And it rained last night...

she stood at her door at 10.30pm and watched it fall…rushed to make a cup of tea…she loved tea in the rain…she watched them fall…drop by drop…so many drops…coming down in gentle little streams like beads…the leaves on her tree looked like they were coated in silver…and the flowers were all like downcast eyes…shy by the way the drops were making them feel…she felt kinda a bit like that too…but in a sad way…first rain in her new home…first rain alone…first thunder with no one to run to…so many firsts…stretched her hand out to feel them…took one tiny step to get a bit closer…another step…and another…and then she felt them…and they didn’t wash away her pain…they took it deeper in…into places from which they can never escape…
Closed her eyes…love the way rain sounds…rhythmic…like a hundred heartbeats…her ears longed for one that her heart could be synchronised with…the scent of the earth filling up her senses…so pure…so familiar…after so long…like the way it makes your heart beat fast when you get a whiff of someone you used to love so much…all the memories come pouring back…car drives…smiling…hands…twinkling eyes…a song on their lips…the shadows of the rain on the car’s roof…and she cried…she tried so hard not to but she did…the rain and her tears merging together…no one would ever know….

she was just a girl in the rain…

Red Umbrella…

I got a beautiful bright red umbrella as a present last evening…and I love it…pretty wooden handle…those long umbrellas with lovely black spokes and little wooden dots at the ends of each spoke to ensure that you don’t poke your eye or someone else’s…one of those lovely umbrellas that cover you entirely…and I couldn’t help but think of what a lovely present that makes…how thoughtful…like saying you want to shelter the person…keep them from harm…always be the one you reach for when its dark and deary and you want to feel protected…a special present…especially cos I love red…love how wild that looks…in a world full of black and dull umbrellas, I always smile when I see a bright one…and maybe looking at my silly umbrella, someone will smile and go out and buy a bright one…and then someday, there will no longer be black umbrellas…only happy smiley ones…That’s my silly world…that’s silly me…

Fragile...

Ever felt fragile…like the tiniest muscle in your body has the power to shake you up…
Last night I hurt my already weak right wrist…and all I could think of was how I’d manage…its just a wrist but…a wrist I was so careless with…a wrist I use so much…misuse even more…a wrist that will heal…a wrist I’ll misuse yet again…
And that’s just my wrist…I do it with every part of me…
I take such care of my mind…how I think…what I say…how it affects me…
Do I take care of my body enough…it has to last me a long time…what am I investing in it now to ensure it survives all the wishes and dreams and goals my mind is churning out by the moment…

got me thinking...
We take some of the most delicate parts of our life for granted…and its not just other people and what they do for us…more often its just us and what we do for ourselves…

Waiting...

Ever felt like you’re waiting….just waiting…
Unsure of what…unsure of whom…unsure…but waiting…

Stood at my door…warm mug of earl grey…always settles my nerves…after the wonderful day I had had, what was it that I wanted…no clue…

I thought of all the times I just wait…
- wait for someone to push me to do things I fear…
- wait for the right moment to say it…
- wait for the right words to come together…
- wait for someone to reach out to me…
- wait…
- wait…
- wait…

why do I need anyone or anything…I am complete in myself…I have all I need to keep me going…
and yet I wait…

silly girl…

I'm All Mine…

I’ve her eyes…they’re bright…that light is mine…
I speak his words…they have a quiet strength…that power is mine…
I live her fears…they’re real…the tears are mine…
I’ve her feet…they keep walking…the path they take is mine…
I've his hands…they can shape…the creation is mine…
I’ve got her mouth…it smiles…that happiness is mine…
I’m all of them…I’m all mine…

Was thinking about how much I’m not me…and yet so uniquely me…I’m pieces of all the people in my life…physical…emotional…visible…hidden…not me…yet all me…
With every new person…new experience…I’m evolving…not changing…just adding on…each addition makes me more me…it’s a fascinating process…sometimes I see it and at other times I don’t…but its happening even as I write this…I’m altering my image of me in my mind…

I’m just pieces…but pieces that come together…that coming together is magic…that magic is mine…

Going Home 1...

The thought of going home…makes me feel like a little peacock in the rain…makes me feel like running about hugging people…makes me feel like jumping up and down…makes me feel like packing my bags right now even though my trip is 8 days away…only 8 days!!...i should panic…so many lists to make….so many instructions to leave…but I’m too elated…I’m in the air…I’m going home…I just had to say I want to come home and everything else is taken care of…why they love their silly child so much remains a mystery to me…?!

Home is ma’s hugs and madness…home is my brother and his music….home is pa and his protective arms…home is my little doggie – auggie and his crazy loving…home is granny and her crazy talks…home is where I should be…home is where I am all the time…in my mind…in my heart…

I foresee many many more posts on this subject…hence the ‘Going home 1…’
: )

Wishes...

