Happy Independence Day to all Indians, and Pakistanis too. Freedom is a right and also a responsibility.
For 200 years, countless people–both Hindus and Muslims–died for it.
Now that we have our land, let’s make it home with love, respect and care. Only then can we repay the sacrifices our forefathers made.
Jai Hind!
Heavy, verbose, rhyming, Elizabethan words
Stare at me with hidden meanings.
Plots of revenge, angry tirades,
All in couplets! I wonder.
Angry, I can barely rhyme,
thoughts jumbled, words escape me.
I would pound with fists
not sing sonnets, immortalising insanity.
I open the dictionary a thousandth time,
I wonder if this is it for me.
It is.
Closing the book, in a moment of weekness,
I glance at the pages
Julius accuses,
“Et too Brutus!”
Guilt looks down at me.
Nay, I would rather readeth
to killeth time
than the read killeth me.
I never did like Shakespeare!
Author’s Note: With due respect to Shakespeare, who wrote timeless books that explored complex emotions and have endured the passing of four centuries.
“Sir, you wrote lovely verses I never understood. :)”
To readers: Do you like Shakespeare? Which book was your favourite? Which is your favourite quote?
I lay there alone sighing, hearing the two of them in the next room showing off their newest bed cover–chatting around obnoxiously happy. Unfortunately, that particular cover comes only for double beds. I, however, am still single.
I hate being single! Being the only one in the room sucks!
Well, to be honest, I am not exactly alone here…
There is this metal almirah who is really cold. Her nose is so high up in the air, I wonder if she lives on Ozone rather than Oxygen. She thinks of us wood-forms as far beneath her status. It doesn’t even creak when you ask a question. Just the swish of the key and click of the lock when the humans open and close it–not even an opening groan that steel almirah’s are so famous of making.
Not that I am prejudiced against all metal-forms–the chair is nice enough. It must be the soft seat and comfy backrest that put her at ease.
The study table is friendly–all wooden, nice and warm. He often bumps into me since he is my immediate neighbour.
But they are both together–the table and the chair. And I really can’t deal with how they behave all lovey-dovey and keep trying to touch each other every now and then.
Then there is this tiny side-table who sits on my other side and keeps chattering all day. The number of times it opens its drawers! I’ve never seen such a chatter-box–stating random facts about the pigeons and butterflies out of the window and singing nursery rhymes with birds. Sounds cute for a short time. But, admit it, it does get a little over much after a couple of hours, at least for a bachelor like me.
Sigh! So, well, I am not really alone, but it is not the same thing as having someone who is with you. Being single sucks!
Tired, arms aching, I push myself further in water.
“Stop struggling,” my brain reminds me, “Just float, would you?”
I can not!
Around me, bodies lie supine, floating, listless, un-dead;
Staring at the stars, waiting for them to move; waiting…
Just waiting…
What stars would do once they do move, they wouldn’t know that.
Eyes glazed out; their smile is one of memory not hope
of future…
Waves push around un-struggling wherever, whenever.
They float along, no questions asked, no dreams to nurture.
Just wait till…
I should give up swimming too; easier to float away.
Water is heavier on my arms with each passing day.
I would not!
Lost and tired and nowhere now, I choose my own course.
Drown soon I might, that would be my choice, no star decides
my life’s shore!
I am a little skeptic about what to write today but I thought I would ramble because I have seen people do that for years on their blogs with successful results. Sure, it needs wit and sarcasm in buckets that I lack (I mean, wit and sarcasm, not buckets), but I can try, because if a spider can do it and King Bruce can do it, then, surely I could too. Though, I’m not sure I will attempt it seven times–I am not a serial killer! Only when I have nothing to write about but a wish to talk and my daughter and husband are out, safe from the tirade of words that sometimes escape me…
You see, sometimes I just feel this urge to speak about nothing and everything and nothing in general. I comment on weather, household work, workload, office mails, lack of mails, lack of phone calls, too many phone calls, school uniforms, school books…
Those are the days when my husband bolts out of the house on the pretext of taking my daughter to school and skips breakfast because he is “busy”. That is when my brother-in-law gets an urgent phone call and father-in-law has work to do, of course.
So, usually, I bore my mother-in-law then. The poor old thing is too frail to run out of the house, so she listens to me, patiently guiding me to the topics that makes sense, like a psychologist. The only thing missing is the recliner. Maybe I will arrange one and make it official…
As you must have realised, I still haven’t found a topic to write about, but the nervous energy has me on the roll, like the geo-magnetic solar storm that was supposed to hit Earth yesterday, invisible yet ever present. I wonder if it is the reason why I am so restless–we all have iron in our blood and if there are too many magnets in the air, it must be jumping around, changing poles from north to south, then north, then south again. I feel tremors passing through me that some might call as a sign of stroke or magic or other paranormal activity, but I know as the sign of restlessness that gets me going, holding my hand and making me push buttons.
Maybe it is a divine intervention–a sign that I should stop writing stories and turn this blog into a ramble-blog. Afterall, I have created a post out it, haven’t I? 😀
Hanging on the horizon, the clouds threaten to fall.
Hearts make one more wish on the falling star.
Hanging between genders, they dare not hope though.
| Wo ujala aaj-kal khamosh hai, Mujh andhere ko roshan wo karta nahi, Chiraag jalte the raat bhar jinki raaho me, Wo shams ab raho me jalta nahi. | The light is rather mute; It doesn’t penetrate my night. Whose path my lamps lighted in dark, My path that Sun does not light. |
| Maikado ne unko aawaz di, Jaam bhar ke yuhi chhalak gaye, Palko ke lafz bikharate rahe umr bhar, Hum kehte nahi, woh sunte nahi. | Glasses called wordlessly; Wine kept filling and spilling– Eyes lost words through life; I didn’t say, he heard nothing. |
Pain,
not mine,
stays and muddles
what’s mine and what’s
borrowed.
Author’s note: Lantern is Japanese poetry form shaped visually like a lantern in 1,2,3,4,1 syllables.
Thin string of love
Tying life together,
Lost inside
the thicks beads of
Vile abuses and angry rants,
Found never,
Missed forever…
Sleepless
eyes on
night-long vigil
guarding the precious angel
asleep
Short Stories | Fish-eye Perspective 