HOPE....

My eyes failed to see the innocuous sign-board posted on an obscure part of the road…thus I trudged on, halting at intervals to consult my weathered road map, squinting my tired eyes to locate the minimized replica of the rickety causeway on it and instantaneously, sighing in defeat. Night was fast approaching…’night’-this was an ominous word for me…it sent a spine-chilling cube of ice, sliding mercilessly down my back. As the fiery red and yellow globule dropped cunningly behind the majestic mountains, the world seemed to be plunged into a massive ink-pot, dark and dreary…The sight was a confounding one, like the wicked flash of the camera, the blinding flash, followed by a shocking darkness…But I was prepared for all adversities…hundreds of angry fireflies remained imprisoned in my glass jar, shaking furious wings at me as I carried the jar in my hand…Nature tortured into submission yet again…Thus I walked on.
Thud! What lay at my blistered feet was a stubborn old sack, lying in the middle of the road with the irritating defiance of a deaf man who has been asked to put his hearing aid on, but refuses to do so on the pretext that it deafens his ear!...Sitting on my hunches, I turned the sack upside down and the word- HOPE stared back boldly at me…In spite of its unattractive outer appearance, the bowels of the sack promised rewards of the highest order…My eyes were drawn towards it…with shaking hands I untied the silver string constricting the neck of the sack…in sank my eager hands into the gaping pit…Right! Left! Right! Left!...like a hunting dog, my hand sniffed out every nook and corner of the sack…and finally, what emerged from the alluring mine was, dull, suffocating misery….the sack was empty after all…Yet, some unintelligible force kept pushing me on…pushing me, egging me on…to Hope…Time and again, I met with crushing defeat…waited patiently by the letter-box for some tidings of reciprocated love to arrive…and kept waiting all my life…Hope, as I saw her, was wicked and vile… a sadist to the core and yet, the soft feminine jingle of her colourful glass bangles softened my heart, restored my faith and there I was again…hoping against hope once again…yet again…again and again…and again.
One fine summer morning, taking the long walk back towards the gate of Infinity, I happened to see the obscure sign-post that I had overlooked earlier….It read in bold red letterings- HOPE…BUT IN VAIN.

MUSIC...

A soft suggestive tune drifted through the air, halted for a while in serious contemplation, teasing the strained ears, and then, with the sudden agility of a preying panther, pounced upon the eardrums….A warm chill slithered down the spine, poking each rib, strumming the heart-strings, making the feet tingle, the mouth smile…helplessly….
Music always intoxicated her…It popped open within her being, a gigantic bottle of wine….and as the creamy white froth spilled over the gaping mouth of the bottle, the dreamy smile crept stealthily into her face and forced open her parched lips, stretching it like a rubber-band….
That was all she could ask for when asked with sadistic indifference- “any last wish?”…With hands tied tightly, painfully behind her, she tiptoed towards the menacing gallows…one step at a time….and there she stood right below the lip-smacking coiled serpent…down came the black cape over her mesmerisingly beautiful eyes….and the last that the fiercely ‘lawful’ world saw of her was that hauntingly angelic smile…..The smile that tamed Death itself …tamed it with the soft tempting whip of that one musical note….

ANGELS...

"Sale is on! Sale is on!", screamed the over-enthusiastic man outside the majestic portals of the garment store..."Can i get an Angel?", She asked with large hopeful eyes...The man shook his head in mock distress and announced, "we don't sell them anymore"...A thick murky rivulet meandered down her eye...distressed and frustrated, she sat on the jagged edge of an upturned rickety wooden carton on the pavement and waited...waited for her Angel to come...
Across the street from her, on the opposite pavement, big burly men with dirty ropelike tassles hanging from their grimy skulls, sold fresh human flesh...a long chain of early morning buyers stood outside the store, with an air of nonchalence shamelessly hanging about their faces, very much like the dirty ropelike tassles crowning the grimy skulls of the flesh-sellers...
A blue and white bus came charging down the high street like a raging bull and crushed yet another soul under its killer wheels...it honked in victorious delight...a revolting concoction of malicious pleasure, sadistic joy and unadulterated malignant glee burst forth from its exhaust-pipe and blinded the eye...the poor soul lay shrouded in a bloody drape...cold and dead...
Somewhere in the distance, the ear-piercing screams of agony of a housewife could be heard as tongues of fire slithered up her frame in euphoria...The brick and mortar walls stood dutibound senitels and looked on unfeelingly as her milk-white flesh slowly withered and burnt...In the spacious hall, an ageing couple prepared the endless list of invitees for their daughter-in-law's funeral with deep concentration...
Admist this strange celebration of life, She sat on her throne..still...waiting for her Angel to appear...The world smoked and reeked of death and destruction...houses and men burnt like a mere scrap of paper...and yet she waited for her Angel to appear....
She waited and waited...waited for eternity for her Angel to come,not realising all the while that strong white wings had sprouted on her shoulders a long time back...We are all Angels in disguise...sigh! if only we would realise....

