The Embrace

“Show it some mercy, it’s burning in flames

The skin of all hopes is melting;

tell me out of this what do you gain?

Shower it with some relief; it’s scorching under the sun

The soothing peach color has turned into brownish red

Tell me how do you plan to resist your misdeeds’ brunt?

Oh well yes, I’m, talking about myself in third person

That’s because you seem to have some grudge against me for some reason!!”

You see, for an artist, stage is a temple, and performance worship

So this pain that I have been talking to, who has got the stage, does not leave

And I tell it that it has to go away

And I have tried to convey the message, but it simply pays no heed

Yes, it swirls around my bed across the hall of nothing

And the dryness in my eyes

tries to sip its beauty and wrath

The tears entering in my ears cheer its performance

But the curtains have to be drawn, and as I doze

This pain, not giving up, then sits next to me, and waits, swinging to and fro….

I do get some relief while I sleep

And I wish the consciousness won’t greet me again

But I guess even if all the wishes would wish for the same

I would still be made to open the door to the pain

And with a smile on my face

To respect the piece of art that pain puts up with such grace

So I decide, why should I fear the fate

Instead I should join the beauty that has come to my gate

and be the excited audience it deserves to have

So with pricked ankles and bare face

And non fancy fabric in which I’m draped

I give it a standing ovation and clap

As if I were standing in the meadows amidst the colors

that are waiting to be refilled, to be shaded darker

Finally overwhelmed by the response, it embraces me with grief

But my suffering then escalates, after all this is the closest I’ve got with the pain

But then satiated with the response, for a while it takes a break

and the needles are plucked out of my veins

I then bid it a good bye with a sad rendition

It leaves but with a bonding condition

That I shall always cheer for every beauty that I come across

I say ‘yes’, immediately, although with the premonition

That it will be back for the greed of applause

Or perhaps, my pessimism is ballooned

and optimism simply pricked and flawed..!!

image source: http://good-wallpapers.com/abstract/1778

Delight

I won’t define management. And there is no definite management style pertaining to any particular kind of organization. What I would rather like to talk about is the ingredients!

Management is like a food item. The different ingredients and the ratio in which they go in the preparation of a dish define the style. It is these styles that draw the differentiating factor.  And of course, the chef, the architect of the style makes the final difference.

Now a dish popular in north India won’t be as popular in other parts of India and vice-versa. Hence the popularity or success of the dish is in congruence with factors involving geography, history, society, religion et al. Similarly, success of management style also depends on the factors stated above and their likes. Of course, the culinary experience has to be implausible and recurrent in nature for which constant innovation has to be encouraged.

Evolution of management style has been as dynamic as water. Societal changes and the final mix have had reflections upon it. Hence the external environment of an organization, which is almost an open system in today’s world of globalization, plays a major decisive role in designing the style and structure of the organization.

The management world is aware of the so called ingredients, some of which are creativity and innovation, ethics and social responsibility, transparency and communication, structuring and restructuring, clear distribution of power.

These ingredients have to be considered in a ratio commensurate to the type of organization; whether it is a start-up or a competitor, a young or middle aged company (according to the age group of employees). Also an organization can be typified according to a company life cycle (CLC) on the lines of product life cycle (PLC).

Another emerging trend that needs to be integrated in organizations is internal branding. The atmosphere in an organization has to be charged with enthusiasm all the time and constant updates and each employee inclusion are needed for the same.

All of us may choose a work profile in an organization for the money and career prospects, but in the long run, what maintains the health of engine of our work life is the feeling of belongingness to the company. And for that respect, identity and subsequent ‘I am important’ phrase has to be pronounced by employees’ minds.

Also a clear division of work has to be maintained within an organization for proper planning, efficient execution and optimized result. One of the road blocks for the drive of UID is unclear division of work. Whether there is a vertical or horizontal hierarchy, or, whether there is a pooled, sequential or reciprocal interdependence seen in an organization, clear allocation of responsibility for work is indispensable.

Authority should not be synonymous with rigidity and bossiness, but assertiveness, confidence and leadership. Whether it’s a top-bottom or bottom-up line of control, the above stated factors remain vital.

Multiple initiatives like organizing cultural and sports events and other employee centred activities should be focussed upon. After all in the highly competitive era that we are facing now, the spotlight must move on from employee retention and satisfaction to employee delight!