wishes have a way of coming true…even when you don’t consciously wish…

what is it with wishes…since we were young, that’s what we keep doing…from the fallen eyelash…to going through tunnels…to stars…to wells…so many ways that we keep wishing for things…people…emotions…out of our reach…
my favorite has always been looking at stars…in a city like Bombay that’s do-able…with the odd 7-8 stars that one gets to see, your list can remain fairly short…which takes me to the most spectacular sky I ever saw… Bhinsar…higher than Nanital, Ranikhet & Almoda (wrong spelling for certain!! My mother’s adventurous outdoor-y brothers will shriek if they ever saw me spell it so…)…oh that night sky was more than just the sky…it was the whole package….sitting outside this little cottage…no electricity…just a hint of the mountains…the smell of chilled green grass and earth…a cool summer breeze…the warning that a panther lurks in the vicinity…the candles and matchbox lying close to us…the midnight blue sky peering out through what seemed like millions and millions of stars…each trying to outshine the other… that night, as a little girl who felt you had to wish on every star, I went crazy cos I take these things damn seriously…

of course, the story has undergone the changes that nostalgia and time permit…every time I tell it, I add a few thousand stars…make them shine brighter…make the grass smell better…breeze cooler…but the one thing that remains constant is the feeling I get when I close my eyes and think about it…one thing that remains constant is the way I wish upon stars…one thing that remains constant is the desire to keep wishing no matter what…one thing that remains constant is me…

Smile...

When I moved into my new home, I found myself all all alone…no good morning…no one making me my morning tea…no hugs…no nothing…the first people I came across everyday were strangers…and I didn’t know it then but I was trying to change that…
Every morning, at the end of my 4 min walk from home to the gate, I used to turn to the security cabin and give the security guys my biggest ‘good morning’…and then I’d cross the road and hop into an auto to take me to the station…my criteria for picking an auto was the automan’s smile…one particular auto man stood out…not only did he smile nice, he also returned my good morning with an equally enthusiastic one…unlike the security men who looked at me like someone from Mars…
And that’s how it began…three and a half months down the line and manoj, the smiley auto man has been outside my gate almost everyday… if I’m late, he calls to check on me…if I know I’ll be late, I call to let him know…he even insisted on charging me less saying that ‘my good morning’ was worth more…no that’s not acceptable…he even has a second smiley auto man lined up for the days he can’t make it!!...
Oh…I’ve had a lot of friends tell me this is not normal and I should be careful…but I don’t want to live a life where I trust no one…doubt every nice gesture that someone makes…I’ll take the chance…
I’ve made friends among strangers…even the old security men smile just a little and mumble what sounds suspiciously a lot like a ‘good morning’!!...
I don’t begin my day alone…it’s a good feeling…and now I’m making friends in the train too…just smile friends…but atleast its not a world full of strangers…it’s a world that dares to smile back because I dare to smile…

Sketched over 3 extremely bumpy...jumpy...shaky auto rides...have to give manoj a copy : )

She sat alone on the bench…

She sat alone on the bench…letting the wind move her as she sat silently still on the bench…an ordinary bench…an extraordinary bench…simple rough workmanship…delicate complicated memories…she watched the leaves as they drifted down…drifted on…she let out a sigh…she’d drifted away…safely…sanely…happily…away…
She was happy most of the time…she was doing so well…
The breeze wrapped her hair around her…exposing just how vulnerable she still was…she tried so hard not to let her eyes give it away…but they did…they always did…

Movie...

Ever felt like you’re in a movie and you’re doing all these things…making all these mistakes…taking wrong turns…looking for intruders in the dark…opening that dreaded door…passing the same street that he did just minutes before…sitting in your fav breakfast place without knowing that he will be sitting there 30 mins later…
Feeling like you’re the only one who does not know what is going to happen or what is happening…while everyone is watching you and knows what awaits you…they wisely know that its foolish to walk through the house in the dark…that something is gonna jump at you when you open the door…and they hold their breath or cover their eyes as they wait for your scream…and sure enough you scream…
And they shake their head and shed a tear when they think of how meant for each other you and he are…and of course you will be together…and they know it cos you’re the main cast and this is a love story…
You’re the only one who does not know…

Moments...

A bag of shells
The chime of bells
A few leaves
Photographs in heaps…
That’s all we’re left with
Of moments we loved…
Moments we can near touch…
But moments captured
Remain just so…
Captured…
Got to learn to let them go…
Let the moments flow…

A striking face
So full of grace
Haunting eyes that controlled my mind
That’s all we’re left with
Of people we loved
People we can never touch…
But images captured…
Remain just so…
Captured…
Got to learn to let them go…
Let the moments flow…

(Wrote this years and years ago in college and my friend actually composed the music for it and we had plans to make a music video featuring the two of us!! Good days those were…)

Sketching...

Sketching…
pencil scratching paper
In search of an impression
of my heart…
the sound like the shuffling feet
of mice hiding
in my head…
fingers rubbing the sharp lines
blurring boundaries
between the two…

Arth...

koii ye kaise bataa ye ke vo tanhaa kyo.n hai.n
vo jo apanaa thaa vohii aur kisii kaa kyo.n hai.n
yahii duniyaa hai to phir aisii ye duniyaa kyo.n hai.n
yahii hotaa hai.n to aakhir yahii hotaa kyo.n hai.n

ek zaraa haath ba.Dhaa, de to paka.Dale daaman
usake siine me.n samaa jaaye hamaarii dha.Dakan
itanii qurbat hai.n to phir faasalaa itanaa kyo.n hai.n

- kaifi azmi

this song from ‘Arth’ always does something to me…
there is a helplessness…a feeling that you really have a grip on nothing…but you still long for that something… that someone…

Her...

she looks at the past
from the corner of her eye…

(sketched her last night…I don’t know who she is…not sure how much of me is in her or her in me…)

