Right Here!!

Dear   ,


I finally write to you again!!! All this time I did come back every once a while to begin to write again, but life around found its expression sometimes in just my grateful sighs or in the amazed silence of my rather inquisitive mind at other times. And then there were times when I was just walking along on the bridge of monotony that lay between these two peaks. Words patiently awaited till this day, to ripe themselves fully to be able to offer in their own way - themselves!


You know, I eventually did board that train and met that friend. The months that passed on by while I awaited that trip made sure that it was all worth it. For the sun shone through the day not just up there but also in the warmth of laughter I shared with my friend. And finally as it splashed the skies with hues of all the seven colours while descending into the Arabian sea, it made yet another revelation. The grains of sand there stretched out to my either sides and were not confined to the mocking hour glass. And this my dear friend is still very little of all that I have seen there. I had been absolved of all that I had long sought to be free from and I awaited the new days ahead with excited anticipation.


Why excited anticipation you ask? I spent the next four months gathering all the essentials that I would need to fly off to the famed land of "beer, chocolates and waffles". How grateful can one be when what one sees in movies is ready to greet him for real at the end of his birthday week! Cliched alright, but I would rightly called it "The Divine Gift". Hereon began the journey of many journeys over the next six months that probably have changed me forever - for the good of course! Life around expanded itself beyond imagination to the world of possibilities. As did the horizon of my thoughts, my personality, and myself. Europe and all of its experiences that will forever be vividly remembered by my mind and heart alike, will always find me being grateful to all the wonderful people that I met there who made those experiences possible. When I finally came back home on Diwali day, ostensibly reliving the SRK moment from K3G as I landed, these words made me understand why I had been having the feeling of having left something behind when I boarded that flight:

"You will never be completely at home again because a part of your heart will be always be elsewhere. That's the price you pay for the richness of knowing and loving people in more than one place."

I have been here and been there - in dream and in reality. I did end up meeting some interesting people too after my return. And it feels great to finally be able to write to you about it all after such a long time.

What do I await next? The next post should tell! ;)

Yours!


"And it's Patience again that speaks!"

The Weekend

What if I’d boarded that train and had met that friend?
What if I’d never chosen to go there in the first place; never bothered to extend my hand?

What if everything turned out just as you had imagined it’d be?
What if, even after that, it still didn’t make you happy?

What if it’s right in front of you and you just let it pass by?
What if that “someday” comes in disguise – would you still recognize?

What if the days of this life were just random and nothing really ever happened for a reason?
What if there was no faith, no hope, no grace, no God – these words but mere illusion?

What if time was non-existent, and a moment elongated to infinity?
What if we had no memory, no ego, no intellect; what then would be our identity?

What if these “What Ifs” never crossed our minds?
And then again what if these “What Ifs” did cross our minds?

What if I’d gone to bed tonight and not written these lines?
What if you never pondered if at all it rhymes?


“Thank God for the Night…”

PEACE?

I’d always been in denial of it, no more shall I lie.
These lines I speak are more than a mere outcry.
Looked up ahead always to what is to be,
But a part of me still craves for what has been.

The mirror rightly says, objects appear closer than they are.
Its only until you look back, you see that you’ve driven up ahead pretty far.

Miss those days of innocent smiles,
The world around was just a beautiful paradise.
The laughter, the careless abandon back in the days of yore.
Reveled in each moment, life embraced you each day when you walked out that door.
When the world of reality was just as virtuous as the books had portrayed.
The dreams would resonate the songs to which you had swayed.

Have never really cared about the miles I’ve run or the people I’ve outrun.
Neither the milestones achieved nor the plants that could’ve sprouted from the seeds.

But tonight I’ve pulled over and have walked back.
It calls out to me so I holler back.

I wish to go back to the days,
Back to the days when it had all began.
Or I just wish for the days ahead
To be the kinds I would want to go back to again.

“I’m glad you came”

Red Or Green?

The light turned red giving me time to stop and look out through my window. I chuckled about the impervious luxury I enjoyed within my glass windows. The temperature inside was a cool 24 degrees on this May evening and my favourite tracks were lined up on the playlist – I really had nothing to complain about. I saw anguished, tired even fatigued and frustrated faces struggling to get their respective fair’s worth of foot-space with alert eyes scanning the slightest movement made by a comfortably seated co-passenger. They were all waiting impatiently – either to get off the god damned over crowded bus or to get the next available seat – whichever would come sooner. Horns blared around suddenly breaking my thoughts. I delicately released the clutch and I eased ahead. The sight of the bus in my rear view mirror and the thought of the people on it were almost instantly pushed back into oblivion. Two cars had already crossed over and as I passed the signal, it finally turned green.

The red lights put me to a halt once more. This time it was a huge glass building I saw to my left. The ten storied structure looked so alive; more so because each of its very well illuminated floors, with people’s fast-paced trots on each of them, were so clearly visible even from a distance. It stood out flamboyantly against lackluster backdrop of the dusk; so much so that it was almost wickedly inviting. I have always been intrigued by the sheer charm and beauty these modern-day architectural innovation, so to speak, possess. I feel that they unashamedly and yet very convincingly deceive an innocent curious onlooker. It’s a mere facade for the innumerable faceless people coming into that building day in and day out .The poor onlooker might never know that there’s more to it all than meets the eyes until he too gets to step into one of those flashy buildings. I knew what those fast-paced feet were running towards – either to get onto one of those buses or to get in the driving seats of their cars. And I chuckled again, this time for having raced past the bus and the two cars that had got ahead of me and also for the good fortune that at least for that day I wasn’t stuck in one of those glass buildings while the rest of the world seemed to be having a merry time heading home. The signal turned green again and I pushed off.

