Letter to Ignorance

Dear IGNORANCE,

                          How have you been?? Quite active it seems to me.. everyone keeps talking about you.. you are the star..aren' you now, my little devil... how come you do not visit Grandma anymore????

I worry about you.. i think at times that you are taking up too much space in people's lives.. 

You seem to have grown rich and powerful enough to buy more and more land.. more than anyone can acquire in one miserly lifetime..

But my son... don't you think you should slow down the pace in which you seem to be growing...

But then.. success makes you hungry, doesn't it?

Even as a kid.. you were always greedy for more.. more peanut butter.. more chocolate chip cookies...

But you are a grown up now my baby..

And i feel like i do not know you anymore..

i wish i had not indulged your wants for more... as a child..

then perhaps.. you would come home once in a while... to rekindle the forgotten memories of my warm lap.. the peanut butter.. the roasted marshmallows.. 

But you've already had so much of all that already.. haven't you???

I miss you..

The child of my thoughts... you are still bliss.. only not for me anymore..

                                                                                                        love,

                                                                                                        Grandma memory.

Head_Heart In Sync

i have often wondered more or less..

why life can't simply see..

it is nothing but a spare thought..

erased when it has to be..

i have often wondered now and then..

how important love is to me?

and realized a li'lle more than,

maybe dew for a dying tree..

now i wonder of things more real..

like hatred, malice.. pain..

and sometimes also of curses gallore,

taming such "love" insane..

i wonder about superstitions,

about satin tied in knots..

around the neck of he who preached love..

till he hangs loathed and rots..

what more do i think of when love gulps down..

my monument of expectant vows?

from the man i dream of, on the galloping stallion..

to whom my reluctance bows..

to whom i pledge my dying day..

a caravan of warmth astride..

to whom i pledge my royal guard

the purple sea and night, his bride..

but i have vowed again..all over again..

to wait till my last sigh..

mists in the fragrance of my man again..

and awaken me lest i die..

though i'd rather die of patience.. not impatience..

between the vision and the blink..

if i ever had to choose love like he chose,

his heart and head in sync...

Bombay Blues

When i first came to Bombay.. like any other young actress looking for the big break, it all seemed dreamy and beautiful.. the endless roads with just enough traffic..the numerous coffee shops , affordable yet expensive because they became a daily luxury..the known faces primarily famous on a small scale sitting in the limelight of the offspring of the evening blaze with a glass of wine at WTF or conversing over coffee at Costa or Bru was just a routine event like taking a shower or brushing my teeth every morning..oh so common.. no one here looks at them in awe.. no one cares.. because everyone is important here.. or I guess they like feeling that they are.. but thats not wrong.. not entirely untrue.. for whatever work they did.. they would always get to go back home and eat "ghar ka khana" and make wild passionate love to one..two..or maybe many..

I began timid.. very unaware of the disguises.. 

I still remember being on the streets.. spending a night and an exceptionally beautiful dawn at Oshiwada bus-depot.. sittng on my travel trolley placed upright and rocking myself to sleep.. one of the many experiences that makes us realize important stuff.. makes us stronger in so many ways that are unknown to the sheltered.. the stench of the stained side walls because of frequent hurried urination is what kept me from falling off to a dreamless sleep that would tug on my eye lids as i struggled to stay awake.. The empty busses like giants waiting for the liaisons of war to command them forward made me feel secure as if they would protect me from everything real and unreal.. I wouldn't lie.. I felt disgusted at first and missed if not beautiful porcelain plates and clean linen but definitely my bed back home..the varnished wooden floors of the library and most of all... Ma..

But gradually when i grew stronger with the stench, the security of the formidable busses, i started feeling at peace.. such peace that i have never known.. What was making me happy? the slow movement of the wind that would at times expose my face to the darkness by lifting away the veil of unruly..unwashed hair or the sudden grins of the metal on the sidewalks that would chuckle light as if they were mocking me.. ? 

Why indeed was i happy? 

i realized late but i did eventually.. the thought that something was achieved.. the feeling of accomplishment.. the tired attempts to gather my life together breaking into dawn.. the solace of being safe.. and the immense pride of a 20 year old surviving the vengeance of an alien city... thats what made me happy.. i had won... the war was over..