Mehndi…

Had called one of the art kids, Sali (as we call her with love) to office cos I needed some help…and I casually mentioned how much I thought of the mehndi she had put on my palm when I’d made a surprise visit to her home during id…
I still remember her home…this little space…smaller than a cupboard…but just as crowded as one…and I still remember how I sat there…like a little queen I was treated…the stove was on…and there was a mustard glow all over the room and the number of colours and textures was almost infinite…there were bundles and bundles of brightly coloured clothes stacked up…the mat I sat on was a lovely hay brown…the colour of the floor…the colour of the metal sheets that made up her walls…and within it all, I felt this love and warmth that I cannot describe…that night, I realized that space is something in your heart…and she’d taken out this little cone of mehndi and squeezed out the last few drops on my hand, it flowing out into the most intricate pattern…and the love I felt…felt my heart squeeze by its tender hold on me…
So Sali walks into office this morning with a mehndi cone and I was delighted…it’s a working day and I’ve got stuff to do but hey, how could anyone resist that twinkle in her eyes as she lay the cone on my desk…
So after lunch, she sits real close and asks me what I want done on my hand…guess?...leaves I say…lots of them…and as she holds my hand gently and begins…I look at her bent head…and then close my eyes…I feel the cool of the mehndi on my palm and I feel the warmth of her affection…that’s what will give it is beautiful colour…and I can’t help but hug her later and thank her for the lovely gift…she took my loneliness away…she made me think of something other than me…
Mehndi…what magic it is…imagine how tough it must be to be mehndi…imagine how people put you on, only to take you off…imagine they go to extreme lengths to ensure you stay, just waiting for you to go and see what you leave behind…they scrape you out with a knife!...and you still give them what they expect…every time…all the time…
Imagine what you leave behind is more critical than what you gave while you were there… wow…its kinda like what you’d want your life to be like…no…no…don’t mean that people should wait for you to go and scrape you out with a knife…but that the mark you leave behind, and your fragrance, lingers and lingers and makes others happy….

Thinking...

Door open again…its almost 9.30pm and I’ve got a delicious mug of Earl Grey tea with lemon and honey and as I stand there with the mosquitoes and cricket like creatures outside my door…after a day feeling lonesome, I thought I should give it all some thought….
Sometimes, I feel like leaving it all and running away…I’m not sure where too…I’m not sure what from…I’m not sure why…just this message Heart sends to Feet…that Head rejects instantly… and Hands cover Eyes…and in one unanimous move, they shed a tear or two together… understanding each other’s limitations…and yet not quite getting it…
And I’m feeling all this…and still standing with my door wide open, smiling at life as it passes me by…lost in the heady fragrance of the white flowers...
Smiling at how alive I am to myself and what’s happening within…
Smiling at how open I am to more of life…

Its gone…and that will go…

Very weird…but feeling very lonesome today…got up with this feeling that something is amiss…there’s something I’ve lost…or something I’ve left behind…you know that feeling when you feel you put something into one of your jeans pockets…you don’t realize that you’ve lost it and then one day it hits you…its gone….that feeling that its with you and will be always…but its gone…and the harder you look for it, the further it seems to go…its gone…
That’s how I’m feeling right now…like I’ve lost something precious…and I don’t even know what it is…and as I type this in, I mourn its loss and I consol myself…
Its only when you’re free of its hold on you…and when you’re happy…and you’re walking down the street on a pretty morning…and you slip your hand into your pocket…and your hand smiles…cos you’ve found it…its been washed and dried…it clean and shiny…its wrinkled and scarred…but you still love it…time can’t change how it makes you feel…and you’ll keep it carefully…
i wait for that day...
This feeling I have right now…it will go…I promise myself that it will go…

Ever felt a morning...

Tis a beautiful beautiful day…got up feeling as good as new…got up late after ages!...first thing I did was run to the living room to see if the broken branches I had rescued from my tree had flowered…four shiny happy white flowers stared back at me! Made my day…
went for a walk and just kept walking…submitted myself to my senses…letting my feet take me away for as long as they wanted to…no thinking involved at all…picked up lots of strange flowers…smelt them…felt them…oh just did nothing and did not keep track of time…it’s a good feeling to not follow a schedule…I should let myself go more often…

In the Morning…
Ever felt you can smell life…
Ever felt the earth stretching to a new day…
Ever heard the sound of anxious little baby birds looking for their mamas…
Ever seen dogs walking about looking busy…
Ever smiled at the sight of old people sitting around and chatting…
Ever felt like the trees seem to bow a little when you pass them…
Ever felt the bark of a tree in the morning…cool to the touch…
Ever felt that the leaves are falling just for you… : )
Ever seen how happy the clouds look…
Ever got up so early that you felt that you were the only person alive…
Ever felt like you’ve lost the day if you got up after the sunrise…
Ever looked at the rising sun and felt goose bumps at the sight of such pure beauty…
Ever seen how dogs curl up to sleep on the sunniest spot on the street…
Ever lit an incense stick first thing and felt its fragrance seep into your hair…
Ever seen how music sounds clearer in the morning…
Ever felt you looked most beautiful in the morning…
Ever rejoiced at the way cold morning water feels on you…
Ever loved the way wet hair feel as the little drops fall down your back…
Ever felt like the whole day should just be one long morning…

Ever felt a morning…

Open Door...