Just as I was about to change gears, I had to slow down and scornfully put the car to rest again at the red. The same bus lined up next to me as did the two cars I had raced past. This time I chuckled with a little resentment at the dawn of this tiny little realization. That unknown person in that glass building, the people aboard the bus along with its driver, the two cars that I noticed and the many others that I didn’t – we were all just dodging the red light to get past the next green one! The string puller above was probably mockingly laughing at this nonsensical race that we’d got ourselves into – inadvertently or out of choice.

Did I hit the red next or the green? Oh! What the Heck?! Does it really matter now?

“Where are you headed, by the way?”

To YOU!

It's in her eyes and she knows its true,
No one could ever make her feel, the way that you do.
Why then does she hide it and denies?
Why the resistance, why all the lies,
When he can see the truth speaking through her eyes?

He fears to admit it but he knows it too,
He doesn't want to live without her, he dreads the thought of having to.
It's beyond his naive mind to understand,
Why he felt so complete the day he had held her hand.
Why then does he not let it take control?
Why not give it a chance and let it flow?

Its incomprehensible, this power of love.
Maybe that is why its called the gift from up above?
Don't they just not want to see?
Them being together is just meant to be?

A ray of light is just all it takes,
To tell the real apart from all the fakes.
Its probably still dark, the dawn is yet to arrive,
Till then they must bear it, they must struggle to survive.

The darkest cloud also flees at sunrise,
The shining glow, upto then remains in disguise.
This serene morning they too would wake up to and see,
Then they'd realize that fairy-tales are for real - they just have to believe.

Years later when they'd look back and see,
They'd know it'd all happened for a reason; some call it destiny.
A new page gets written every night and day,
This book thus read tells us that life works out in mysterious ways.


"And so you know"

So I heard...

Probably there came a time in his life when EVERYTHING fell apart! He lost his sense of direction, where he’d go and what he’d do. He just couldn’t go on believing in all that was good and beautiful! The smile he’d flash was just a mock, the laughter of people around; a guffaw at his misery, and that reflection in the mirror – just doesn’t recognize the face it knew before. Sick, as it may all feel, that was the ground reality. Rock-bottom, and hit so hard on the spine, that the tiny little hole way up there, scintillating just about enough sunlight to catch the eye could very much be a mere illusion. Burnt, bruised, hurt and pained, the god damned breath pumping through the lungs became a curse, disallowing him to meet his fate, ridiculing the vision of his eyes with the little dash of that remote sunlight. He just lay – motionless, caring pittance for anything..everything...
Probably, he’d never want to get back up again..but then probably he just TRIED to.

For every wrong, there’s got to be a right.
For every silent prayer, there’s got to shine the Heavenly Light.
For a remorseful past, a future to reveal the futility of grief over what’s been done.
For every moment of loneliness, a tight hug for each from a beloved someone.

For every moment of pain, deliverance to finally come through.
For what's been lost, the joy of finding something new.
For every time that your faiths faltered, the Holy Cross making itself show.
For every failure, a lesson to learn, just so that you must know!

For all the sleepless nights, a day to finally revel in bliss.
For all the hate that’s been fostered, the heart to find love and be at peace.
For every broken heart, a love so great, for it to rise above all the pain.
For all the worries, an answer to say that the worries were all in vain.

For what is yours, can never be lost,
For, in life, hope is all you’ve got.
Come around the circle, come home to yourself,
The journey may be long, but in the end, it’ all worth it, I guess….

“YES?”

P A T I E N C E

So, what is it about patience that is so irritatingly optimistic? Why does she have to so convincingly say: Keep patience, the fruits it’ll bear will be sweet. Why do the lessons learnt about it the past twenty five years keep getting revised every year and the marks to pass that exam higher?


PATIENCE!!! Lately, I’ve been bumping into this word a lot, especially since the past six months. So much so, that I have come to believe that I am in a live-in relationship with it! The exasperating truth it bares - so obvious for you to see, the wretched wait in disdain and despair and finally when you are bereft of the hope of ever seeing the daylight again that you’d so desperately been waiting to see, the sun slowly shines through from behind the darkest of the clouds. It’s like the endless wait of the woman for her man at the station who’s been away for months fighting at the war. And finally when the day comes that he is to arrive, she puts on the brightest of her floral dresses, wears the most fragrant perfume and turns up at the station hours before the train is to arrive. But alas! She doesn’t see him getting off; pained to know that he may not show up in that train that day. She begins walking away; all her wait in vain. And then ever so slowly, advancing towards her, she sees him at the door of the train. As if it’d all been planned all along, as he’d been on his way back the moment he’d left!


It should really take some mettle to live and bear with this word. There should really be some magical charm about it. For, from the many stories told, from the many lessons learnt, you just have to wait for Deliverance to be delivered to your door!


And you know what? When the right time comes and the truth be revealed, you’d know that in the end, it was all worth that wait! :)

“Hey, the clock’s still ticking man!
Ahhh, that’s a good sign – the countdown’s begun!”