where are my words?? and my muse?

Its been ages since i wrote. Wrote stuff that really mattered to me, my words have lost their muse - that was long back, over three years now, but i never believed i would reach a time when id write this - i just cant seem to write what i feel. why do words fail a person who lives by them and with them? literally? there was a time when words would flow uninhibited like they always lived within and just had to be written, but not anymore "where is all your writing" they ask me and i have nothing to say, i have the time the resources the inspiration but not the words! my muse walked out of me a long while ago and ever since i have dreamt of my muse every night, asked myself what went wrong, i helplessly attempt and associate myself with the shadows and roots of the muse hoping I'd catch a few glimpses of it. i walk through old roads hoping the street corner might be the place, get drenched in an obscure rain hoping a drop would be familiar, I helplessly browse through old letters, mails, posts, hoping somewhere there i would find a point of ignition, but no! oblivion is all that comes from the vain exercise. I miss my words, i miss my muse, At the end of it all i do is chant a hymn of borrowed words from a distant past spent with my muse and heave a sigh and go to bed, only to be haunted by words and the lack of them. in the background i can almost hear an old poet welcoming words just come to his mindscape, i'm awed, i'm jealous, i'm tired, but i wait.

Have u seen Men Blush?!!

OK to start of with... I'm employed. damn i love it! , my work involves a lot of creative growth and interaction with people of different streams, which is in turn happy... !!

in fact it is this aspect of my work that got me reflecting on this one... "have u ever seen men blush?" - its so cute!! god!!

blush as in not in the "god i m shy" blush... but the blush that is combined with some random thought at the back of the head suddenly stimulated by some discovery or thought or whatever... getting to the point... an example

for instance 'K' who shares a few training classes with me at work is this "I'm the cool n funky guy, the macho the man" type of a formal guy, looks good and all that but cant be bothered about senti stuff about the simple and the like... teaches Physics! we were discussing the colour 'Black' and its associations . Me with my literature gyaan, poetry, semantic inclinations and all that jazz was rattling away what i thought of black, i suddenly said "black also is the beginning and end of everything" and 'K' in an unusual introspective said, "yeah death! birth" . "hmm birth!!" said I. Suddenly he jerked from the sofa like some heavy dosage of goosebumps had hit him and said "tell me, when the child is in the mother's womb which is dark can it sense light like daybreak or a candle... ?" Now how would me know... "I don't know about light but sounds yes! Even minute little sounds apparently reaches the fetus after a few months... Miracle this creation is!" i said "so can he hear me if i say his mother looks so much more beautiful cos is in there?? " i nodded and god the man blushed his face turning as red as...

I had goosebumps too :-)

and i just had to write about it!!

Of Memories...

Of late i have been dwelling on the concept of memories a lot. Strange things they are, memories, of the good times and the bad. I was thinking how much memories shape folks, old and young alike, how much they cause us to do and not do things and how they cause us to cry and laugh and sigh and sing. All this without any incident occurring in our 'here and now' . Although new memories take the place of the old, although the people and places associated with those memories are no more our own... they still cause nostalgia, they still cause us to emote.

Memories of the first crush first love - Memories shared with soul mates turned strangers, memory of those rains and summer afternoons shared with friends who are not on the radar anymore, memories of weddings and get togethers where a stranger meets the eye for a fleeting second and you are left wondering who it was for the rest of your life .

It amazes me how i can smile when i recall a poem or tune sung by the lost soul mate or the compliment paid by the estranged friend!!

Whoever said memories fade with passing time was probably not all that right i think... i mean how can we oversee the way the smell of wet mud and the first rain remind us of the first rain walk we took, or the fragrance of the lily of the valley that reminds us of a random party hall? how can we oversee the way we can never forget the games we played during childhood summers or the history of each rose petal hidden between the pages of abandoned notebooks. It wearies me sometimes to have so many memories but the times that memories lift me up and make me smile weigh more than those that do otherwise!!

"Life is calling where are you?"

I know this really nice guy who thinks he's not nice

a guy who can talk absolute nonsense for hours and still keep u listening

a guy who writes from the actual words that occured in his head at the trigger of a thought without a single punctuation changed!

a guy who demands a treat for everything from a new bag u got to the wedding of your fourth cousin

a guy who eats like food is god (even when not hungry)

a guy who can be twins if he were any happier at each joy in your life

a guy whose shoulder is both the strongest and the 'prickiest'

a guy who is more concerned about a small bruise u got while driving than a huge bandage on his leg

a guy who treasures a little knot on his wrist from within and fakes that he doesnt (n does a bad job of the faking)

a guy whom a lot of us love and have failed over and over again getting him to believe we do

a guy without whom there is a lot of dullness in the air

a guy who loves but expresses it by arguing, ignoring, letting u wait and keeping quite

a guy whose single call makes your day, week, month!!

a guy whom u want to hate but cant

A GUY WHO SAYS EVERYTHING OF WHAT IS REALLY NOTHING AND NOTHING OF WHAT IS REALLY EVERYTHING

but all of a sudden now this guy... no more talks nonsense, no more talks actually, is no more happy, no more is silent when in emotion, is no more the way he used to be, a guy who has fallen silent in a way that is uncomfortable ; doesnt suit him; not one bit... each night as i go to bed i remember this sudden season change and in a silent hym to god i ask for that lost spring to return or reveal itself and dude if u r reading this... i want u to know that home awaits u ; you only have to believe it does!!