I made a big big discovery last evening….
After a Saturday spent in blissful solitude…and no human contact at all (unless you include meeting the fruitwala, human contact…),I wanted my Sunday to be drastically different… so come evening and I sit with my door open…floral skirt…flowers in hair…coffee in hand…bare feet…floral incense burning…flowers all around me…a restless breeze…sketch book in hand…ready to capture anything that moves…
looking kinda like a gypsy as Yuv would describe me…kinda lost…kinda alone…kinda happy with myself…kinda carefree…kinda i-don’t-care-what-they-think…kinda totally me… : )
and the most incredible stuff beings to happen…

- I meet a neighbor and find out all about my tree and fall more in love with it…
- Aaji (granma) next door, invites me to a bhajan…
- The crazy big dog who always frightens me with the intensity with which he looks at me and then comes running and jumps on me…came upto me…bent his head and sniffed my hand…a submission of sorts…I think we are now friends!
- The little cat that one lonely evening came into my home and slept next to my leg…the little cat that I looked for in vain…she was passing by…saw me…came to me…lay next to me and let me love her…then she looks straight into my eyes…I look into hers and say ‘its okay cattu…I’m fine…you can go now…’ and she leaves…
- and as I wrote this in my journal, I hear guitar man and my heart skips a beat…oh long story but I have to tell short version now…this incredible guy, walks up and down my lane, playing the guitar…his fav song is ‘tie a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree’…and he sings it hauntingly…and I always find a reason to be outside so I can hear him…he’s always in the dark…and the last time I saw him, he walked right upto me…introduced himself and said something flattering about my eyes…and what did I do?...nothing…I just stood there and heard nothing!...i can’t handle things these sudden things…throws me in a tizzy…and he was gone and my slow brain was just about beginning to register the meeting…idiot girl!...

oh I know most of my friends disapprove of this ‘open door ‘ experiment of mine…they have told me in great gory details what can become of me…but really look at all that happened in a matter of a few hours…one awesome tree story…2 neighbors…a bhajan and dinner invitation…a dog…a cat…(let me add here that I also let in a whole family of blood sucking mosquitoes that kept me awake through the night…and a cricket like creature that made a loud crikety sound thru the night…)…great live music and even a coffee invitation…what more could I ask for?! Really…?!

Open your door to life…and life will find a way to reach you…open yourself to hurt and you’ll find love…it takes a lot to open yourself but that’s that only way to experience life in all its beauty…in all its victories and all its defeats…take the first step and then watch how everything around you will come alive and make sense…
My life seems alive…

Trees...

My love affair with trees is probably as old as I am…from as far back as I can recall, I’ve felt a pull towards them…they’ve taught me something about life and about me…I’ve spent many many hours thinking about them…made many sketches…been laughed at, ridiculed… but it never bothered me…I laugh along…this is what I love and nothing anyone can say can belittle it…
my sketches and paintings of trees have marked different stages in my life…

I distinctly remember my first tree…it was not like the usual two lines and green cloud over it…it was full of branches and flowers…I have no idea where the sketch is but I’m sure my ma can track it down…: )

The first almost life size tree that I painted was on a friend’s wall…a blue tree with little mirrors…all dreamy and unreal…where I fell in love with M and will always cherish that wonderful crazy feeling…I have my first photograph with him in front of that tree…I looked madly in love!...my first love and my first special tree…

The next tree was in ma’s house while it was still under construction…pa got a wall painted so that I could paint it…a delicate madhubani tree filled with birds…supporting life…that’s what home is for me…it remains a symbol of all that pa went through to get that house to become a real…all of ma’s dreams…our nest…

Trees 3 and 4 are in my office…a symbol of how much of my life I bring into my work place…a constant reminder to keep giving…

Tree 5 was painted in ma’s courtyard…I love that space…right in the middle of the house and you can feel its pulse…filled with delicious sunshine and the green of the plants…and right in the middle of it is a little bed…my old bed…covered in a blue and green bedcover…lots of soft squishy cushions…oh, how I long to be there…to lay my head down there…and in the corner is a painting of a Franjipani tree…I don’t know why I chose that tree…but I painted that tree at a time when my life was falling apart and all I held close to heart, seemed like it never existed…it was my symbol of survival…

When I got back to Bombay and started to look for a place of my own…nothing seemed to appeal to me…nothing was clicking…I was looking for something I could not put down in my checklist…for that vibe...and then one evening I went to see this little flat far away…as I walked down the lane, and came to the apartment…I saw a Franjipani outside, in full bloom and I knew at that very instant that I had found my home…I did not need to look in, I had already decided…the tree was the deciding factor…it was saying something to me…I never knew what it was…

And then Tree 6 happened…on a beautiful holi morning…on my living room wall…painted only with lots of fingers…all heart and with all my being…unplanned…wild…unreal…many a times as I lay my sleepy head under it, I smile cos it’s a symbol of all that I am…a symbol of all I am capable of giving…unconditionally…

I met a neighbor this evening…She touched the tree outside with obvious love and said ‘I love this tree…she is my mother’…those words startled me…what??...only I get to make crazy statements like that…the tree had special meaning for me…it was the reason I picked this apartment 3 months ago…and now I hear the tree had a connection to someone else… the Franjipani tree was special to uma auntie…her mother always gave her a flower every time she went to her mother’s house and when her mother passed on, her son bought a cutting from the tree and planted it…so my tree was her mother…wow…she had tears in her eyes and I hugged her and told her my story…we stood there…looking at each other…with something as beautiful as the tree forming a bond between us…
It makes sense now…that’s why I loved the house…that’s why I feel so safe…I have a mom standing at my door, protecting me, shielding me…showering me with flowers every morning and evening…how fortunate am i…
My love affair takes another turn…a deeper connection…

(made that sketch ages ago in a manager's meeting that seemed to drag on slowly painfully...i was sketching the franjipani tree long before i knew how important it would become...)