Image source: http://wavelengthsblog.wordpress.com/2012/05/15/the-download-on-delivering-delight/

Foolish you

You are getting nervous, do you know that?

Your gaze is at her but you’re trying hard to look away

Your heart beats are skipping the regular count

It’s not normal, can it be gainsaid?

Your side of garden is full of roses in the times of drought

There are butterflies fluttering spiralling the red hearts in the peak summers

Your days and nights are in direct proportion

to the number of times in your mind she appears

Your wishes are different shades of the same colour

Nod your head if it’s not a usual behaviour

You are telling yourself that telling her won’t do any good

May be you’re right but the truth will still goon

You’re running in circles around your own mind

In your head, your words are hunting you, and they simply never die

You are chasing the squirrel of solution around the tree,

the roots of which simply do not exist

underneath the grounds that you’re standing upon..

The memory of the facts seem to grind your skull

Your heart aches, suffocates, forgets and jumps into the deep dark waters

But soon you heartless feel the empty space within you, in the core

You miss the childlike crazy heart that you wore

The heart that made you a demon, bird and human

You are teased by the lost innocence that you just threw away

And you’re left alone staring blankly into the space

You’re getting pale, do you know that?

You disowned nonchalantly your true colour

as if you have the ability to weave another

Your artificial colour painted on your skin will leave in coming seasons

Your so called love by then, will have deprived you of everything

Foolish you, you gave up your heart just for nothing..

So listen to me, and pay some heed

Whistle the tune of joy, of simple innocence and not greed

Desert the bloody roses of grim soils of the superficial gardens

Unhinge your mind off her; the knot of the troubles will be untied

Rediscover clear skies, and soar your kite of destiny high

The dry cutting pain of the emptied space of your heart

Will be made fertile once again for your lovely heart

And promise it you’ll never give it away just like that..!!

Also, I came across a beautiful song. You may like to listen to it here.

image source: http://www.to-en.gr/Newton/p01_t_en.htm

The Hero

Numb the time and swell it

Let the bloodstream stop and listen to your heartbeats

The moment would pause and history disappear

Let the present throb till it dies of wear and tear…..

Pluck and eat the fruits of anxieties from the garden of future

Stare at the sky and ask it to pour

The greenery that your present needs

Don’t let this time be pricked…

Cheat logic for once in your life

Drive away your child like passions in a car to a beach

Abscond the building of boundaries

Run away… Run away from the daily redundant drudgeries

Grind your emotions and feed them to your heart

Make it beat faster and redder

Kiss the panic and seduce it till it surrenders

Create a house of cards and demolish it…

Dare the stillness to move by an inch

Interview the silence and hear it out for what it speaks

Memorize the conversation that you would have

Retrospect what you and others didn’t convey

Is there a smile, a fury, or any other curve that your lips might make?

Pump this moment with air and make it float

Steer the ship of problems to an unknown island and then flee

Swim back from the widowed waters and don’t turn back

But don’t wait for any welcome, you hero, from the folks of your city

In your mind, just ink a shade darker the route you followed on the waters

Don’t let the defeats, slaughters, injuries make your solid steps falter

Break in the dark and dingy territories

Open the floodgates to deluge the area in the river of spirit

Drop the match stick and paint the city in a colour of orange for a change

Before of course it dies of the colour into ashes

But don’t you rest now, you hero, your work is not yet done

Watch out! There are shadows lurking around to be burnt

Now wake up, you killed all those music-less places of anxieties

The music now soothes you

You won’t look at your life and others’ and extract disparities

The present now awaits you

You won’t look back and fear the curves ahead on your way

The road now awaits you

You won’t weigh your past and future against your blood

The life now awaits you..!

image sources: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/07/photogalleries/100730-china-oil-spill-dalian-environment-world-pictures/

https://www.facebook.com/islamicquotes

Fighting The Heavyweight

 I love talking. When there’s no one around to talk to, I talk to myself. When there’s something I need to share with someone, and can’t, I talk to myself. And so I love talking.

Most of the times something or other goes on in my mind and so when I cannot talk, I write. So I love writing. I need to pour out my thoughts or else I feel flooded; flooded with my own thoughts.  And floods remind me of nature. I see my thoughts’, my feelings’ reflection in the nature. Those beautiful rains make us either ecstatic or forlorn; may be because we get to see what joy is and what grief is in the form of rains. It is as if there is something inside us which we know exists, but can’t define. I mean those feelings do exist. It’s just that they need to be manifested in some physical form for me to witness them; in a smile on our face for others to see, and in the nature for us to see.

