To be continued

Act I

Hold my finger, said they.
Yes, please! said She.
I have to outrun the sun, said She.
Be back by dusk, said they.
there’s only so fast we can run.

Act II

Hold my shoulder, said they.
Yes, please! said She.
I have to create new colors, said She.
Don’t spill, said they.
there’s only so much we can clean.

Act III

Let me anchor my boat, said She,
you are my shore.
No, said he,
you are your own shore.


But She was scared
and this was not a movie
where a boy could find Her 
and save her.
So, She continued to float.
Riding some ripples,
and creating some.

Act IV

She met swans
who knew of their beauty.
And crows
who knew of their destination.
And some swans
who saw beauty in their destination.
And some crows
who saw destinations in every journey.

She met a doctor
who travelled not places but people.
He knew nothing about healing
and sought only to save himself.
But the universe rushed to save him
because he walked with the universe on his shoulders.
And told the swans about the crows,
and the crows about the swans.

She met a painter
who painted questions.
So, She fixed the color of the sun for him,
and started to float.
But the painter looked at Her
incredulous.
He showed Her the water.
And for the first time,
She saw.

She saw the ripples in her reflection
and the beauty in every question
She had ever asked.

Act V

She was the sun
and the colors waiting to be created.
She was the swans
and the crows saving the doctor.
She was the shore
and the water.


So, She continued to float
because there were more questions
looking for an anchor.

Limits of Law

Who made law the province of old men 

When forces stronger than their words 

Dictate what should make us happy?

Who made law the commander for order

When chaos louder than their voices

Reigns over what should make us happy?

Who made law the harbinger of justice

When morality denser than their reasons

Governs what should make us happy?

Law, equally blind to all

Law, liberally unjust to all

Law, legally limited

Fails.

What does it mean to be human?

Philosophers and Poets

And Sciences I will never know

Keep running after the same old question –

What does it mean to be human?

Clones and Machines

And Intelligence I will never comprehend

Keep blurring the line –

What does it mean to be human?

Trans-genders and Trans-sexuals

And Identities I will never be able to protect

Keep expanding the definition –

What does it mean to be human?

Horrendously self-aware

Of the frailties

And the fragilities.

Abysmally optimistic

Of the flights

And the failures.

We forgive each other for the monsters we raise,

And we forgive ourselves for the monsters we become.

And we love and kiss and smile

Fighting the fragile monsters within us

Failing and finding our way back to the question all over again –

What does it mean to be human?

Why I Philosophise

You know how once you leave home

what you miss

is 

what you cherish. 

Maybe that is how it is for them;

The freedoms once lost

missed greatly, 

But only by those that lost them. 

I will never know how it feels to spend years calling gulag home.

I will never know what to write to my mother from an Indian prison in 1976. 

I will never know the smell that comes with marching troops, falling houses and empty classrooms. 

And so I will philosophise and theorise 

I will attempt to unravel that which makes wolves out of men

I will write about morality and law and constitutions

Hoping,

To prevent little kids from the losses of my ancestors.

Using,

The reasons of the fortunate to cure the maladies of the oppressed. 

Knowing,

The futility of my pursuit. 

Being human

How is it

That we believe in magicians who walk on water

But find no truth in the carcass of the boy

Who went from chasing kites to chasing a chance to live?

How is it

That our tears respond to Will Smith’s pursuit of happiness

But see through the performance of the girl

Who sees food in every rose she sells?

How is it

That superheroes exist only in imagination?

When did

How we looked to the world become more important than

How we saw the world?

When did

Kindness and Empathy

Go out of fashion?

When did

Machines become more human.

One day at a time

Breaths shorter than the time it takes to cry for help.

Heavy, heavy:

Like sand - heavy and hard to catch. 

Heavy, heavy:

The weight of the ocean - heavy and all around. 

Heavy, heavy:

Guilt, Shame, Hopelessness - blocking the air, crowding her lungs. 

Eyes try to water the parched lips,

The beverage derails. 

The lips part

To let the light in - the oxygen at the end of the tunnel. 

Heavy from existing

The lips close,

Dragging her forehead to the ground. 

‘One day at a time’, 

says he. And like Houdini,

The breath breaks free. 

She’ll be fine. 

Peace

The house craves the night,
There is silence, she can think.

This is not the silence of a Bengali novel,
there is no battered clock, no rhythmic shuffling of feet.
The wind doesn’t rustle, no early risers bustle.
If a lover mourns for his beloved, the air conditioners muffle, 
All sound.

This is not the silence of death, 
Books - half read, earmarked - lay strewn on the table.
The mobile - like a car abandoned for a beautiful view - keeps blinking.


The silence is temporary.
Her thoughts dance on the walls,
Changing the universe, saving the world.
Silent victories echo in the halls.


And then they wake up,
Footsteps, songs.
The silence makes way for routine.
And the routine, for Peace.

The house prefers Peace.
The house, then, sleeps.

x

A world without mirrors

A world without mirrors

Four girls in a room – the quintessential makeup of a coming of age movie – scribbling

The script.

With one eyebrow raised, Nostradamus stands amused

At the pacts they’ve made over pizza.

Between the Present and the Promise, Presumption stands

Silent and brooding,

Like Adulthood.

Rules of fashion run deeper than the Rules of kindness,

The room is big enough (just about)

For the Rules of friendship to quell the tide.

Adulthood greets at the door,

The script has taken a life of its own.

The Pact surfaces,

Like a message in a bottle floating near enough (just about) for you to see.

Presumption stares out of the mirror, you don’t like what it says;

But the room isn’t big enough anymore

To run away from the reflection.

So you stay. 

Silent and brooding,

Wishing for a world without mirrors,

Objects in the mirror are farther than they appear.