Art…& Me…

I spent a large part of my day yesterday at work, reading about artists, movements and their work…finding images, making notes, picking up interesting trivia…and imagine this was officially ‘work’!!
Doing a session with older kids around realism and impressionism in art…I spent so many happy hours…and I feel so inadequate…I know so little…so many incredible artists to read about…so many paintings to look at…so many associations to make between their life and their work…comparisons to their contemporaries…oh so much…overwhelmed…got to understand and learn more…gonna pick an artist for every week and grasp as much as I can about their paintings…lets see how that goes…

I’ve always been drawn to art…more than any other activity…more than sport (I was too careful a child to let myself get hurt…and not competitive…) more than writing (I wrote too much from the heart and not everyone could deal with that…my english teacher in school killed it to some extent…) more than drama (in an all girl’s school, I got only the male roles and I don’t think I could get into their head then and I sure as hell can’t now…) more than elocution (while I could come up with interesting pieces to write about, I’m terribly shy about talking out) and now that I make this list, art seems to have happened by default!!

Yes, art has always been my sanctuary… it could never hurt me physically…I never felt the need to compete…I was never judged, or rather never cared about what my art teacher had to say…I could do it in a room full of people or by the swings in the playground…it was just perfect…
Art has been with me as long as I can remember…and I’ve got my ma to thank for that…I always had a steady supply of crayons, paper, paints and the latest ones and the most expensive ones…and I guarded them with my life…using them carefully…having a separate set for careless friends…bugged if the paper on my oil pastels was torn the wrong way…particular about the way my brushes were washed and kept to dry…they were like sacred objects of worship that need to be looked after…and yet when I use them, I use them without any hesitation…

Art has influenced me in many way…influenced the way I see the world…influenced the way I feel…influenced who I am…and I’m a better person cos I got art…I’m so fortunate…art is a constant process of discovery…
When I was really little, it was discovering how crayons feel…and make me feel…to feel them become smaller as I used the creamy pastels was fascinating…more fascinating than the traces they were leaving behind…a littler older and I discovered that art can help me get attention real easy! Everyone wanted to see my latest work and really they were quite terrible…older and I saw how much art could help me in getting projects and drawings done in a unique manner…still older and I discovered that I was aping artists that I loved…B prabha’s women used to haunt my dreams and without doing it consciously, I was drawing just like her…I discovered the outdoors and how much I liked to sketch and through that I can see everything around me in more details…my mind breaks them up everything into lines and curves…I see more clearly and I see everything…still older and i discovered what oil paints were like and my life changed…I got my first easel and I felt like an artist…to feel buttery paint submit to your lightest touch on the rough white texture of a canvas gave me a high that nothing else could…the smell turpentine mixed with linseed oil goes straight to my head and is a mix more potent than any alcohol…to see a canvas transform is an exhilarating experience…like bringing life into the world…like catching a moment and freezing it forever…like…oh I could do this forever…

My work is on a permanent exhibit…in my parent’s home…every wall…every corner…has my touch…from my senseless doodles to my most recent intricate trees…they’re all there…my life is on display…my emotions…my memories…and no place can be safer than home…no place as non judgemental…no curator as loving as my mother…no owner as proud as my father…no critic as lovable as my brother…no other place or combination of people can make them look so beautiful…no place can just let them be…

they just let me be…

Stand by / Safe Mode…

I am officially on ‘stand by’ mode for a while…friends have been given the right to slap me for any violations…in person and even via email…slap me hard if I even let my heart flutter!...

I am steering clear of anything that has the potential to harm me…suffering from an overload of harmful elements still floating about in my heart…aggressive means being employed to eradicate them from the very core…think the progress is pretty good…I’m impressed…lesson learnt – no one is un-get-over-able…
Post operative care required…oh…nothing has changed around me…all remains beautiful as always…it’s the insides that keep constantly evolving…discovering, assimilating, growing, learning…and the learnings are not always what we want to learn…
So why is the heart so arrogant…
why does the heart have no self-respect…
why do we operate more from the heart than head…
why do we continue to ignore head’s warnings…
why does the head not have the power to over ride the heart’s decisions…
why do we let the heart give us commands, when that’s the head’s job…
why does the heart take a back seat when the damage is done…
why does the heart lay there looking stupid and not help solve the problem…
why does poor head have to pick up the pieces and keep the show on the road…
why is the heart not closer to the head… major flaw in design…

the leaf gets wiser…
even the harshest of winds can be navigated, if you know how…
the leaf is beginning to lose her bright green…

Keeping moving leaf...