And so I look outside and search for tangible forms of all that is intangible, there inside me to be viewed, appreciated, criticised and analysed by me..!

Words for me are like a mirror. I can see myself. I can read myself and so I can come closer to myself and love myself consciously.

So as I said when there are too much of things going on in one’s mind, it’s better to dispense them. In my case I have to do it. In my third year of college, a professor mistakenly gave me detention (wherein I was barred from sitting through exams) in two of my subjects. It obviously worried me a lot and I knew that there was no use of worrying. But I was not able to control my worrying and was feeling bullied by my thoughts. I tried to emasculate them and so I scribbled the following lines on a rough sheet of paper:

So this moment gains weight

as many thoughts proliferate

This is not the right time

so I ask them to just wait….

But my mind has no place

nowhere to make them stay

and for a while I say,

“Please, these thoughts need some rest with such a pace

that they are incessantly moving at..”

But my plead is caged in a bubble

No one listens and it goes to waste

So I tell my thoughts in order to direct them,

“You have to go far, very far, and so go, segregate..”

And they do so sincerely obeying me

in spite of knowing the fact

that I’m putting them on the wrong track

and that they ought to be together in a group to affect me,

torture me and bully me to their best

They know that I’m trying to mislead them

But they still go on different tracks..!

But how could I underestimate these thoughts

Of course, they follow my order of getting dispersed as they very well know that

they can still gain weight, enough weight

by producing some and orienting other thoughts with each of them

And so, as my efforts go in vain

this moment still gains weight..

Yes, my thoughts mushroomed and at that moment I did get worried to a certain extent, while I was jotting down the above lines, but afterwards, writing it down not just distracted me from my previous state of mind (i.e. the one before writing down the above lines), it also did make me feel better, much better!

And my efforts eventually did not go in vain and the moments felt light.

So, try out this writing exercise and disorient your thoughts whenever they try to appropriate your peace of mind. The thoughts will try their best to club themselves to get powerful, but you have to keep fighting and trust me you will succeed in the end. So don’t let such worrisome thoughts bog you down and after you write, you will feel remarkably well.


image source: http://www.markjonespainter.com/Image%20Pages/Troubled%20Mind.htm

Desire to desire

If there were cotton seeds, that I could climb upon

I would fly, if only for some distance, I would fly

And if there were any real dragons

I would trick the evil and make it stand in front of the mouth of fire

If I had long hands and sharp nails, I would rise, liberate the sky

by tearing its mask behind which it refrains to cry

And if there were two of me, I would stand in front of me

to understand me, to love me, to know my heart and mind

I know I can do this all but only if I knew how..

Do I need to carry or surrender, the love, the compassion, the ire?

And as I ponder, wander, halt on the highway of my life

I realise, everything I’ve achieved, everything I write

all the songs that I sing, all the fears that I kill

keep me fresh and not stale, warm and not ice-like..

I need to defeat if not conquer, stay alive and not die

Now I know, I can do it all, I could do it all

But only if I had those eyes,

Only if I had those eyes, flaming with desire…..

This life is a dog! No matter how far you throw the grief, it puts all its energy and focus to get that grief back to you.

And it expects you to pat it.

Oh! my dear life, you really don’t get it, do you?

That you need to get a life!

Things that we love, desire, no matter how much passion goes in to fill it, they attain ephemeral characteristics. Whether it’s rain, cool breeze, time spent with friends and loved ones, they all seem to come and go. And yet we desire them every minute of our lives. We spend rest of the time to possess those jewels. You get rich one moment, the next moment your jewels seem to be fake. And you wonder that what is it that you possess. Whether you possess the reality or if it’s the other way round. And most importantly, whether you possess yourself..!

Many a time, I decided to surrender myself to moments of joy, grief, jealousy and their shades and then later recoiled fearing losing myself to those ephemeral moments. Those colorful moments flutter in front of us, attract us, possess us, color us, carry us, and then fly away dropping us somewhere in mid way. You find yourself lost in foreign lands. You then trace back your steps. But you never reach the same place, because time moved the plains. You wonder if it was worth flying for the time-being. Yes of course, why not!! You got to experience the beauty, the sky, the freedom. But what about the fall? Didn’t the landing hurt you? And how many times can you relish the descent in the hope of next ascent if any? Or are you surrendering to the assumption that the journey has to end with descent?

