Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Yellow Strawberries
















One wayward wintery day
with the snow falling in chubby cherries, 
my heart took a sudden fancy
for canary yellow strawberries.
You fool, I said, strawberries are red
as red as blood can be,
pretty sure yellow there are none
not definitely the shade of canary.
But my heart did not listen,
that lubdubing hulk of a stubborn fellow,
it insisted that I try to find
strawberries in canary yellow.

Gloved, suited, coated and booted
racing through a flurry of flakes,
I made my way to the shed outside
home to oddballs and keepsakes.
There on the shelf lay a can of paint
and yellow it was too,
not as yellow as a canary can be
but to humour a fool it would do.

I brushed the strawberry layer on layer
with lemony dollops of yellow,
the more I brushed, the more it turned
an orangey hue of mellow.
I shot at it with a spray gun
a million yellowy speckles,
but red it was and orange it stayed
in solidarity with demony obstacles.
I tried and tried till there was
just a brushful of yellow in the can,
and suddenly I knew what to do,
like a flash in the proverbial pan.

I knew it was there somewhere
plunger, needle et al,
a souvenir of my tetanus shot
way back from an '80s fall.
With the point glistening in the dark
I ruptured the red fruit skin,
and sucked through the needle
a syringeful of red from within.
I drew out red juice from its heart
like a vampire on a full moon night,
I pulled, I drew, I sucked and I pulled
till there remained nothing but white.

With the red gone, the berry so white
thus spake color theory,
orange it will not be, it has to be yellow
a couple of shades afar from canary.
I pierced its heart, yet again
with the needle a menacing bright,
I spurted yellow into the strawberry
an inside-out vampire on a full moon night.
I waited for it to turn a yellowy hue
as the snow piled into the night,
but red it was, pale it turned
and it stayed a lifeless white.

That night the snowflakes swirled and fell
like a million crowds making wanton merries,
and my heart provoked, rebuked and smirked
at my failed hunt for yellow strawberries.
Why, I asked, did it not turn yellow
when I tried and tried so much,
red and yellow make orange I know
but white and yellow should be yellow as such.
You fool, laughed my fat-bottomed heart,
my whim was like the snow,
It lets you walk a million miles
but leaves no trace of where you go.
You think you took just its color
when every drop of red you stole,
but how would a strawberry turn canary
when you robbed it of its soul?

Monday, March 12, 2012

thought bubbles

something I wrote ages ago...


There was a blind boy who would sit by the plant in his garden talking to it, listening to the bird on the plant respond to his words with its own sweet song and thinking that it was the plant that was conversing with him in its own floral language. And then one day the bird flew away. The boy talked days and nights to the plant just to be met with a stony silence and a deaf ear. Not even a whimper or a bark from the bark. And he spent his entire life thinking that plants are strange moody beings….
***

There was a girl whose only wish was to sit in a bus…a double decker bus…more specifically, the upper berth of a double decker bus with both the window and her hair all open…the cool breeze caressing her face…her favourite music playing through the earphones….smiling away to herself…looking at the world outside just move by her window….and going across the world….from town to city to village annd back over and over again….just her, her window, her music, her bus and any and everything inside it….But she never did so….for she did not know what she would do if the bus were to ever run out of fuel….or she were to run out of songs….
***

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Unfinished Business

Well, its been ages since I have come face-to-face with my blog. And we aren't even estranged! So finally, after having been accused(!) of lethargy, laziness, disloyalty to blogosphere in face of zippier social networking and microblogging sites and running out of 'creative steam', I decided to take some 'action'. And since I almost always write about childhood, lost joys from the 80's and 90's and more miscellaneous blasts from the past, I decided to run through my old posts for some inspiration. But then, who wants inspiration when you can have salvation! So, to cut a short story shorter, I have decided to publish all those unfinished drafts lying abandoned among their much-complete, reasonably-commented over cousins in my blog dashboard. Open-ended stories that leave a lot to the reader's imagination are a rage nowadays. Open-ended films too! So why not open-ended blog posts, right?
 
I have skipped the drafts that ended much before you could even say 'draa...'. They would have been too open-ended, even for a well-endowed imagination.
I hope I have redeemed myself with this post and I shall not henceforth be accused of mind-block, writers-block or any such vagaries. QED.