Betrayal is a very bad feeling…betrayal by someone you thought close to your heart feels really really bad…betrayal by someone who advised you on things close to your heart is even worse…for it to happen twice within a month, makes me hurt more…
Lesson learnt…

Phew… this is just a bad phase and you can beat it…try a little harder leaf…push them out of your system…they’re just human…
making the same mistakes as you are…
don’t expect them to know the answers to your questions…
don’t expect them not to falter…
don’t expect them not to think of themselves over you…
don’t expect them to be as open to you as you are with them…
don’t expect them to not lie in your face as they did before…
don’t expect them to think about you…
don’t expect them to think…
don’t expect anything…
let them be…
forget them…

oh, its so easy to say all of the above…reality is not as easy…
keep moving leaf…

Flowers...

Gone again…

He was gone again…gone as suddenly as he came...she shouldn’t feel so bad…this was not new at all…he’d just stayed a little longer this time…they’d talked a little deeper…laughed a little louder…sang a little higher…but it was no different than before…no big deal…she’d live through this as well…one by one they seemed to leave….some left her physically…some emotionally…did not know which was worse…with him, it was both…really, no big deal…
She could picture him…beige shirt…khaki trousers…back pack…calm and relaxed…only his tossled hair gave away his impatience…very much the outdoor person…rugged yet sensitive to the most minutest of her emotions…alive to the smallest details of nature…
The images he took always left her struck by the way creatures responded to him…kinda the way she did…he could get into her head and ease out her thoughts….get her heart to beat so loud that he could hear it…he always captured the gentler side of even the most ferocious creatures…they did not seem to be disturbed by his presence…like he was one of them…he in turn photographed something more than the tangible…he caught something in their eye or the slight movement of their head and the straightening of their ears as they listened…and he listened along with them…engrossed in their world…he smelt the deer’s anxiety…he smelt her fear…he heard the rustle of leaves…he felt the breeze carry the danger…he also heard her heart yearn for her child’s safety…he heard her mind calculate their chances…and that’s the unconditional love he caught on camera…the fear of losing someone you love so much…he could have focused on her struggle and her sacrifice as she fought and then surrendered only when she knew her baby was far away…but no…he caught the moment just before…that moment when life’s purpose becomes all too clear…that moment in which you are revealed…
She held the photographs in her hand and felt so proud….his pictures will never appear in magazines…he would not let them…in them, he said, was a part of him and he’s never sell himself for money or fame…they were alike – him and her….in more ways than either would ever admit…
She wondered when she’d hear from him again…he’d just got up one morning and decide to leave…having no idea what it did to her…why do they always warn you they’ll not be around…why do they then become a part of your life…its just an escape route…a convenient way of getting out of a situation when you’ve had enough…that may be true of others but no…not him…if he knew what he was doing to her, he’d never leave again…
He was a rare kinda creature…she already missed him…but it was a quite type of missing…it was not the type that your eyes and hands felt…it was the type that your heart and mind feel…
She never worried about him when he was away…she had faith in him…and a strange quiet attachment...she looked at the deer again…into her eyes and in them she saw him…the deer knew what she meant cos she’d felt it too…
To love so single mindedly…to love with that clarity and purity…the deer saw it in his eyes just as he had seen it in hers…

The sky most certainly needs a mention this beautifully hot morning… it has character today…always felt that a sky without clouds is like a face without features…expressionless… it’s the texture, the movement, the moods that the clouds bring in that make the sky mysterious…and I love a good mystery…

Is it ever too late…

Relationships…are an enigma to me…just when I think I have a grip on them, they slip out of my hold…like water through my fingers...like silky hair through a piece of ribbon…like a yellow leaf from a tree…like tears…
I just don’t understand them…so I spent a wonderful afternoon and evening with someone…and I don’t understand what happened…a whole lot of questions have been racing through my head and they just won’t stop speeding by unless I put them down…

Can relationships just end?...
Do relationships ever end?...
Can a relationship end without really starting?
Can a relationship restart without really ending?
Can you love someone like crazy?...
Can you then hate someone like crazy?...
Can you then stop loving them?...
Can you unlove them?...
What would make you stop loving someone?...
Does that vary from person to person?...
Can you forgive someone even if they’ve hurt you like nothing or no one else?...
Do traces of that love always stay?...
Do traces of that hurt always remain?...
Can you truly get over someone?...
Who in the world coined the term ‘get over’?! what were they thinking?!
Can you forget?...
Does that thread connecting the two remain forever?...
Can you pick up where you left off?...
Is it ever too late?...

Honestly…I don’t know…an enigma…

More than a Fragrance…

She walked down platform 2 at Cotton Green Station…enchanting little girl…her tiny blouse and flowing skirt wrapped around and being pulled by the wind…her fragile frame painfully visible…her basket of flowers held high…unknown little girl…spreading a sweet sad song as she passed by…a song that the wind played around with and then carried far away…the song’s fragrance lingering around her…there was a grace in her every step…a beauty in the way she moved against the wind…a vulnerability…mixed with a strength…
She held the basket firmly…like it was all she felt she had…like it was her ‘now’ and it held her ‘later’…she looked into her basket…curls and curls of delicate jasmine…intricately woven together by a single coarse strand of thread…
With every sleepy bud that she’s picked, she made a wish…with every twist of her wrist and turn of the string, she’d let a tear roll down…among those coils, lost in that fragrance, lay hidden all that she wanted to be…
They were more than flowers to adorn pretty hair…the fragrance was more than momentary…they were a part of who she was…the only way to continue living her life was to find a way to give away today’s dreams to a stranger so that come tomorrow, she’d have a chance to dream again…

Bare...

