her place.
I went.

They gave me sweets when they were done moaning.

MAN!

I blindly followed and believed.

So now, there was a different God for every weekend and weekly holiday of the Gulf. Also, everyone reiterated there was only one God.


One day, when I was sixteen and confused, I decided, "I will have a religion".
I discovered marijuana.

You know what? Ms. Mom and Mr. Dad were right.

They managed.

'Mama' Calling

I wish the Caller ID technology had never touched my life.

(Some polyphonic tone, would be lying if I said Tring Tring)

'Mama calling', my phone read, blinking at me brightly like a psycho killer would, I'm guessing.

'What did you eat?'

I knew that was coming. It came five times a day, everyday, for the six years I've been living away from my parents.

Probably, I wouldn't be this irritant if I didn't know who was calling. I'd just give into the call like you give into fate.

Look, don't get me wrong. I love her, I mean, its a biological liability. You can't help but love your mom. She'll nag, she'll bug, she'll even rearrange your furniture, but well, she's Mummy.

“What did you eat?'

I will not answer that phone. I will NOT answer that phone.

'Mama calling'
My phone was still blinking at me brightly like a psycho killer would.

I've tried to talk to her, you know.

I've said, “Mama, I'm not a kid anymore.. I mean.. I know you think I am.. But trust me, I can look after myself.. You needn't keep calling to find out where I am, or what I'm doing. Or what I ate! You've gotta trust me!”
“Okay, okay. I know. You had food?”

Once, my mom said, “You know, Rae, our phone bill's gone too high this month.”
MUHAAAHHAAAA!!!!!

“I know, Ma. You know what? Don't call me five times a day. Call me once. Or twice. Maybe in the morning and then once at night to begin with.. then we can cut down after that?”
“Why?”
“Your bill's high 'cos you keep calling me..”
“So?”

“No, mama, I mean we can cut on costs.. I mean, Even I can't pick your calls all the time.. I'm in a meeting.. or at work.. so, we'll speak twice a day..”

“Hmm.. What did you have for lunch?”

There comes a time when you realize you've moved on. You still love home, but its now your parents'. Mom and Dad are now individuals, they have names besides 'Mom' and 'Dad'. And you begin to consciously see how you are pretty much like them in many small, significant ways, whether you like it or not.

In case you're wondering, my phone was still blinking brightly at me, like a psycho killer would, probably.

Its sad. Sad for her because she loves me so much she can't let go. Sad for me because she loved me so much I realized I can love myself more. Sad because she's holding onto me so tight, I can't breathe anymore.

But, dammit, I love her. I can't stand giving her details of what my digestive system has been through since morning, but, maybe I should tell her she means a lot to me, and if she wants me to be the grown-up she keeps idolizing, she needs to let me grow up, by myself.

“Hi, ma.”
“What took you so long?”
“I didn't see my phone ring.”
“What nonsense! You didn't pick my call even in the afternoon!”
“I didn't see it.”
“Rae, you're being very careless with your excuses. What were you doing?”
“Nothing, mama.”
“Talk to me, Rae! You don't talk to me anymore!”

Damn.

“Mama, how many different things can I tell you in a span of two hours everyday? You call me five times!”

Shouldn't have used that tone.

“Sorry, mama. Just worked up.”

I was glad she'd probably ask me something else now. But NO!

“Hmm. You handle your issues. You're too big for me to tell you what to do. What did you eat?”

I hate the Caller ID.

I miss me

Today, I sat alone at my regular old coffee bar. By my table, was the one more often than not occupied by haunted children who never grew to be men, for over a year now.
I am usually accompanied by three friends and four coffees in my regular sessions that last for over three hours.
Today, I sat alone at my regular old coffee bar.

ordered my coffee before discovering it was already smiling at me with all its pleasant filtered aroma. I watched the froth of the morning's milk brew into my hot cup of caffeine and puzzled, I stared into the little hot bubbles that brimmed to the sides of the chipped ceramic cup. I counted one hundered and twenty two bubbles before I was bored. Again.

This place was familiar; my table, my cup, my broken chair, almost like how you carefully stepped to your right, groping in the dark or you knew you would bang into the red couch you insisted on having in the centre of the room, even when the lights were off.