CHILDREN OF GOD....

A solitary wooden swing, swinging in distress…
The majestic sand-castle echoing its lonliness.
Paper boats, marbles and kites strewn across the floor…
Unstrung, uncared for…not needed anymore.
Peter Pan lies captivated beneath moth-eaten books in cream….
The magical path to NeverLand now seems a distant dream.
Boxes of scrabble…the stiffled voices of joy…. jungle-gyms stand empty…
A cruel cruel ploy!
And as glasses of untouched ice-cream shed creamy tears in brown…
God let go of the reins with a warning frown…..

( THE PIED PIPER OF HAMLIN CAME ON GOD'S URGENT CALL...HE IS STILL THERE, POLISHING HIS MAJESTIC PIPE AS LITTLE PARTHO SCRUBS AWAY THE PROUD BLACK BOOTS OF MR.SEN...PARTHO WON'T BE DOING THAT FOR TOO LONG NOW...HE WON'T...)

PEACE..AT LAST....

Spiders, cockroaches and unidentified winged insects have infested the locker-rooms of my heart...there were no bloody skirmishes, no tedious wars...i submitted without a fight...simply held open the gates and in they trooped, fifty thousand blotchy scrawly creatures, beating triumphant drums of victory, majestically, trooped into my kingdom...my heart...
I was a weak queen, who could not hold on to the reins of her chariot...A weak queen who gazed at the world through translucent pink shades and smiled in delight...a queen who juggled tiny earthern 'bhars' on the shamelessly-balding stretches of the Maidan, blissfully complacent....and a queen, who intentionally kept her doors and windows unbolted and thrown open at night....
My poor patchworked heart!...It had been operated upon too often... A mercilessly-menacing pair of silver scissors, barring its saliva-dripping canines, ripped through the soft red flesh a million times...excruciating pain blinded my eyes with silent, forceful tears...then came the sadistically winking needle...thus continued the hellish task...the gory unfinished jigsaw puzzle, hoping against hope to be spared the slow-poisioning...and yet the needle took the sharp dives, swam on underwater through soft quivering flesh and emerged on the surface again in euphoric delight...and oh!..the pain of it all...my poor patchworked heart that bore it...My poor poor patchworked heart!
The secret would go to the grave with me...the fact that i had sealed a deal with the present occupants of my heart...My heart had been ravaged, plundered, it's blood spilt again and again and again...ravaged by thoses very beings to whom it opened wide the doors and windows of its castle...in they came and broke down yet another carefully constructed wall...The souls i trusted with my bounteous heart...left me maimed, mutilated for life....
Hence i resign...retire...let go of the reins and sigh.....
The spiders, cockroaches and unidentified winged creatures would do better justice to my poor patchworked heart....they would....yes, they would....

A BREATH...

The sky was not the right shade of purple…it desperately needed another coat of paint to convince itself that it was more than just a filmsy backdrop to a melodramatic world of damsels in shining armour and knights in distress over the sudden loss of their gallantry. At the high street, melancholy stray dogs stood in a tight circle and took in turns to bark aloud the sad tales of their wretched lives spent on four wretched legs. A lethargic halogen lamp, precariously hanging from the summit of a wobbly lamp-post, winked intermittently, rather shamelessly, at the moon. Occasionally, neighbouring trees exchanged formal pleasantries after a hard day’s work…the rustling leaves adding soft melody to the silent din of the night, an insipid occurrence in an irritatingly-insipid night ...and yet, nothing felt right, the sky still seemed too bright for the night…was there not enough paint left in the gigantic tin-can?...’Maybe there is!’, smirked back the moon at me..’Maybe I just hid it in some discreet corner of the attic-room where no one would find it for a while…and then, for that little while, I would drape myself in colours bright…for once, I would throw back my head and laugh…intoxicated with sublime happiness, I would do away with those suffocating iron shoes and gavotte on the roof-tops of this sombre world…for there comes a time in every existing being’s life, when that being, in a sudden burst of joyful realization, remembers to breathe…to live…to smile…’

WINGS....

