Showing posts with label Abstract and Creative. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Abstract and Creative. Show all posts

Sunday, September 07, 2008

Musings in Imladris

Exhausted to the last sinew , you lie staring at the richly carved wooden beam in your room at Rivendell. The arm feels right with life again.

There were dark days....old willow trees , lying naked among cold treasures at the feet of forgotten wights....knives in the dark....and Horses....especially horses.....the last memories are of horses.

The Valley of Imladris knows no darkness and in the heart of the Last Homely House , one may find rest and healing.

.....but already the scouts have departed , and eventually they will return.....alas it seems that it might be well into December before they do.

"Its all your fault , Frodo , my lad. For waiting till my birthday to set out. Funny sort of way of honouring it , not the day I'd have chosen to let the SB's into Bag End."

At times you wonder at Frodo , in the council....but Hobbits have the habit of surprising the wisest , not to mention themselves.

"Bill, you fool, " said Sam "You coul have stayed here and 'et the best hay till the new grass comes up."

.....On that last day , Bilbo gives Frodo the Mithril Shirt and the elven-blade 'Sting'.....and in front of the December fire , breaks into a slow chant....

The road goes ever on and on,

Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the road has gone,

And I must follow if I can.

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way.

Where many paths and errands meet,

And wither then , I cannot say.

Monday, August 11, 2008

Love Song to a Stranger....

erased...to ward off misconceptions.

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Another Harry's Bar....and the tale it tells.

Wet wind on the sidewalk….I’m staring in the rain,
Walking up the streets…and walking down again.
And my feet are tired and my brain is numb,
See that broken neon sign say…. “Hey, In you come.”
Got the scent of stale beer hanging, hanging round my head.

Old dog in the corner sleeping like he could be dead.
A book of matches and a full ashtray.
Cigarette left smoking its life away.
Another Harry's bar -- or that's the tale they tell.
Harry's long gone now....and the customers as well.

Somehow the first thoughts are always of bleary Pune December mornings , exhausted to the last mitochondrion of the body - with chronic sleep deprivation and substance abuse , you are dragged off to usual business. The morning fingers nearly breaking into a rigor , at the first strike of the heavy E-string. However, as the first chords lend way to the bridge , Miruvor has coursed through the body.

“ The mist had fled and the sun rose red
Upon the church spire tall,
An old man clad in a cloak and hat
Sat stoned on a battered wall.”

The mornings have always been the most dimly lit…..an uncomfortable jamboree of uneasy slumbers in incomprehensible lectures ; amidst bursting cacophonic hospital OPD’s and sardonically satisfying pools of blood in the OT ; amidst endless cups of pepper n ginger tea in the brilliant mornings of the decadent valley nothingness.
This hasn’t been the best of years , even by the exalted standards of your generally wasted existence. You’ve lost count of the number of ‘ oh, nearly so’s’.....ever witnessing the finishing line , yet forever shy of it ( damn you …hellish hope) ; from the vividly dark nights in the U-block to the anguish ridden centre court of Wimbledon. Yet maybe such disappointments were imperative to attain such hypoxic heights of nihilism , that you boast of in any case.
True nihilism they say arises from a perfect harmony of intellectual and philosophical realization ….. yet you cannot help but feel the ever worsening decline of the intellect amidst the mundane tribulations of routine existence. Not without an end, these tribulations, perhaps….but at what cost….and will it all be too late.

Last of all , Frodo hugged Sam…. “ Maybe you too shall follow someday , for you too were a ring bearer , though for only a short while.”
….and Sam , I think , made no answer….He was never very good with words anyway.

The fell voices of Caradhras fill the air , and the company awaits …death or worse….in the shelter of the naked cliff. “ If this is shelter , then one wall and no roof make a house”, said Boromir…..and Frodo dreams
“ Snowfall on December the 12th ? There was no need to come back to report that.”
“ But I was tired Bilbo.”

Sitting cramped amidst a blinding snowstorm and not being able to stretch or move , is possibly the most physically uncomfortable situation ( in my experience at least). Every moment is a dread weight….an eternity of wait. Fire , in either form , is elusive. You almost wish there was some…..in one way or the other.
Were it not for the generous swigs of rum , it might indeed have been the death of the Halflings ( or one of them at least)….Ferpectly True ( Hic!).