दुनिया से बहुत मिल चुके ,

खुद से मिलने कि चाहत है

अजनबियों से प्यार बहुत कर चुके
अब खुद से मोहब्बत कि चाहत है

बुलंदियों से नाता कुछ ज्यादा ही जुड़ गया
अब खुद से एक रिश्ते कि चाहत है

इन्सान और ईमान को जी जान से परख लिया

अब खुद को परखने कि चाहत

दूसरों के इच्छाओं के बंधी बन

अब बहुत वक़्त गवा चुके

अपने ही सरहदों से आजाद होकर

अब खुद के साथ वक़्त बिताने कि चाहत है

बाहरी आशा निराशाओं में बहुत गहरे डूब चुके

अब खुद के आशाओं में डूब उभरने कि चाहत है

अलग अलग लोगों के उम्मीदों को कायम कर बहुत जी चुके

अब खूद से खुद के उम्मीदों को सच्चाई में बदलने कि चाहत है

खोद खोद के असतित्व को बहुत इनाम पा चुके

तराश्कर अपने आप को अब खुद के खोज कि चाहत है

इंसानों के महानों के भगवान् को बहुत जान लिया

नाम और धर्म रहित खुद में बसे उस भगवान् को पाने की चाहत है

अंत के निश्चित सत्य से डर डर कर बहुत जी चुके

अंत से परे खुद में छिपे उस अनंत को पाने कि अब चाहत है!!

My history repeats itself...

I was so numb that day, so still... like a still birth, and that's exactly what it was, a still birth. Life was being born into another realm another system of living and i was numb, still, frozen!! My soul mate walked out of me... yet again! I'm still in denial! I don't remember how life was before this little poet who had so profoundly changed my understanding of life!

It is one thing to have a life partner and quite another to have a soul mate. God had blessed me with both.

A life partner becomes a part of your day to day living you are called by his surname, identified by his family traditions, know as an individual who is literally the better half of your life, the 'I'll be there for u' guy of your life, the kinda guy u'd nag, beat up, and cuddle until red! But a soul mate is the silent unsung part of your life who contributes not so much to your daily life crisises but contributes to feeding the soul in you the poet in you the musician in you the intellectual in you, the brook in you that is waiting to break into a song of truth and beauty... the unnamed part of your life but so so critical to the emotional you!

What does one do when soul mates walk out of you uninformed without any forewarning without any notice without even a breath of knowledge of what is to come?? especially when the walking out is without an explanation. Its like you are in a really dark forest and there is a sudden streak of lightning... Light for the way? not really, its plunging of darkness. Is it easy to walk out? is being away really so beautiful? Why is there no explanation? why is there no consulting before breaking those untied ties forever? How can emotions get over? or closeness cease to exist? and all this without any material reason?? beats me!!

" i do not feel that closeness anymore. I thought it would be wrong to continue to act like I do. The change is in me, and it has nothing to do with you" so why am i being put through this stage of denial of bewilderment, disbelief and a million dollar why??

But as tradition has had it, life will move on, pangs will be felt and the memories will remain, you will remain you and i will remain me but changed forever in that little space that you occupied in a fragmented verse of life...

And to you if you ever read this i have this to say

Thank you for dusting off the rust on my poetry and reviving the spirit and making it new!!

Thank you for having shown me that one rain can drench two dwellings however far away

Thank you for the sea that never drenched my feet but always listened to my words

Thank you for teaching me to see and understand beyond words

Thank you for bringing me closer to my roots and making me feel cosier in my home

Thank you for Meenakshi

Thank you for the songs that would break out uninterrupted on the moonlit nights i had lost

Thank you for all the people you brought into my life who stay despite your absence

Thank you for making me see that absence is not loss

Thank you for Paradise regained and lost

Thank you for making me see that i was more than just a woman in love

And

Thank you for the meaning you brought to silence!!

Around the corners, in the hearts of the cities
By the lane’s end, selling all nitty gritties
Shadowing the tired old family grocer’s stall
spread all over the place, looming large that mall…

a modern witch like, luring casting its market spells
‘best buy! yours to choose!’ the graceless sales guy tells
money exchanged - no smell of fresh note or clanking of old coin
cards and coupons answer the bill
at the end of an unending line
Surely the property plays host to spirits
where we once tossed pebbles to seal a trade,
leisure afternoons when mom called out from home
to run and buy salt for her special lemonade

that was when… when we had hours

here now our hours refuse to see the rest of earth.
This time today, morning of midnight madness,
the minutes quicken between escalators.
Faster than food the climate cringes

Waiting for love on those obscure stone benches
before a crowd comes from heat and hooves
of buses screeching to a stop before the ATMs
No more is it in, the pavements selling dolls
And No more bargains, its thanks to the malls!!