There was a time...many a thousand light years ago, there was a time when i used to have wings...brick-red wings of recycled newspaper that my Maker had put together with tedious concentration and unflinching dedication....by the time this Herculean task had been completed, Heaven reeked repulsively of Dendrite, wet paper and divine sweat...but nonetheless, there stood my wings...brick-red wings of recycled paper...!...Thus, off i flew into the night air....dodging the ash-coloured bales of cotton suspended in the limitless sky, i flew on...and on..and on...The wind whistled softly, flirtatiously in my ear...i blushed a little...and then sailed on...and on..and on..and on....
Suddenly, a papery hand ticked the nape of my neck...my head turned impulsively...a flash of brick-red caught my eye...my Maker had been careless afterall...i clicked my tongue in disapproval..and yet my eyes refused to budge from the loose strip of coloured newspaper that held on tenaciously to dear life...my eyes refused to budge, attracted all of a sudden to the curious scribblings on the surface of the paper...a hand reached out and tore the strip from its root....the eyes travelled over the printed word...a light-bulb lighted up somewhere deep in the crevices of my being...i smiled a knowing smile...shook my head in witty contemplation and thus,let go of my papery appendages....the wings were of no use to me anymore...the airy sea had been conquered..there it lay tamed and purring contentedly in the palm of my hand, captured in bold black letterings...the wings were of no use to me anymore....
Or so i thought, as i shut and bolted my doors and windows, complacently ignoring my Maker's defeated sigh from above.....

ALONE...SO ALONE....

The last time I felt this marooned was when i sat huddled up in my oversized maroon tunic and white blouse in a roomful of screaming, shierking, screeching beings with my leathery sheild containing alphabet-books and skeptically-pointed pencils held my defencively before my perplexed countenance...a mere child of five and a half years of age....And now as I sat at my french poetry-scribbled weather-beaten desk,the same menacing feeling of isolation crept back again...slowly, stealthily it slithered into my being..i looked around at the colourful sea of humans around me...humans who thumped each other on the back, smiled and winked... and humans who all seemed blissfully oblivious to my existence...A few faces i recognised..faces of friends who had just the other day rubbed happy shoulders with me...but now i was no more than thoses fiery words of poetry scribbled in a bout of poetic frenzy on the weather-beaten desk...nothing but an endless,meaningless plank of wood that would eventually fall prey to the merciless hands of Time...

SHADES OF LOVE....

The stubborn hands of his watch refused to budge an inch more...there they stood their ground, on no-man's land, STUCK somewhere between the tenth and eleventh hour, while eddies of worldly dust and black exhaust fumes hovered over him, enervating him...testing his very patience...
Sophisticated animals in iron and steel honked away in blissful oblivion...burping contentedly now and then after satiating their thirst with a good many litres of petrol, they now strolled down the concrete unmoving sea with the air of one who has been well-fed....
I watched him from my position on top of the crumbling brick wall...i have been watching him for about five consecutive days now...his innate impatience with this lethargic life interested me..i fancied seeing him all of a sudden,riding pillion on a majestic white horse, holding on tight to rash little Life...dodging the slowly-moving mass of humanity and flying off into some exotic world....
However,what stirred my interest the most was his drastic change of facial expression the moment bus number 45 lurched to a stop before him...At once, the cresses adorning his perspiring forehead would disappear,his desperate attempts at entertaining a menacing scowl on his visage would attenuate...and an ever-so-tiny smile would take its place...
For there she would be...sitting by the gaping window on the fifth seat from the left...there she would be...and there she was today as well...with her shoulder-length jet-black sheet of glossy hair,she sat a perfect mannequin,her piercing eyes, glistening like two alluring marbles...her lucious pink lips sat pursed in concentration..not daring to pout open...the milky white skin seemed dipped in a blood-red concoction...probably, rose petals that had somehow been shredded,plummaged mercilessly in a mortar and then mixed vigorously with pure heavenly milk...
I climbed in behind him...The claustrophobic existence did nothing to kindle his anger or irritation....he just stood transfixed before her...holding on to the rusty iron-bar overhead,he swayed and stumbled occasionally to the hackneyed rhythm of the crawling bus...blissfully unaware of the rest of the grimy reeking world around him...The eyes just refused to budge...very much like the immobile hands of his watch....Time, as i chose to interpret it, had indeed stopped in its track...This sudden thudding of a pristine little heart among a junkyard of convoluted, manupulating, wicked minds shocked it...freezed it in its steps....and thus, the errily magical moment that passed in a blink, as she gave a fleeting glance to him and as he, softly but sharply drew in his breath...stood captivated in the silvery, translucent web of Time...Time will remember to scribble down the beauty of this sudden moment in its memory-book....i gave a little smile...
Today was 'the day', his eyes seemed to say...will he or will he not, win?...The long long wait...the heat,the grime..the dust,the smoke...fighting it all just to be on the same bus with her...he has to win....my heart swelled with sudden undefined pride as i found myself cheering him on silently...