There is nothing wrong with fall, bruised, broken or grief. I’ve patted my life even after it brought me grief. I stroked it with passion and fuelled it with desire. Every time I fell, I searched for scrapes and prepared it for next flight.

Every time I got bruised, I gathered strength to walk and found old and new companions to cheer me up on my way.

On my way, I sipped the sky, and greeted hills

I cut the air above the blue and ran on the sea beach-frills

I did it with passion; I did it with enthusiasm..

On my way, I perched on the branches of grief

I looked down wondering at the wandering nomads

I filched a little momentum from them and left the shadows

I did it with passion, I did it without notions..

On my way, I met so many and flew with few

While we shared meals, recalled our journeys,

I knew they followed different maps

And yet, I did it with passion, I did it with love..

On my way, I witnessed different worlds of joy and glee

Rich fearing the fall, poor hoping the rise, but listening to the same melodies

I felt the despair of free children’s shrills halting with descending swings

I saw it with passion, I saw it all with compassion..

On my way, I dipped my wings in river

I ascended to a height I could not have imagined ever

I knew I may meet the thunder up there

But I did it with passion, I did it with the desire..






image source: http://beforethebabywakes.com/2011/01/flying-bird-prayers-mouth/

It's always about YOU..

“Go away..”, I say, to these times that are prevailing

the state of us being together, that these days are curtailing

I say it helplessly to the time, to the eternity

As against the currents and winds, my happiness is sailing

It is then when I give up to the belligerent winds

That you fill my heart and bones and make me sing

The complex tune of honey & brine, flowers & butterflies, death & life, good times & these times……

And So, You become the cutting contrast

That brings out the stark difference between the white & black, the happy & sad

You’re the silver lining between this land & the blue grey sky

You’re the one that makes me want to live even beyond this life

Tell me how do you cut me so softly into a lovable one?

How do you manage to bring peace in this wild town of my mind that burns?

But then as you control the fire, you deluge me as your thoughts  flood my mind

and then I remember your touch as your skin against mine rubs,

only if I could contain you all this while

only if I could be with you, all day and night…

You perhaps don’t even know as certain facts evade my understanding too

That how you’ve taken over all the aspects of my relations in this world that exist

You’re my friend and my competitor,

You’re my student and my teacher

You’re my guide and my lover

You’re my veil and my mirror

Your absence becomes poison, and your presence an elixir……

But then somehow even without the explanation, I’m more happy than bewildered!

So as this moment gains the weight and I feel sinking deep down the water

I remember those moments that we had spent together when the days were brighter

I close my eyes and I enter the gates of my parallel universe

Where you’re there with me before and after the dinners

And then your weight on me lifts all the burden

your eyes strike me every time like bullets from gun

they pierce me and the pain inside me gushes out

you make me as white and calm as a white flower

Tell me, how do you do it with such ease and indomitable power?

But then I wake up as the ‘present tense’ orders me to, of which I’ve to be a minion

I see the fresh flowers of  our yesterdays that were once bestowed upon us

now lay on the ground, dried; at times I feel they are in complete oblivion

and then you ask me to clean it up and that it’s such a mess

I pick a flower and preserve it in a book, as those days’ dried yet redolent reminiscence………..

 I take a walk down some street alone..

Abandoning those lanes on which our shadows together once strolled

But then I reach one of the crossroads where our lives intertwine

So as I meet you, you show me your book, looking at which my heart smiles

You too have kept some of those flowers and as the rest lay fresh in your heart

I promise you that I’ll never let those flowers dry

I’ll bestow them with all the required ingredients to nourish them

And In this garden of your heart I’ll grow other colors too

All you have to do is, in my heart, keep pumping this life

As I’m from You, since I started the walk in search of You…







Image source: http://www.behance.net/gallery/Its-Always-about-You/785280

*IPL Weds Branding*

And you all (crazy cricket fanatics, businessmen/women, Dada/Nana followers, wives/girlfriends of all non followers of soccer, sponsors and whoever is left) are cordially invited to the auspicious wedding that’s taking place at various stadiums in India, and costlier the gift you get(ticket), better will be the service from our side! Namaste.

