the last piece...

She walked into triveni… many many years had passed… not much had changed… the walls adorned a different shade of paint… the chairs looked more worn out… the artists were none that she recognized… the same old relaxed atmosphere… same kinda people yet so different…she headed straight for the table that they always sat at… but it was occupied… she’s kinda particular about these things… so she decided that since she was early she’d go take a look around while the table got free… she walked around aimlessly… stopped a second or two longer at paintings that caught her attention but her mind was not quite there… she was drifting away… unable to stay in the present… its hard sometimes to stay grounded in reality… especially in a place like that… its like walking through a gallery of memories… every corner and every turn, sprang up another moment that they had shared… they leapt at her and she tried so hard to fight them off… but she felt so powerless cos she had, over the years given them so much power… they leapt off the walls… held her feet and closed her eyes… and she fought them off… telling herself not to give in… not to let that colour her decisions… they’d gagged and bound her… held her captive and she could not set herself free… head in her hands she sat at the table and waited for him to arrive… and he did… and she really wished that he would not… if he had just been like all the others, he would have avoided her and gone away… or worse, stayed and hurt her everyday, gnawing at her… but that’s why he was so special… he cared and he was always there to show her that… and she’d grown too used to just the other kind, to know how to deal with this… he ordered a cup of masala tea for himself and a lightly brewed lemon tea for her… and he of course had no idea of the turmoil this visit was creating… why do they waltz in and out of her life like this… really, why?
And they spent an evening sitting together… just touching the surface… not dwelling into anything deeper…cautious, not to bring up anything that would hurt them… sometimes you just need someone there with you… someone who loves you and expects nothing more than who you are… sometimes all it takes is a couple of hours of senseless catching up to make you feel good…and then you go back to where you came from… you go back to all the senseless things you do in search of that one thing that will make sense of who and why you are…
As she paid for their tea and their time together, and they walked out… close to each other in the most remote kinda way, they were gonna step out and go back into their own lives… and they knew this well… their time together was limited and precious and that is all it could ever be… their lives had no place for the other… the only thing that made sense was this and it really made no sense at all…
Her mind blank… blank like the walls in the empty gallery… blank so that anything that was hung there, could catch attention… no one need focus on the wall… that held no relevance… she could do that so well… become the blank wall… hide away her own art… let no one see that her wall was the gallery… with every year, she’d add another coat of paint to it… never wanting the paint to peal off and the real texture and brick of the wall become visible… no one had ever seen the wall, in its rawest form… all they saw was a bland, fresh, adaptable, impressionable wall… and that’s why they loved her and wanted her…
When he looked at her one last time, he saw her… and he was perhaps one of those few who had watched her become who she was… he’d tried to stop her… slow her down atleast… but in many ways he felt she had to take that decision and he had let her take the last painting down… pack it up neatly… never to be opened again…
But he still saw her for all that she was… he understood her reasons… he did not understand her decision… but he stood by her… that was his contribution and he knew why he was so important to her… cos he was the only one who had seen her for all that she could have been…
And as they neared her car…he saw the driver step out… he pulled her back into a corner… ‘I have something I must give you…’ and she looked at him blank…they never exchanged presents… it was a decision they had made to ensure that they carried back no traces of this meeting… no memories…he held it out for her…a bundle of coloured fabric…’see this later…think about it please…that’s all I ask…’ and he gave her one last look…she did not meet his eye… she did not say goodbye…she never could look into his eye and lie…
She held herself together and collapsed into the car seat… she could not get her fingers to unravel the fabric… it smelt good…she felt her senses arouse…she could not fathom what it was or what it contained… she rushed into the house…ran up the stairs… no customary pleasantries to the many she passed… she locked the door behind her… laid it slowly onto the bed and began to open it… with every fold that she unfolded, she felt her heartbeat rise… ‘oh how could he have thought of this’… the colours were the most magnificent… shades of blue, turquoise and purple with just that contrast of pink and yellow… she lifted it slowly… scared that if she held it wrong, the colours would spill out like water…if she wore it too close, the smell of oil and turpentine would be lost in her… over her beige kurta, she drapped the piece of art around her… and cried at what she saw… he’d painted a face, peaceful and calm…half submerged in water…a delicate hand outstretched… fingers reaching desperately…towards a pink sun that was on the verge of setting…
As she stood in the mirror…she cried out…she always thought she was the face…but she saw today who she really was… the water…

crisis...

I have a major minor crisis…
Silly little cute mouse running around my home… every time I turn my heard there he goes rushing… his high pitched ‘hehehehehehehe…’ ringing in my ears… I have to say though, we have similar taste in food, him and i… so I go into the kitchen… the apple and juice lie untouched but he’s nibbled into an entire pack of masala Maggie and through three different flavours of bru instant cappuccinos.. and I tell myself to please not look for similarities… no no no leaf, stop it!!

