cat thought

you curl up

beside me

like a cat

fed on love,

only stretching

to gnaw at my hurt.

It's been years. Like forgotten raindrops, this narcissistic trope remained in the subconscious until it was yanked into memory by a chance conversation. Many things have changed. I am older, not necessarily wiser though. People lurk in my consciousness now, no longer central to my being. I add, subtract and multiply relationships with ease; no one has a fixed address to my affections. I go with the flow. I partake of the finer things, I exist, but I also refuse to just exist. It seems as good a time as any to walk this earth. Much of the pessimism has been replaced by cynicism. But also hope, that the worst is past. One gets a feeling of deja vu sometime, of course, but the mind stills these thoughts. Think, I will have to get back to writing, to poetry, and books. Think, my place under the sun has arrived.

my baby

baby boys, it seems, usually beat any doctor mandated deadlines and say hi to moms and dads at least 10 days before they are due. my boy sure did the same, crying his way into the world in the early hours of a March morning. it was like in the movies and was not! i spent an all nighter waiting up. when i held him, he cried. are babies supposed to laugh when they see their dads for the first time? guess not! dads may eventually deny them pocket money for any silly thing, so it may be best to not smile or become too friendly, he must have thought! i don't know if i will make a good dad or not, but i have minimal expectations of him and myself. he can play and skip lessons, just pass will do. i will show him how to lead an honest life, and show respect and kindness for others. the rest, he will have to figure out along the way. i don't know whether he will respect me or take care of me in my old age -- all the classic precepts that sons ought to follow in our tradition. but dads, i realize now that i am one myself, don't raise their sons or daughters expecting this. they do in spite of them. what is being a good son or daughter? is it to obey unconditionally whatever you parents say? is it loving them despite the scoldings and the hard times? i am not sure. by all conventional accounts, i could be said to be a rebellious son, who drove his parents crazy. did i love my dad? do i now that he is no more? what has love got to do with it? my son will negotiate the same treacherous waters of loving and hating, and all the greys in between. if he comes out of all those with some love intact for his dad, maybe it will show that i have a good parent after all. if not, i can conveniently blame it on karma, my past sins, his et al. the one sure things is this...there is no need to be judgemental about these things. children need to be accepted unconditionally, whatever their and our shortcomings. i hope i will just let him be.

back to the wall

today, the walls enclose me. my screams against injustice are choked. the walls move in ever closer, squeezing what little space there is. i want to get on with living, to be able to live in peace. i want everything of the past to bury itself. i want a life filled with hope. i have struggled all these years. i have faced strangers, friends, colleagues, family squarely and stood my ground. now the ground beneath my feet has disappeared. i am standing, but there is nothing to stand on, stand for. i want to live in peace, filled with peace and joy. enough is enough. is there a way to buy happiness, peace, to skip despair and run, fly! i have forgotten how to! i did not do it as a child, i was too wrapped in earning a living, honestly. now, i have responsibilities that i cannot run away from. i need someone to say i am fine as i am, without dragging money, fame, character etc into the bargain. i want to be accepted, not judged. please let me live my life in small, little, unnoticeable ways. i won't ask you for money, for your time, for your advice, for work, nothing. just let me morph into a butterfly that i always dreamed of becoming. please let me live just once!

Micro worry

Lending to the poor seems a good idea, especially if the interest rate you charge is in the high double digits. Of course, you can force them to repay week after week. You don't have to bother about sending show cause notices, or about getting hauled to the courts. You can also raise money from the public to lend to the public, a case of cheap rupees lent to poor Indians and repaid in costly rupees. As long as the borrowers don't commit suicide, unable to repay their meagre loans, you are safe. The trouble begins when borrowers' inexpensive deaths end up getting widespread press, and the governments are forced to act. Of course, the counter argument is that these were not credit-linked suicides, that the state is cracking down to ensure its own pro-poor lending schemes succeed and that higher interest rates are justified to cater to a segment that nationalized banks themselves do not touch. The truth, as always, become the first casualty in all this obfuscation. The poor in India live on less than $ 2 or 1 a day, going by various yardsticks. Why would they need to borrow, when they know quite well they won't get increments or bonuses in the foreseeable future that will help repay the loans? There is fortune at the bottom of the pyramid, only that fortune is made on the graves of destitute Indians.

back!

to a land that thankfully does not ban blogs, from one that bans just about everything! well, it has been a nearly two-year hiatus from all pseudo intellectual pursuits. time to give those grey cells a workout!

hip long siesta

the yearly break from blogging does some good. i have forgotten how to spell, and un-twine my thoughts. there is more clarity in the thinking, a little less in the action and lot less in the execution. hope makes a comeback, boundaries of love and sharing have been crossed. people, friends, places disappear in slow motion, facebook, orkut all out! living a claustrophobic existence without the phobia. at 32, life is teaching me to skim the waves, but not delve to deep for fear of drowning in the world's illusory tactile relationships. mellow like vintage wine, and battling lifestyle conditions that bring moderation, makes virtue out of medians and shuns vices with a sigh. to keep at it, like a writer before the block begins to make him a nervous wreck, that is what i want to do. the next post will have to wait until the next year.

at long last

been out of the blog world for ages. thanks to the Chinese. now back in India for a little holiday. several things have happened in the meantime for which i would need more time than this to pen down. for now, suffice it to day i am married and living a different life! will keep you all posted, until then!!1 cheerio!

finally

after months of no access to the blog, here i am trying to make sense of my time here. it has been a roller-coaster. time well spent and sometimes lonely. now, the good news is i am hitched. going to start on a new life in a few days. the world continues to roll along merrily, i have miles to go and promises to keep before i sleep;-)

thoughts of you come in snatches

it has been very many years, but you appear out of nowhere. in a corny movie filled with cliched dialogues about loving and wanting, i see your face. the actress is speaking for you, as i watch. she becomes you like in a dream gone sour, like with the last piece of the jigsaw gone missing. you are far away, i don't even know if you cared or do now at least. i see you in every woman who talks of love and want. i didn't know if you did. and there seems to be no way of knowing it ever. you just stepped out of my life, like you do when you want coffee or something, and then never come back...you were the only real thing in my life in a long long time. even now, however much i try to stanch thoughts of you, i bleed. i don't seem to be able too be unfaithful to you, although  i am. for, you just refuse to die inside of me however much i try.