I’m not an avid fan of cricket or even IPL or any other Indian big fat wedding. Nevertheless, I happen to observe few aspects of IPL just like various movie trailers that I get to see, seated along my excited-for-new movies-siblings.

On every ‘IPL day’ at dinner, my mother ridicules some random poor guy because he is rich and awkward and gives insights about IPL on TV, and some female who would have put up too much of make-up or dressed in revealing attire. My dad condemns every catch that is dropped, gets exalted every time the ball kisses or flies across the boundary and opposes every team that my mother supports. I instead focus on the teams’ t-shirts and caps, bats and grounds, umpires’ uniforms, giant screens. If you take a ‘who’s in whose team?’ quiz, I’ll shamelessly terribly fail. But ‘the bigwigs-sponsors’ of various teams have definitely spammed in my ‘memory-the mailbox’.


So whether it’s 'LUX COZI 'written on uniforms of  ‘Kings XI’ and ‘DC’ or ‘Manyavar ethnic wears’ partnership with ‘KKR’, or even small firm like ‘Burn Fitness Port’ which has invested in 'DC', they all have converted these cricket men into playing talking living hoardings and cartoons ( in various comic features like ‘Rock 'n' Royals' and ‘Electric Chargers', The 'Delhi Daredevils' in Diamond Comics' special series where they join the latter's characters 'Chacha Chadhury' and 'Sabu') and models ('KKR' team dressed elegantly, posing in 'Manyavar ethnic wear', and they look so cute, some look hot..!! see the link below, no wonder I know who all are in this team!!).



 The above video with ethnic wears reminded me of big fat weddings that most of the people like to be invited to. We love to celebrate know, whether it's a child-birth ceremony, marriages, or cricket and its various forms. WE push the boat out.
Not that I’m against it, not at all, but it is more like the Indian wedding where everything (designer clothes, people wanting to be captured by camera, shiny 'firangi' hopping cheerleaders, the ‘pandol’-stadium setup) , except the couple, is noticed. Obviously little happenings like ‘SRK-MCA fight’, etc are bound to take place in the big wedding (controversies are main features of such grand occasions)!!

Anyhow, the couple is going to make a good profit out of the whole wedding and we, the invitees, the audience, the viewers will get entertained somehow( I’m going to have spicy ‘chhole-bhature’ while checking out some cute guy wrapped in the ‘wedding’ dress on TV). Also, I have a gut feeling that the strong couple will have a long-lasting marriage with pompous anniversaries to be enjoyed equally, later on.What a charm!!

With 302k followers on twitter, 1.1 million on facebook( thanks to various FB pages, youtube accounts devoted to these teams), others whether invited or not, whether a fan or not, this wedding is being attended by many.

So are you attending the wedding?

White UP White DOWN…

 So basically once again we got manipulated by ubiquitous commercials. But this time, it’s different!! We don’t want fairness creams (for females’ private parts).

I got to know about so called fairness cream after I read that there was a furor in Rajya Sabha (upper house in Indian Parliament) regarding it. According to them, the concerned commercial was debasing females. Well, the first thing I did after reading that article was signing in my you tube account( so that I could see the commercial even if it were X-rated). I had to see it as I wanted to know what it was that made it more attention-seeking and women debasing than various gang-rapes, eve-teasing, honour-killing of women, all of which never create such furor in Rajya Sabha, on print-media, digital media..

I saw it. I saw it once again and read the you-tube users’ comments on that commercial. And I started to figure out what exactly was wrong.

I was sure that one of the reasons for the uproar was that the product dealt with female private parts. Another reason was the story-line of the commercial, which according to me was confusing, like other commercials. It showed a husband/boyfriend ignoring his plastic doll-like-wife/girlfriend. The sad female is shown with the product, followed by a not-so-offensive-sketch of a female applying the product on the darkest area of the body. Meanwhile, the specifications were told which were mainly about keeping the concerned part dry, clean and also making the complexion lighter. And so in the end, the husband/boyfriend was happy. Yeae!!

And so, viewers focused on only one aspect of it and that was the fairness one, not the hygienic ones. Even the product’s name has got no word related to fairness. But still they took it as female-private-part-bleaching-cream.

Men thought that the next product might target their private parts’ skin. And so they felt offended in advance. Also they thought that the product was typecasting them as racists and narrow-minded.