Oh!...Why hadn't she ever spared more then just a fleeting glance at him?....and oh!...why hadn't she ever trailed her mesmerising eyes from his handsome face down to his hands?...then she would have seen the tiny glittering knife grasped resolutely in those masculine hands...the knife that he used stealthily as she edged her way towards the door..the knife that seemed to take on a life of its own and made a grand gaping hole in the soft leather of her hand-bag...in went an expert hand and out came an assortment of worldly possessions...a sleek cell phone...a beaded little purse...a gold chain and a hair-brush...the hair-brush went back in...and she alighted from the bus, feeling strangely carefree and 'light'.....

WELL WELL..LETS NOT BE CYNICAL YET..THIS WAS JUST ANOTHER SHADE OF LOVE.......

DEATH....

An old fellow had once complained about his dead friends…”I do not find these disappearing acts of theirs’ at all amusing!”…Pardon me if my words sound unpleasantly pregnant with cynicism but I do find Death pretty amusing…in an age when Man has victoriously answered to Nature’s call on the brazen face of the Moon and entrapped the world in a constricting web of red, green and brown wires, Death still rejoices in the deep dark vortex of the Unknown…Bewildered, astounded, stupefied Man continues to drill through but victory is elusive…it sprints gleefully about…chuckles at street corners….scoffs at them all as they, bearing the halogen lamp, march onwards…and thus, the quest continues…..
Death is indeed cynically, sadistically amusing….very few living souls can digest this bit of grim humor without a strong dose of isabgol….and yet we all have to gulp it down one fine insipid, uneventful morning…gulp it down like an unsuspicious cup of black tea…and eureka! Our hackneyed journey on earth is done!
I wonder on my idle vagabond days, who invites Death? A flamboyant purple parchment embellished with sparkling gold vines and creepers, encasing verbose, formal words of invitation….is that how Death creeps in through life’s wide-open gates?….I have never been able to bring my imagination to believe that Death just might be a hunchback beggar in tattered rags…extending out its gnarled wrists, shaking a disfigured aluminium bowl, begging for life itself…and Man is too much attached to this brick and mortal world to give it away in charity. So Death just bulldozes through the carefully constructed walls…spreads its hooked tentacles and sweeps its victim off…off…far far away into the diabolic world of clandestine existence….
So be it…Death is a Chameleon, agreed !…but it is amusing all the same…it amuses me…it amuses my pupils that, having been accustomed to the presence of a living soul around its line of vision suddenly finds that soul living no more! There lies my friend, a smug little smile plastered on her face that will only be wiped away by the unmerciful hellish flames of the electric chullah …there she lies in a state of irritating complacency, not twitching an eyebrow, not scratching her slightly perspiring temple with her long nails…there she lies, yet another tenant of Death....

I AM FREE!