15th October 2011 | Untitled
There was a 'right way' to put the audio cassette into its cover,
There was a place for stamps and 'stick-em-stones' in the top drawer,
There was a trick if the floppy disk got stuck inside,
There was a carrier for a bum-hurting bicycle ride,
There was a secret stash for summertime ice candies on sticks,
There were stars, 'v.v. goods' and neat red crosses and ticks,
There were peep-holed numbers on the phone that turned into a tizzy,
There were yarn-spinning, tale-telling neighbors who never got too busy,
There was one channel to watch morning, noon and night,
There was a wooden ruler for every hand in a class fight,
There was a fountain pen and a blotting paper too,
There was a home-made concoction for the annual bout of flu,
There was a pen friend in a difficult-to-spell place,
There was a tailor who made frilly 'umbrella' dresses with lace
There was always one more person to squeeze into the backseat,
There was a glass of 'Rasna' when you walk in from the heat,
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15th October 2011 | Untitled
There he was, a raggedy old man,
with a toothless grin and parchment skin,
breath rasping and whistling with the wind,
reed thin bones rattling within.

Holding a bowl close to his heart,
He walked to where we stood,
Tasting raindrops as they trickled down our faces,
Feeling the clingy wetness of a newborn brood.

"Look my children....loooookkkkkk"
His palm uncovered the bowl just a tad bit
"Look how they lie in there....
Oh, look how perfectly they fit"

Smothered smile, hurried hush,
Heads nodded in a collective whole,
Ten eyes inspecting the invisible contents,
of a weather-worn bowl

"They were quite big once,
Oh yes, needing a sack that too,
I couldn't get them to sit still,
as much as I tried to...
They would leap and jump,
from day to night,
-------------------

11th April 2010 | Untitled
Like the breeze that blows across the meadow
Silently stirring, casting no shadow
I walk alone along the street
Whistling in tune with my feet
Like the wind through a crack in the window

Like the sea touching every shore
Letting go and asking no more
I walk amidst the summer dresses
My face caressing the wind-blown tresses
Of perfect strangers I met not 'fore

Like a frivolous bee
On a springtime amorous spree
I devour the scents of the bazaar
The mundane with the bizarre
Feeling insanely happy and free

Like rain on a parched land
Satiating the hungry sand
I let the city fill me
With all I can smell, hear, touch and see
I let it hold my hand
And take me where it wants
To sights unseen and familiar haunts
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16th November 2009 | Untitled
Its been quite a while since this location has seen some activity. Just like the good old ODIs and test matches losing out to their fancier sibling 20-20, blogging is also fast relegating its place to the pesky 'what are you doing?' and the naughty 'what's on your mind?' of the www world.
everything in a jiffy...hail the quickie !!! But let me not digress and stick to my original plan for this post. Actually this post is a celebration of a phenomenon that dug its feet in the ground and is braving the onslaught of the 'fast and the furious' craze that is sweeping the world. Ladies and gentlemen, presenting to you Bollywood. You may be in and out of a McDonalds with a full belly in 5 minutes...but you still got to keep that $$$ glued to the seat for 3 whole hours to watch the split-second softening of the father's face on the train station as he lets go of his daughter's hand to send her to her beloved to walk (in this case, ride) into the sunset. No shortcuts here...no brutal edits. Just good old stories taking their own sweet time to crawl from that white screen with lots of text on it to those defining bold words THE END.
Stalking and watching the girl from behind the college wall. 3 months. Getting to know the girl's name. + 2 months. Writing your first love letter. + 1 month. Discovering your family's longstanding feud with the girl's family. - 25 years. Fighting goons, hired policemen and emotional blackmail alike. + 3 months. Holding the girl of your dreams in your arms as the police takes away the repentant cruel uncle and his hired goondas and the flowers and kissing birds cover the screen. Priceless. Laying the foundation for a sequel. + 9 months. See? Whoever proposed that the world is moving towards a faster life has jolly well left Bolly out of his calculations.

Yeah yeah....I know my account of Bollywood is outdated by atleast 10 years. The kissing birds, holding hands, family feuds are so passe...they died with the late 80s or maybe the mid 90s...but hey
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