They won’t say it openly, “ darling, if you don’t have 'it' fair,

                                             you may use the product there,

                                            at least you can have it considered

                                             I might even do it for a longer time, my dear.”,

                                         Ha! But that’s what many of them may say it loud and clear,   

                                             but only in their private minds’ corners……..

                                                                                     

Women professed that the concept of the product was senseless. They don’t have to show 'it' to impress/attract men. And because showing *it* is not involved in the process, unlike what was shown in the advertisement, they don’t really require the product.

Now let me ask all these thoughtful critiques that why such uproar is not created when almost all the advertisements for men deodorant show skimpily-clad-females going wild after males using the advertised deodorant. That’s not debasing women? And will they use their moody logic towards such advertisement? Because going by the advertisement, I should transform into a sexually hyperactive female running crazily after some random guy using ‘the’ deodorant; also I’ll smell the scent even if I were a mile away. But no, they won’t use their logic over here.

I’m not judging the product or its usage. If you don’t like or want it, don’t use it. Why does anyone have to get the product banned? Do we take care of those body parts only which are to be shown in near future? We all go to beauty parlor and saloons and use shampoos and soaps and other ‘beauty’ products. Do we use them to attract the opposite sex? I personally like to keep myself groomed (at least at basic level) even when I don’t have to step out of my house.There are already facial fairness creams and fairness ‘body’ lotions for females. 

There are advertisements that show using certain toothpaste (once again) attracting female mindlessly towards a random guy using the product. Now do we all use tooth-paste for that? May be some do. And this is where the manipulation comes in. Read the specifications and advantages of a product. If you think some of those might help you in some way, then use it.

There is definitely something wrong with the ‘fairness addiction’ that Asians have. I already spread my views regarding it on an earlier blog-post(You may like to read Copper Maiden ).

But guys, grow up (pun intended). And women, we all are lovely and intelligent, but we don’t really have to sniff sense at everything(pun intended)!

image source: http://free-extras.com/images/black_and_white_daisies-1551.htm

The Omitted

After a while as I was filling an application form today, I realized that I was missing the alphabet ‘e’ repeatedly. We all, I suppose, usually omit random alphabets while writing. That happens. What took my attention today was that I was omitting only ‘e’.

May be I was tired. Even though I skip every time, ‘e’ in the word haven’t, just because at some time during my teenager years, I had developed the habit of using SMS lingo, all the time. Still, it bothered me. Only if I could erase memory of this incident! Yes the movie, ‘Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind’ came to my mind, but other things, as usual, also followed..

I imagined a scenario with my family and me, sitting together, chatting, smiling, enjoying. And then suddenly, I vanishing, dissolving in the air, omitted from the scene. It would happen instantly.

I would evaporate in the frozen time.

And then my memories getting erased from family’s minds.

They would be confused later, seeing a cup of tea, my clothes lying on my seat. Their confused senses would sense something amiss. My belongings, photographs, voice recordings, cards, gifts, poems, writings that will catch them eventually will force them to think. They would try to establish my identity and their relationship with me, but it would go in vain.

Then, they would try to understand their habits related to me. My mom coming to my room in morning to switch off the night lamp, but finding no one in the room. My sister dialing my number not knowing whom to talk to. The sudden free time left in the life of those that otherwise was spent talking to me. The habits would frustrate them. But then they are ‘Habits’. With time, habit without purpose erodes away. It is transient in nature. And if the essence of the habit is not reminded, it is forgotten.  My vanishing into the infinite followed by a short phase of vanishing habits will be all. They would eventually then go on. They wouldn’t place the omitted in their lives.

I have had such friends in many phases of my life without whom I used to think life would cease to exist. Now I just remember their names and very few things related to those times spent with them. New people came in and took their places which obviously happened in a very gradual way. They have been like different curtains on windows of my life with different capabilities of filtering light. I got used to all of them till they vanished or were substituted.

What bothers me the most is the fact that we people render nothing worthy, because everything and everyone, times spent in joy and oblivion, enemies and loved ones, at some point of time under some reasonable situations and circumstances can be logically forgotten.

We take pride at something and next moment we delete it. It doesn’t really matter, even if it is restored to its original place from the recycle bin. It loses it’s worth.

 Once omitted, remains omitted forever, even if it is re-established strongly in darker shades.