"I am free!",cried he...and dramatically spat on the street...Equally patriotic souls joined in and soon the helpless cemented street lay a pitiable sight...a gruesome battlefield strewn with contentedly-empty beer bottles and smirking cigarette-butts...Freedom has been won...and justified....
"I am free!",proclaimed she...and curling a resolute palm around the yellowing wrist of the five thousand year old skeleton in the desolate museum,crack! broke it in half!...the amputated appendage slipped into her backpack...it would fetch her definite acccolades from fellow revolutioneries...mighty pats on the back and cheers of "bravo!" from all...she smiled in satisfaction...Freedom has been won...and justified....
"We are free!",exclaimed they...and went on a fiery rampage,pulling down brick and mortar...spilling eerily-familiar blood...committing arson..spreading terror and fear....and all because, 'smoking has been strictly prohibited on campus'....They did not stop...did not take a breath...not until fifty odd cigarettes blazed defiantly in fifty odd fingers again...rings of tobacco smoke rose in the night air like victorious soldiers rising from the valley of death with Death itself caged in thick iron cages...Freedom has been won...and justified...again..and again..and again...
Thus, a very happy independence day to all folks there...Freedom has been won..and WILL BE justified indeed!

RAINDROPS...

Sprays of water hit my face like a million tantalizing pin-pricks...rain-sodden curtains lent their master touches to this mischievious artwork by gently carressing my countenance whenever the billowing monsoon winds buoyed them up and i lay sprawled in blissful submission to Nature's silken brush-strokes. A solitary crow was ambling slowly, resentfully towards the safety of my window-ledge from its precarious positon on the rusty garder hugging the drain-pipe of my brick and mortar existence...Honking, belching beasts in iron and steel passed below...the monotonous yet alien swish! slosh! indicated that the beasts were wading through tea-coloured water..there will be the careless yet violently religious offerings made to this holy waterbody..an interesting potpourri of empty coconut shells,torn slippers,half-eaten-and- the-rest-forsaken cucumbers,tomatoes and loafs of bread,yellowing pages of daily locals dating back to 2001 and the occasional stray dogs,impersonating wild ducks...Now and then, the overcast sky in its menacing black and threatening grey burped in contentment...a sudden blinding flash followed by a resouding crack! and there we were, caught unaware...framed for eternity in our most candid expressions!...Towering coconut trees flapped their green wings in a desperate attempt to fly...they wriggled and swayed...dropped a few pregnant coconuts in distress and yet stayed rooted to the soil...crows, sparrows and the rest of the winged creatures smirked at this futile act of desperation...and then,spreading their own feathery appendages, floated away in the dark tumultous sea above....Men continued their tedious journey below....wading through all watery barriers,hoisting up colourful apparels,clutching canopies over their heads...cursing....growling....and intermittently,missing a step and slipping....Yet,admist all the cacaphony..the hustle, the bustle and the plaintive whistle of the shuddering traffic-police...some naughty little Fellow Above kept clicking away His camera at leisure!

ROSE BUDS....

He was there all the while...like the inconsequential lone light-bulb, ungraciously gracing the white-washed wall in every single scene of the sixty minutes motion picture...he was there all the while....but my eyes saw him not.They were too busy satiating their visual hunger for greater things..things that shone and sparkled in the sun..things that left one shocked,stupified,stupended..things that danced cunningly before my vulnerable eyes like alluring little fireflies...and then,as i reached out my hand,off they flew into oblivion leaving behind an erotic trail of chuckles and smirks.
He left behind a shy little rose bud in my lizard-infested letter-box everyday...a rose-bud for me...like pursed lips they sat silent in my flower-vase only incurring my irritation at their passivity....by and by,they all met the same dishonourable fate...rubbing delicate shoulders with eggshells, rotten tomatoes and intricate fish-bones, they slowly lapsed into non-exsistence...Thus, without realisation, i kept plundering his heart...almost a sadist,i derived joy in making him cry...and yet,the silent lovers kept appearing in my lizard-infested letter-box.
He tried erecting the strongest of earthly walls around me to keep me protected...standing senitel at the great iron doors,he spent infinite sleepless nights.Armed with a menacing sword, he paraded the grounds, ready to cut, slash and burn...singular beads of sweat united in a deluge of perspiration and drenched his being, ugly black rings circled his deep-river eyes...and yet he stood his ground.I saw it all from my window above...silently cursing him all the while.
His laments tore through the night air making hyneas recoil in fear...the cries of anguish...of loss, shattered window-panes,snuffed out glowing candles,made scavenging rodents scurry back to their burrows,aghast....I had cheated him...broke through his protective bars and escaped into the seemingly free world...my mendacity shocked him..but as the tears slithered down his grimy face,i hooted and jeered..oh! how i despised his mawkish nature!....and thus i left him...a defeated man....
It had been three days..just three days in the free world...and i had been sucked of all life...there i lay in the dust,crushed, beaten...choked and throttled...all that my eyes encountered were brisk footfalls and all that my ears heard were nasty catcalls...the heavens rained no mercy on me...the earth remained parched....shockingly dry.
It was then that my pregnant lizard-infested letter-box burst open with a mighty crack!..and out spilled blood-red roses..pouting and bright...the lips had finally opened,they were pursed no more.....and as i took them up in my writhered arms,they seemed to snuggle closer...warmth spread through my cold shuddering frame,shot through my heart and spilled out in silent retribution through the corner of my eyes...i realised,i was finally alive again.....
'I love you' was easy to utter...shamelessly,remorselessly i let the words spring forth from my mouth...But he shook his head and said.'let it stay the way it was before...'
Thus,he continues to be there...the lone insipid little light-bulb ungraciously gracing the white-washed wall in every scene of the sixty minutes motion picture.....and the silent rose-buds keep arriving in my newly erected lizard-free letter-box..but the only inconsequential abberation here is that...now,i wait for hours on end to hear the rose-buds speak...speak those very words that earlier i had not the ear to hear....