So I called up my grocery shop at 9pm… I sounded so desperate for help that the sweet man walked ten shops away to buy me a mouse trap and sent it home… so now armed with a mouse trap, I wonder what to do… the contraption is really quite tough to fathom… so I spent 15 mins figuring out that I can’t put my hand in and attach food to the hook… tis not possible… then I notice that the crafty mouse trap maker has made a provision for me to slide the hook out, attach food and lower it back in… so now that figured out, what food would appeal to a smug, smart little mouse in the prime of his life… a mouse carefree and careless…. A mouse that believes in the power of one!... that nothing in the world can stop him… maya didi’s cooking would have to dismissed as inappropriate… I tire of it too often… so I put her roti on the hook it crumbles to bits… so I try something a little more enticing… a cheese roti roll… carefree young leaf used to love it with lots of ketch up… so I proceed with the tiniest roti wrap ever put together with nimble little fingers… left the ketch up out.. the sight of red in the little trap would have given me nightmares… so trap all set, I leave it in my dark kitchen… hoping that if not the trap, the ghost I am convinced lives in the little corner will scare the tiny mousey… so I double and triple check the trap and go to bed cocooned in my quilt… visions of him dancing next to me on the bed dismissed as idiotic…did he party alone or did he have friends he called over… no no lets not go that way please…
First thing I do when the alarm rings is rush to see if I have caught him… what do I see!? He devoured my little cheese wrap and laughed out loud all the way back into hiding… the cheek of the little creature! And then as I’m brushing my teeth, what do I see from the corner of my eye, a little brown dot dash by and I swear I imagined that horrible high pitched laugh… and then as I get ready, he rushes by again… oh it made me so mad…
Having consulted maya didi on how to rig it better… having been laughed at in office by people who fail to see that behind my laughs is a very scared petrified individual, I will venture back tonight to confront that laugh… that stupid dashing around little brown dot…

but deep down in my heart, there’s something about his spirit that appeals to me… him, with his carefree dangerous ways, wriggling out of traps, braving the enemy, going where few venture, living on the edge, a rebel, living underground, living alone, fighting the odds, surviving in the wild… yes, we are talking about a mouse… yes, I its time for my much awaited vacation…

just old photographs....?

Old photographs…
Captured souls…
Stranded somewhere in time…
Images of who you were
Before you became who you are…

Old photographs…
Trapped memories…
Bound by the eyes…
Triggers to incidents
That held you close…

Old photographs…
Moments you’d rather leave behind…
Colours that have faded…
Surfaces that have cracked…
Never to be re-touched again…

writing when hungry can sounded warped...(oops terrible spelling)

I sat in the train… on the side seat…all cozy… bag close to me… in a dreamy state of mind…and I cover my head with my dupatta… to punish my damp hair that were flying everywhere…I began writing… the shadow of my hand moving as fast as my hand… covering my words so I could barely see them…felt a shaft of light fall on me…yummy morning sunshine…hmmm…delicious… made my skin look like caramel… made my hair turn a chocolate brown…and I felt like I had honey all over me… thick… warm… overpowering…golden liquid…seeping into all my pores… felt like a warm piece of toast… basking in honey and syrup!!
: ) I guess I was also just a little bit hungry : )

home is...

home is…
ma and pa
fighting kunal…
auggie doggie…
painting walls
yummy rajma…
the courtyard…
troubling dadi…
reading books…
early morning walks…
triveni café & gallery…
photographs…
trips to HDFC : (
pampering…
hugs and kisses…
appraisals!
Medley of music…
Meeting boring relatives…
Pandara road dinners…
Trees.. trees.. trees…

going home… going home… going home… : )

sari...

wore a sari today… felt like I was wrapping myself in tradition… cocooning myself in all that I remembered as I was growing up…
as I wore my little south Indian jhumkis and glanced at myself in the mirror, I saw a hint of my mother… I saw the way she wore a sari every Saturday afternoon… the day dad came home for lunch from office… saw me sitting near her… 9 years old... watching in awe and wishing that someday I look as graceful as she did… so as I saw myself today, I closed my eyes…
wishes can and do come true…
they just take a while…
they just take some remembering…
they just take recognizing…

autumn...