It is a very strange fact that the ‘Omission’ leaves the darkest mark; darker than any shade of insertion. And yet we skip the ‘Omitted’.

Synthesize the pigments of sorrow, indifference and joy

And color the time with them, it doesn’t matter if you are color blind

as you spread the sheet of time around yourself

and dip the brush of your actions in tears, waterfalls and brine

make it beautiful with shades of success and romance

and then cherish it; I say, hold it high in the day light

and if you don’t like some part or shade of it

bring it and see it with a different aspect, under a different colored lamp

you will then feel the beauty again

and the sorrow will camouflage with joy surrounding

The whole process of painting goes on, on the same canvass

Your dimensions change with each painting

Then one day when your skin and hair would have changed their color

try to place that lovely shade you had once spotted on the canvass

which you had held high with the satisfaction of a monk

with a blissful smile of a first-time-in-life-proud child

You may not find it and the worst being, you may not miss it at all!!

For it would have been omitted from your mind

Like the dreams you ride between sunset and sunrise..

 Image source: http://freelanceweekly.com/2010/03/03/the-case-of-the-vanishing-client/

 

Pebbles

A simple logic that runs through my mind

A hard truth which is equally hard to grind

is that world that we are possessed by

is unfaithful to everybody who is alive..

And we still have faith in it despite

Our logic that doesn’t fit in the given attire

And I wonder what is it that’s mine

irrespective of all the knowledge and quagmire..

And I wonder how do I know who is mine

irrespective of this cycle of death and life..

A sinking feeling then makes me realize

the depth of simplicity that I have taken in hand so easily

A negative feeling, in me that balloons inside,

then feels the pressure of the positivity in the air outside..

But it keeps soaring high in the sky

And I wonder when the balloon would deflate into nothing…

The complexity has churned nothing out of my head

And to contemplate upon what they and I said

has lost its charm as it doesn’t seem to help!!

So what do I do? Others say that I should take some rest

and spare them from the torture of  the whips of the simple and the complex!

But I say someone would foresee, someone would understand

The need to mull over the seen and unseen, heard and unheard, fought and abandoned..

Well I suggest that this complexity is an exercise to understand the simple

And our logic and thoughts are nothing but ripples

that arise out of some disturbance, good or bad, in our lives..

So let’s just sit quietly at a river bank, under shade of a tree

And drink the beauty of those ripples appearing, swimming, and disappearing

caused by nothing but by pebbles of those moments…

image source: http://50lessonslearned.nichetraining.co.za/uncategorized/lesson-3-people-aren%E2%80%99t-going-to-act-the-way-you-want-them-to-act-2/

The Fugitive

A lonely street I see, in front of me

Full of people’s dreams floating in the air

It makes me wonder, “Where is my sleep?”

This night is passing away,

 And the dawn is near

I try to listen to the sound of tip toe

Somewhere I know I’ll find it if I follow

But it seems all I hear, is my panting breath

And even my heart beats have gone low

Where are you my slippery sleep?

What have you slipped into? Where did you go?

To my left and right, I toss and toss

My now straight legs I then again cross

In my mind I still wander here and there

This consciousness, now my mind cannot bear

Someone tell me where are my dreams, where?

Can’t you see my helplessness now bare…?

I’m on the verge of giving up now

The sun is rising  and  the sky has allowed

The birds to fly towards the horizon

And as I see the scene outside my window so mesmerizing

“Forget it..!!”, I say, springing out of my bed

Why should I mourn over my sleep which has fled…?

A rusty book I see, in front of me

Full of hazy words floating in there

It makes me wonder, “where is my sleep?..!!”

The book from my hands is slipping away

.........And my sleep is finally near……! 

image sources: http://cloudninetalks.blogspot.in/2012_01_01_archive.html

http://www.thesocialpenguinblog.com/2011/08/29/the-weird-world-of-the-blog-spam-comment/john-tennek-4x18-insomniac-ren-e9378116/

 

Stirring The Wonderful

At the behest of my own knowledge

I consider myself and you as one

But Oh Dear! Do I have to take any pledge

before I profess such statement?

Anyhow, I think I still craze

for those moments that passed by

without our permission they crossed

the territories of our then present..

Tell me, tell me please

Can we ever retrieve them?