I waited too long…and now its just too late…there’s a beautiful tree a little down my lane…two actually…that I simply love cos of how bare they were…on a dark blue night, when the stars and moon were out, I used to love to look through its branches…a dark brown against the midnight blue…its branches so stark and so beautifully shaped down to the thin spindly stems…had planned on capturing this sight on a canvas…the canvas and paints have always been there…the sketch in my journal…but that will…that spark…I don’t know where that’s gone…to the extent that I did not look up at the tree for many many days, fearful that my eyes would show how I felt nothing…
I just assumed that they would stay like that forever…and I would one day get over that block and paint them onto my canvas…that day came…and I looked up…I was in for a shock…it was alight…it was on fire with hundreds of red flowers…and beautiful little leaves…and I stood under it…for the longest time…feeling really ashamed…I had taken it for granted and in that lost out on its big moment…when the first sprig grew out and the first flower opened…how could I have been so selfish…time stops for no one…I stop for no one…why in the world did I think that tree was stuck in time…
All the truths we look for are written in nature…
I picked up one bright red flower in my palm and looked at it in all its glory…life moves on…no matter how bare you get…no matter how much you have lost…it can’t last forever…just part of the cycle…part of the circle…the tree and its flowers told me that…owe it to ourselves to wait for the flowers to bloom cos they have to!

More Shyam…

That face….still haunts me…all day yesterday all I thought was about him…and I can’t put my finger on how I feel…trying to analyze it…

Am I disturbed?
Am I disturbed by him?
Am I disturbed by my inability to act?
Am I just disturbed that I’m disturbed?!
Am I reading too much into this?
Am I going through some crazy heightened state of emotions?
Is this how I’m always gonna be?
Is this a crazy list of questions?
Am I going crazy?

Oh I don’t know…it was just one of those things that happen in your life that you will never forget…but they’ve never happened before…and this one is a toughie to beat…
Gosh that face….that crazy panic I felt when I’d lost him…that mad rush to put down how I felt there and then in the auto…just crazy…K telling me that he thought I was stoned! Me actually wondering if I was!…Surprising myself with the quiver and tears as I read it out…

I got up many times that night…and wondered if I’d dreamt it all up…no no I’m not going mad…then I wondered if i had been in the train but just imagined him…no no he was there…oh…i don’t know…can’t understand why I am the way I am…

Yuv said it best…just be…use this confusion and energy creatively…many more sketches happening…finding new ways of looking at the same old stuff…looking forward to my evenings…never know what’s gonna happen…
Shyam will always stay with me…some things are better left unexplained…this is one of those many…

In the Mind's Mirror...

Shyam…

I saw him the minute I stepped into the train compartment…he stood between the two exists…right in between…a flurry of activity around him…but he just stood there…like his feet were riveted to the floor of the train…yet standing loose…hands on his sides…holding nothing yet hardly swaying…everyone around him maintaining a safe distance…like a ring around him which no one dare cross…yet they treated him like he wasn’t there…
He was the first thing that caught my eye and noticed little else on this journey…my eyes couldn’t move away from him…a strange strange attraction…I took him in…the colour of the night…a lovely rich textured dark brown…close cropped hair…a mouth that was closed and did not once utter a word…a mouth that would have transformed his face if he’d allow it to smile…a little black spot on his chin, barely noticeable… little nose…ears that looked just a wee bit too big but perfectly formed…and the eyes…oh the eyes had me trapped…they were his most striking feature…big…the colour of apple juice…the whites of his eyes a little murky…they had a vacantness about them that made him appear much older than his 10 – 12 years…he wore a sky blue full sleeve tshirt with his little fingers sticking out and a beige pair of oversized trousers that had frayed and his bare feet just about showed…
I watched him with wonder…how could someone so young have eyes so old…so knowing…so distant…so calm…he stood still and only his eyes moved about, casually, in no rush to see anything…taking it in at their own pace…I kept looking at him and waiting for our eyes to meet…they did…twice but so briefly…just a flicker registered…the women kept their distance and winced if he swayed too close and wrinkled their nose…he’s just a little boy for God’s sake, I felt like screaming…it did not bother him…a woman stepped on his foot and I flinched but he didn’t…he just looked at her and then at his foot…
I was a mess…I could not fathom what this boy must be thinking…how tough was his life…at what stage was he…was there any hope…his eyes were dead…a mere body with no spirit and he looked so so small…
I wanted to rush to him…set my bags down…kneel before him…hold his hand and direct his chin towards me…just ask him if was alright…and I did that…in my mind many times…and I wanted to hug him and ask how bad it was…and I did that too in my mind…but I could not move…and I felt so ashamed…and hurt by my reaction…I was no different from the others…
I was afraid he would look into my eyes and I’ll see nothing…I was afraid I would not register…I was afraid he’d push my hand away…I was afraid I’d be rejected yet again…I was afraid I wouldn’t understand…I was afraid I’d make no difference…I was afraid I was incapable of making a difference…
I just stood there and continued to look at Shyam…that’s what he has to be…the night…the sky…so beautiful…so dark…so mysterious…so far away…outside my reach…undiscovered…another world…
And what my nani says came to mind – that God walks among us in different forms, visible only to some…this had to be krishanji…this had to be shyam…who else could capture me and turn me inside out the way this little person had…I felt drawn…I felt life…I felt sadness…
At Andheri…I followed him…the crowd was so dense…he was so small…it engulfed him and I was left searching frantically…pushing people aside…looking for the sky blue in the sea… but I’d lost him…and through my inability to reach out to him, I’d lost a part of myself…oh shyam…someday our paths shall cross again…hang in there little boy…I’m sorry I was just another nobody…