FREEDOM....

A narrow rivulet of translucent sweat meandered down my temple...paused a while in silent contemplation at the bridge of my nose, only to steer right, and then took the mighty plunge into the deep dark heaving crevice below hidden ever so cunningly by my faded green dupatta and i gave a tired sigh....
The seemingly tamed serpent in iron and steel slithered along its metallic tracks...a whirlwind of 'Heavenly smoke' from an idle smoker's middle-aged cigarette-butt and grains of earthly dust nudged the lethargic blades of the rusty ceiling-fans above,giving but momentary respite to the passengers below....and the ailing serpent crawled on through the concrete jungle....
The resolute little ant slipped the thirteenth time....sliding down the glass-pane, it hit the dirt-clogged sill below with a silent thud! However, regaining composure with the air of a ruffled hero,it continued its up-hill climb...
A blurred kaleidoscope of red, blue, green and grey,symbolic of terraced hills,harnessed rivers and cultivated plains swam by...ocassionally,the gnarled ribs of trees caught my eye...i shuddered at the sight of its petrified leaves...it seemed almost dead...dead and embalmed...The sun hooted...its cynical laughter echoed in my ears...i could hear the earth writhing in pain and distress...the earth was being tossed over and over in the hot saucepan..it was being roasted alive...the terrible nauseatic stench of burning flesh attacked my nostrils again....i gave another tired sigh....
The minutes ticked away menacingly,the serpent echoed this warning in the mundanely rhythmic chugging of its wheels...the heat bore down on me,oppressing my spirit, making my patchworked heart grimace in excruciating pain and all the while, the rivulet of sweat continued its journey into the dark vortex of oblivion....
I could take it no more...red-hot anger burst through my veins,the unseen shackles held on to my being like a constricting python..tighter..tighter...my breath came in short uncertain puffs...Earth turned a nasty brown like overcooked onions....and i wrenched open my clumsily sequined cloth coffer,delved a greedy hand into its pregnant interiors and in a final act of difiance,threw all my wordly possessions out of the window...my coffer gaped at me in derision...i smiled back at its chagrined countenance!
"Ticket!", "ticket!"...the conductor stretched out his shamelessly greedy palm..a self-styled beggar,demanding to be fed...i smiled ...the same peaceful smile...he did not smile back...his bushy brows started crawling slowly,threateningly towards each other....i had sinned..there was no redemption....it would come...my freedom would come....the minutes held their breath in suspence...and then, as i had expected 'the civilised Man' to behave, i got pulled up from my seat and then, a push...a mighty push...a push....and that is all i remember....
They do not sell newspapers in the Other World...but they do carry tidings from the breathing world to this one now and then...i heard that i had landed on a pavement..my blood had created quite a gory masterpiece there...people had gathered,bewildered,excited...the Press had taken pictures of me...and in all of them,i had this peaceful, angelic smile on my face....