And even though we compose new music now

You see I have my favorites that I want to rewind

And those templates of the past that once menaced

I wish I could play with them once again this time

And those street lights that behind us flashed once

the darkest phase of our lives had lit when

And that light music that played in our loud heart beats’ presence

Yes I remember that time that left such deep dent

I don’t want to get it repaired and cherish it instead!

Only if I could get into the memories in my head for real

I would sneak into that world and get it sealed

But tell me if you would accompany me in this endeavor

because without you every world is rendered

colorless whether real or fiction..

Will you sip the drink of magic

that I will create for us to enter our dreams

or are we expected to stay lethargic?

and just miss helplessly those moments that still gleam..

I also wish I could somehow get

new lyrics for the old times, the music that we once played

and fresh dialogues and gestures to recreate

some moments that we didn’t live to the fullest..

But why should I mull over the bygones

when distance has followed our decision

of staying away from each other?

In such case, how shall we ever

expect to do the justice to our past?

May be we should just move forward

with a bag of things we managed to escape which

otherwise would have left us in the endless stream of spent years

Eight pairs of 3D glasses, that parking lot and bus tickets

the expired Barista cards, the ring made instantly out of the grass

flower petals, a black cap, and defunct earphones,

the tissue paper on which we played the game of criss-cross

and other remnants of that glorious time

I carry them all with me stirring the wonderful in my mind

and with them I make this dim conduit of your absence a little bright..

Apathy?

                                                                                   

If there were ashes flying in the air

Would you be glad to see it?

And if snowflakes instead were there

Will from your eyes, emanate tears?

In mornings when your feet touch soft grass

Do they ever painfully sear?

And if you know somewhere a child is without meal

Will you still dare to waste a supper?

Or if an evil you confront in present

Will you welcome its footsteps into the future?

I know your answer is ‘no’

Because we are under our control and we know

The right, the wrong, the good , the bad

We can identify the comforts, the discomforts,

what makes us and people happy and sad

Then how with such ease, do we chose to suture

The mask made of ignorance towards suffering of others?

Look into your own eyes in the mirror

And try to evade the above question..

If you’re thinking I’m going to talk about compassion and kindness and mercy, then may be you are mistaken!!

What I actually want to highlight though is the complexity  of human mind (not anatomically). I wonder how could I enjoy a delicious meal while watching television, just five minutes after reading an article on the condition of slum dwellers in Mumbai. Obviously my mind was numbed by the joy my taste buds provided it with.

OK. Well I think that I am going to talk about compassion and ignorance. Continue reading. So let me throw some light on what I read about the condition of slum dwellers in Mumbai. Kids over there, at times, have to kill rats and feed on them. Other alternative may be collecting grass grown near a pool of stagnant water or some ponds (where we better-offs would chose to shut our noses and mouth). Lack of education and opportunities make working in nearby hotels as waiters, a dream job. They rattle junk materials in search of metals and to differentiate them. And so on. And I pledged that I would not waste any food thereafter. But I couldn’t keep my own promise; may be because I am not ‘Chulbul Pandey’ of our typical Bollywood movie ‘Dabangg’, whose famous dialogue goes like, “Ekbaar jo maine commitment kardi to phir main khud ki bhi nahi sunta.” ( “if I commit once , then I do not even listen to myself.”). Also I am no Mother Teresa and likes. So what can I do? And a prequel to this question is, “Do I need to do anything?”

I read all sort of bad articles, news on atrocities being committed in this world, in present, in history, and those that will take place in near future. I get moved, both emotionally and literally. I take a step ahead and forget. I may remember all the bad things that have happened in he past and get depressed but not once do I think of those underprivileged, I read about in the past, and then get depressed. I need to be keep myself abreast with such news to feel bad about them, or passionate about them. And I think most of the people reading or not reading this piece of article share the same story.

Well, as for now, I do the minimum I can do to help the underprivileged. I hope I raise myself to the platform where I will be competing in the field of philanthropy. For now, I need to compete in other fields to feed my stomach and my ambitions. The starvation for philanthropy is yet not felt by me. It's concealed and subjugated by the selfishness and greediness of my mind, just like those kids’ starvation is concealed by them, behind the veil of ignorance, helplessness, capitulation to their fate…

 Watch the video of this NGO 'Kartavya', also listed among 20 successful nonprofits started by students across the world

Image source: http://www.sonrays.org/2011_05_01_archive.html