Autumn… leaves in the most brilliant colours… trees preparing for the winter… what a sight… even in Bombay… the streets are strewn with old ideas… old feelings… old grievances… preparing for something bigger… shedding all that the year had forced upon… shedding all that they had brought upon themselves… bare… that’s how they wanted to feel… they fell unmercifully… showing the tree for all that it really was… a vessel that held moments and then let them slip away when their work was done…now at the tree's feet lay everything they held dear… everything that helped them sustain themselves… temporary illusions… now crisp with their dryness… crisp with hurt… crumbling at the slightest touch of a foot… Walking down my little lane, I felt the crispness of life… the brevity… the need to say what you have to and then shut up… this urgency to get done with it… this need to rush before its too late… this need to reach out before I too crumble…

Fish in a train…

Been traveling in the same train for over 6 months now… same time… same people… everyday… know each by their smile… know them by the place where they sit… know the ones I can smile at, knowing they will smile back too… know the ones that have friends in the train… know where some of them get off… know the ones who will drop a coin into a begger’s bowl…know that some study hard… know that some cry quietly every other morning…

There’s something about observing other humans in a confined space on a regular basis for a fixed period of time… without even speaking to them, there is so much to discover… I find it hard to read, write, sketch in the train cos there is just so much to take in…
Sometimes I feel like this is my little fish bowl… this sense that there is no escape and I should try to get to know the other fish for lack of anything better to do…

Smoke dances...

Been lighting an agarbati for a few months… the fragrance calming me down and now I associate it with being alone… being happy... so I sat the other morning and just watched the smoke… its simply beautiful… like a dance performance… the smoke spirals up and curves and moves with such grace… leaving behind a thinning trail… twirling and curling… letting the breeze take it where it wishes… and I sat there watched an entire stick burn… unable to take my eyes off it… so much beauty… and the fragrance filled me completely… delicate transparent ribbons, moving with the grace of music… spinning to an unknown tune…contrasting and yet merging into the blue surroundings of my room… how strong it was in the beginning and then somewhere along the path, it dissolved into the air… merging into it… losing itself…and yet new spirals kept rising above the agarbati… fragrant…vibrant…
so strange that we associate smoke only with fires… with harm… with destruction… how can it then have such a life… such beauty…

Skies….

Sitting on the edge of the terrace was a whole new sensation… this sense that you can’t go any further… this sense that nothing could hold you back… and he seemed so completely at ease… that’s one thing that he brought into her safe world – the edge… and she loved it… she was cautious by nature, strangely logical where her safety was concerned to the extent that she missed out too much in her life… and still found ingenious ways of hurting herself despite her caution!.... and that’s where he came in…
And she dangled her legs and reached for his hand slowly and he grasped it tight… his way of saying that I might take you there but I know how to keep you away from harm…I’ll never let you go over… not while you have me…
She followed his gaze, looking at the sky… it always fascinated them how the clouds could scatter just so… taking patterns no brush could create… she told him about the time she took a flight home at night… this sense of flying through the clouds… passing each to come across another shade of rani pink and turquoise blue…he always smiled when he saw her cran her neck and said she looked like a 3 year old on a major discovery… he held her hand harder… wishing that she always found something to admire in the sky… wished that the sky never be blank for her… that it always be brimming with colour and texture and that it always gave her a reason to smile…it was his way of ensuring that he always smiled…

Old ways…

Its weird how at the end, all that remains are the little gestures that you never paid attention to…

It’s the way my feet always found themselves most comfy, tucked between yours….
It’s the way you always knew what I wanted when I lifted my face to you...
It’s the way you never let my head hit the pillow without your arm under it…
It’s the way I’m still at ease around you…
It’s the way I smile at you even when I’m mad as hell at something you did…

Why does anything else need to matter…

Imagine this…

Little chawl in worli… around 9 in the morning… a little temple kinda room with statues of Buddha and Dr. Ambedkar… 30 little 9 year olds in bright red Akanksha t shirts…and even brighter eyes… focused in their work… a tree outside… me and a colleague sitting under a tree… whole bunch of assessments to do… hear the children slowly read the story of the turtle… slight drizzle… Shefali and I smiling at each other after every good assessment that we conduct… man walks by... throws seeds… a 100 pigeons descend (okay… honestly, around 25 or less!!)… me mesmerized… don’t know where to focus… take a break… watch the pigeons tirelessly bend and beautifully and effortlessly pick each seed with their beak… their peacock coloured necks glistening in the most beautiful rainbow colours… their red claws as bright as the tshirt of the little kid in front of me… focus back on the kids… have you ever seen a child trying to read a sentence… there really are very few instances like this, which make your soul soar…
First they look at you with big unsure eyes… then you smile… and they grin back… you ask them to read you a story… and hand them a sheet… they begin… some of the words are new… and that’s the fun part… you watch them say out the phonic of each alphabet one by one slowly and then piece the word together… their little mouths taking adorable forms… their eyes deep in focus… little finger moving with each alphabet… and at the end of it they say the word…’Discovered’… and they look at you eyes sparkling… and I look at them… probably more excited than even they are… and you feel like swooping down and squishing the child…
Oh it’s a high…