I was comfortable, but uneasy.
I decided I had to stay to find out why. I am used to being alone in coffee shops, in bus stops, at home, in my head.. this was least different.

I realised I was missing something. I was missing someone. It wasn't my friends, those who accompany me and my four coffees everyday over arbid conversation. It wasn't the air, the sleeplessness, it was me. I missed myself.

The other side of me had gone off on a vacation with my ambition, my passions, obsessions for over a year now. I realised I missed my reason to be, who was off praying by a lake enveloped by mist by the stone of old temples.

What remained, was longing, life, and a chipped cup of now lukewarm coffee.

Kabab Magic

Five years ago, I washed into this city, lost in new freedom. I had no idea what it was going to be like from here on, and I was aware of the fact that I was never going back to what I thought was home. I remember walking down this dark street in Mohamaddin Block, canoped by trees and wires of light poles infested with bats, trying to find the main road, thinking to myself that the light at the end of this tunnel must belong to civilization.

It was seven, or so, and as I reached my destination, the light (which was far from blinding), the air around me suddenly smelt different. It was full of this divine aroma.. of my mother's pampering, somehow. What was it?! Oh, how my mind hath turned with no will! What was this smell.. the scent of love.. or life.. of GRILLED CHICKEN!

Like in a Disney movie, I turned around, I remember, flabbergasted something this heavenly could land right before my being on this dark and lonely evening. I can't remember what I was thinking.. but I walked to the establishment on my right. It was like a doll house. An open restaurant, with plastic chairs and tables set on the road, with nothing around it. Not a house, not shops, not another hotel in that space of 100 metres around. "My very own presonal oasis!" I thought, as I looked up to catch the neon sign that flashed in my eye.

Kabab Magic.

Like in a trance, I let my nose lead me the way in. I followed everyone around me to precision. I hypnotically checked the menu and registered the first thing I read. Then I hypnotically went to the counter and paid my Rs.25 for a Shavarma. Then I hypnotically went to my table, holding onto my little white coupon like it was my pardon from life imprisonment.

I watched in awe as the guy with a weird chef's hat flung the dough in the air, twirling it aroung, as it grew massive in size to plop onto a round cooking pan. It flew in the air, swirling like a space ship as everyone around watched him perform his dough-defying stunts.

When his naan/khuboos (still no idea what that was) cooked, he flung it to the guy next to him, and it landed exactly, I have to add, at the spot he most wanted it. This next man began to slice like a conductor in a concert, at his tandoor with two sharp, long knives in a frenzy, and chunks of meat, supple and fresh with green lime and hummus dropped onto a silver disc.

My shavarma brought to me, I hypnotically bit in. And then, i broke out of my trance only to land in a higher state of unconsciousness. It was an orgasm!

My memories of what happened after that, are very vague. I think i just went back home, content with not doing whatever I was supposed to and just surrendering to my nose and rumbling stomach.


Today, years later I passed by my haven for one night five years ago. I felt funny and I didn't know why, so I stopped by to figure. (Wallah! A poet is born!) Nothing much had changed, except that, the guy at the tandoor grew a white stubble now.. or was it always there? The trapeze artist didn't play with his dough like he did that night, either.

I followed the same ritual of buying my coupon (it was now for Rs.30) , and thenI took my prized roll and walked down the dark lane I once lived on. Trying hard to recollect what my thoughts must have been like that night, I realised with a smile in the dark that I was now free.

Walking down the lane to nowhere from nowhere, I had grown up, in some ways, perhaps, from that seventeen year old confused glutton to a twenty-two year old sure glutton. Home was where I wanted it to be, and right now, the canope of old trees and poles infested with bats suited me just fine.