Maybe i didn't make any material gains.. no deals signed..no agreements agreed to.. but i was free.. with more conviction in my stride as i looked Bombay in the eye and said in my mind," Someday you shall be tamed.." 

And she smiled..

I have learnt a lot from this magical city.. She's taken a part of my soul everyday and tended her wounds.. she has stolen a stray bit of my fragrance and whispered it away to the sea.. She has injured me just to take away a vial of my tears to water the trees.. I feel broken at times..

But what keeps me alive in this mad mad world????

A part of me that lives on ...in the trees..the breeze..the sea.. the wounds of Bombay.................

The Frozen Tree

Do look beyond the frozen tree

There's sunshine a li'lle, I think..

Or maybe just broken glass

Smiling with every blink..

Do look beyond its ugly knots

The russet cracks and the scoops

There are treasured pains, Linking arms..

Bronzed in friendly loops..

Do look beyond its leafless shrug,

Its stare..

Its toothless grin..

There are unshed tears,

Resting in peace..

In the cradle of thoughtless sin..

Lovers robed in leaves of passion

Of Autumn frolics and fun..

Leaving behind forbidden love

Naked beneath the sun..

Pirates of the lonely coasts

Robbing the shelter of the tree -

Draped in hues of earthly pleasures

And the mystic lull of the sea..

Burnt, broken.. but still alive

With secrets buried deep -

It stays awake through endless dreams..

Just so, I can sleep..

Look beyond the frozen arms

Where I survive unseen..

A solitary bud in the crest of death,

A hope that keeps it green..

Vexed

loving the unknown..

at times all of us wonder and often wander around things that are inevitable and often out of imagination.. why didn't he turn back? maybe coz i didn't remind him of women he loved all this while or maybe there was no marigold on my feet.. i have often felt like the wrong cinderella .. the glass shoe didn't fit my otherwise beautiful and delicate feet.. 

or maybe i didn't remind him of all those beautiful women in red sarees that have often caught his eyes.. i had always adorned the simple never the extravagant.. but is that a flaw? my mind thinks not.. but my heart still corrects the unknown..

or maybe the scent of my hair doesn't lure him to feel intoxicated... 

or maybe.. he has loved enough..

and i have just begun..

And she fell...

why the beginning?

she has often wondered why everything in the end is called the "beginning".. she has often wondered who wrote all those words that she always wanted to hear? she often wondered when was it that she realised that she felt all those words she wanted to hear.. she often wondered how she always managed tears and laughter at the same instance when she recalled those words over and over again....

it had been difficult to embark on realisation but it had been so easy.. painfully easy to feel happy... she had imagined someone beautiful, someone clever and funny and someone she could own.. almost like some character whom she had read about in books.. stories.. evidence of the unreal.. but she still dreamt on.. for someone perfect..all that in her mind remained untrue.. spoke out loud in her heart.. and she thought not of age.. of kind.. of caste.. of differences... she just embraced what seemed closest to her reality.. she closed her eyes and felt her heart squeeze in pain and she smiled.. for she felt human... she felt pain so deep inside that it could not be untrue.. and she glowed..

For she fell in love.........

The Preface

for the time being...

as more and more time has been spent on growing up.. I have often wondered how i have evolved as a being.. not much I assume but I can be wrong.. as I have been for so many years. To be honest, it took an enormous amount of courage and an overdose of the very popular and very famous American series "SEX and the CITY" to get me to start writing this blog.. inspired by age old gossip about men, men and more men, it wasn't very easy to just start stating facts about how I feel about relationships or gender equality being a myth but yes someone wise advised," writing helps you understand better!" 

and so I started writing as did Carrie Bradshaw.. though it was very honourably for the NEW YORKER, I am happy writing for myself and for all young women who care to read and vouce their opinions..

A child is either born a boy or a "woman".. yes , you read pretty well, a "woman".. there is no childhood neither are there brown paper packages tied up in  strings or blue satin sashes.. its all a dream dreamt long ago and an illusion which comes to a quick end as soon as puberty strikes.. especially menstruation..

but all said and done.. we hate, we cry , we curse, we lie.. and we love....... murderously...