2am…

Its 2 am in the morning…she can’t sleep…sitting in the corner of her bed…a gentle breeze outside but too gentle to reach her…she takes another spoon of chocolate ice cream and feels it make its way down…slow and cold and refreshing…her cure for insomnia…its warm and the mosquitoes are abuzz…evanescence sings in the background ‘you were there but I was alone all along…’
That line held a new meaning now…she closed her eyes and was not sure what to marvel more at – the physicality of humans or their psychology…was it just 15 days ago that she’d found out?...it seemed more like a decade and yet the very next instant it was as raw as ten minutes ago…the ability of the human mind to handle even the most horrifying insight into another mind was incredible…she had actually survived…
Truth had finally had the guts to emerge in front of her doorstep…sneaking up on her…a coward…brought there forcibly…she had stood her ground but broken down…she could not take it…she had broken down at its feet and closed her eyes, hoping it was just an illusion…but no…it still stood there…looming larger than ever…engulfing her…she felt so small and helpless…

She remembered walking down her lane…alone…conscious of the absence of shuffling feet by her side…conscious of no one to share the glorious morning with…conscious of no hand holding hers through the crowd…just conscious of herself as she was…and she realized that’s how it had always been…had she closed her eyes at those times and wondered if it was an illusion, the answer would have been an affirmative…
But a forthnight later…she was amazed at how she was doing…she was her normal self most of the time…okay with being with herself…in fact loving it…music…books…her sketching…she was gonna get out of this and get something out of it…she was walking out with dignity…in her eyes…
She had her flaws and so did he…she’d confronted hers…accepted them…learnt…moved on with a clear conscience…she’ll learn to forgive and maybe even forget…
She smiled cos she knew she’ll love again…with just as much heart…with maybe a little less pain…with maybe someone who’ll feel the same…

Little Shoe…

Walking to the station the other evening, I saw something so little that it touched me…

I saw a little shoe on the road today…
A little shoe
A blue and white shoe
Just one shoe
All alone on the road…all blue…
In the opposite direction to me too..
Lace untied and looking lost
I passed it by
I wished it well…
Cos I know how it felt…
A little lost and by itself…

Connections…

Found an old bracelet hidden away in a box…felt the beads with the tips of my fingers…the most sensitive part of me…I closed my eyes and let the associations with the bracelet run wild… I put it around my wrist and then all of a sudden I heard the click of the clasp closing…my eyes flew open…
Why can’t what we say and what we do, click and connect in the same way…why are the two ends so isolated and distant… we all do it at varying degrees…varying degrees of harm to ourselves and others…
saying you love someone and then lying the next instant…lying close to someone and loving another… it always has baffled me… how does one cope and live with the disconnects in our life…
I’m trying to lead a life where I say as I do and do as I say…I’ve failed very often but I’ve tried…and I still keep trying to stay truthful to me…
And while it hurts tremendously to discover what people really are…I discover a little more about myself in their truths and untruths…I’ve learnt to dig deeper…its stupid and naïve to take people and gestures at face value…it never is as it appears...
Why was I not taught this earlier on… why was I taught to trust those I love… to believe in them… to continue believing no matter how dark they get… to believe that my instincts can never let me down… to believe that people falter on their path and that’s okay…
Why couldn’t I be cold…unmoved…uncaring…capable of moving on without flinching…of pretending nothing bothered me…to continue living…
Why does it always affect me so profoundly… that even as I write this, my eyes betray my strong stand…why…why can’t I be someone else…why can’t I live a false life…I’ve been alone all along inspite of what I was told… just another lie in a long series that went up in the dark sky like a firework…instilling in me the fear to go hide and yet filling me with awe the very next moment…
Awe at all that I can now see so clearly… awe at all that I’ve learnt about me and others… awe at all I wish I did not have to learn this way…
Awe that people are rarely as simple as my bracelet…no connect here…just ends that never meet…ends by themselves…

Pieces...

a wooden chair stood on the side of a dusty lane...watching the children prance by...ignored... unseen... unknown... this chair was unique cos very little of its original wood remained intact... every part of it had been repaired and put together till it looked more like an abstract piece of art... different types of wood... different colours... different textures... even the material used to hold it together varied from nails to strings to wires...
i looked at it and the first thought that occured to me was that it was pretty much a symbol of who we are... so much gets added on... so much gets fixed and patched up along the way that we are hardly what we began with...
i was instantly drawn to to... sat at a respectable distance and sketched it out... could not get myself to go and sit on it... no way...
i felt i could understand it... we are pretty much like the chair... our pieces held together by people... by memories... just puzzles... made up of pieces that don't always fit...

there was a spirit of survial here... there was something here that i wanted... there was a dignity inspite of the wounds... a pride in just being...