Dark Chocolate

The most romantic of presents was always dark chocolate. I don't know why, it just was.
I decided when I was fifteen that I would fall in love with someone who gave me a box of assorted dark chocolate. I wonder why it would be assorted if everything in the box was dark chocolate.
I will turn twenty two in ten minutes. A ritual I've followed for years, I go twenty one years, twenty three hours and fifty minutes back in time.
I went past the first day of school when mom stood by the window and waved, wondering if I would cry in the school bus while I looked at her through the greasy window of the bus, excited about my new yellow lunch box.
The time dad bought me a new pink bicycle.
The time I sold its wheels so I didn't have to ride it.
My first crush.
My first kiss.
First job.
First love.
Second love.
Thi..
And so on.
I went past the time I stared into space last year, on my twenty first birthday. When twenty one years seemed a life lived long enough – I had nothing more to unlearn, nothing more to lose. I sat alone, stared blankly at my TV screen in the dark. I liked its play of light on the wall.
It was my birthday. I was alone, and it mattered. I didn't want people(come to think of it, there were no people) barging into my living room with streamers and pineapple cake, and I switched off my phone in all my senses because I wanted to be the first one to wish myself. Maybe I feared no one would call.
But suddenly, I didn't feel that way any more. I wanted another voice outside my physical self to say “Happy Birthday, Rae.” And it would be a generous topping if he also added, “I love you.”
But I loved no one, and that hurt more than no one loving me.
I switched on my phone. This year, someone was going to wish me. His voice would ring from outside my mind, outside my body. I sneered at time and jeered at the year. I had won! I'd conquered! I am a victorious twenty-two year...
Tring-tring!
“Hello?”
“Rae?”
“HI!!!” He remembers!
“What you doin'?”
“Nothing....!”
“Oh.”
Then he said he was in love.
I listened, as I imagined him with a ribbon and a bow around his neck.
Time and the past year came closer, fell on their backs, rolled on my floor and laughed, snorted and farted in ugly mockery.
The clock struck twelve. I was twenty two.
“Kay is so amazing!”
“Yes. I know.”
“She's.. Rae, God bless you for bringing her to me!”
“Hmm..”
“You seem sleepy.”
“Ah.. Yes.”
“OK. Good night then. And Rae, thanks. HAPPY BIRTHDAY! LOVE YA!”
Click.
I put the phone down, very slowly, almost carefully and reached for the remote control. I switched on my TV. I'd stored Cartoon Network on 11. The Brain told Pinky he had to concoct a potion to put humans to sleep so he could rule the world. He said he would mix the potion with ice cream so it would be lavishly consumed all over the planet.
I am still thinking, dark chocolate.

Mama was lying

Once upon a time,
summer was a fair.
Mud didn't kill you, and no one really cared.
Now we're all grown up.
All controlling, controlled and softer.
Is this what they meant when they said
Happily ever after?

Exiled

Silence is golden
Yet silence is still.
Time seems to linger with practised skill.
Not that I complain,
I'm not too agile.
It just gets lonely in my exile.

The Beginning

On another planet far, far away,
Where life prevailed like here
Green blue water rested on a white bay
And on it, stood a lonely seer.

He looked up high into the red of the sky
His arms were gold and dead.
“Forgive me, forgive us, make us undie!
Tis you who made us sin!” he said.

Crashing to the sand, he then realized
The end was near, it was time.
Then crashed his pain, sin and lies
His tears, soul and many minds.

The sky began to boil and simmer
Ready to drip into the seas
The dark of the red made him quiver, shiver,
Shudder the coming of release.

The human kind came at a lonely hour
When He felt all alone, marooned!
He had no one but Him, He was His lover
He was His friend, His foe, His doom.

He thought a while, which should've taken longer.
He thought a while and smiled.
He'd create a being which would want to conquer
All he saw and then beguile.

He will amuse and he will annoy
He will effect, without his cause
He will create, then he will destroy.
“Man! I create you!” And so he was.

“The pass-times of the Alpha! The Supreme Loner!”
Said the seer, as the sun went down.
“We will come again, we will hope and surrender.”
As the sky dropped onto the ground.

Time, Creation and Destructions later,
The seer, again, hoped. He, again, longed.
Sprang a new spring, a new season and nature.
But again, He was right. The seer was wrong.

I saw the seer again, screaming into air.
“Forgive me, forgive us, make us undie!
Tis you who made us sin!” he declared.
Crashing to the sand he cried.

The skies aren't wishing they had stayed.
The seas will eat more men.
Man kind will go, His longing will fade.
The seer will never cry again.