It’s the Olympic year…..we’ve already had a horrible Euro and a rather forgettable Tour. Blood was spilt on the red dirt of Paris and the stake firmly driven into the heart across the channel in London. Tiger winced and grimaced and hobbled , moved practically on one leg yet somehow managed to win the US Open….but the price was paid , and he’s out for the rest of the year . Kobe was MVP and the west was won yet the Celtics thrashed the Lakers in a lop-sided Finals.
I have a bad feeling about Beijing…..amidst murky drugs taints , there is an overwhelming lack of champions….notwithstanding that Phelps might yet win 7 golds ( I don’t believe he will).

“ The King under the mountains is dead….Girion lord of Dale is dead , and I have devoured his people like a wolf among sheep”

Indeed…. the all too brief era of light seems to have passed us by…..and the grim age of poisoned reality and heartache seems to have returned. And I have not the heart to write further. Now I see the 2 Sams had quite a few things in common , not least poetry. I wonder if pipe weed had more colourful connotations…. especially given Gandalf’s ability to blow those wonderous smoke rings….and of course…
“The finest rockets ever seen.
They burst in showers of blue and green.”


The cross atop St Patrick’s never stops glowing. You fall in, fallout , curse , berate and continue ….. to exist. As an old and dear ( now lost) friend so succinctly described it once - strumming furiously….sometimes you get the elusive chord, and sometimes you don’t….even as in some corner of Harry’s Rank old mess you can hear the unmistakable strain of Gilmour trailing….
“ for killing the past…and coming back to life.”

For all your efforts , you resemble the smaller Sam , as far as expression goes , at least.

Maybe there is some truth in doomsday predictors and thinkers of the likes of Diamond…. What wouldn’t I give to see that day of shattered notions. For the moment then….sit there …. Wait…strum…roll….stroll….maybe a ship does sail…..or Tol Sirion is overrun.
And the foresight dawns upon you….nothing in your realm shall endure……

In the meantime , of course....

"Harry's still here...."

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Crazy little thing called ...Hope!


The most terrible thing to come out of Pandora's wretched box was Hope....far worse than all other maladies to ail the human race......brings you up with a soothing falsehood....and then drops you down into the depths of the nether world in such a manner that you are never able to rise from it again...or even desirous of trying to rise.....much better to live out our days in dark pessimism....

Would hell have any meaning if those that dwelt here dreamt not of heaven...I think not....and it is miserable hope that flings these rotten dreams to the inhabitants of hell.

What better than the black hands of Maglor to remind one of the promise and the unfulfilled hope of the light....Go forth then...sing in pain and wander the hither shores.

Monday, June 09, 2008

The Hidden Face of Humanity

Scene I : Marine Drive , Mumbai at midnight.

A teenage boy steps out of a plush residential complex overlooking the breathtaking Queen Necklace , walking a perfectly groomed Spitz on a leash. After barely going a few steps , he notices the imminent intention of the canine to relieve itself ; and places a piece of newspaper immaculately beneath the posteriors of his pet. Subsequently after the routine is complete , the boy neatly folds the paper around the malodorous contents and drops the same in the nearest bin. Thereafter meeting my look of incredulous admiration with a quick smile , he is quickly lost amidst the midnight Saturday crowd.



Scene II : Mumbai Chattrapati Shivaji Terminus - 1500 hrs.

Amidst a torrential downpour and surrounded by masses of Indian humanity in their unfettered rage and angst , I wait with fast ebbing patience to board the train and be rid of the claustrophobic crowd. With almost sadistic amusement I look down at the empty tracks and stare wondrously at the wide and varied filth lying there. From biscuit packets and chocolate wrappers to empty whiskey bottles and even a dead rat , the tracks , seem to mirror the warty underbelly of all that signifies India.

Even as I watch....SPLAT....goes an improvised newspaper plate , dispersing the remnants of a frugal midday meal into the ever forgiving drain ; followed by 2-3 generous contributions of betel stained, and in all possibility, AFB positive expectoration. Standing next to me is an old 'baba' , looking distantly like a severely malnourished Luciano Pavarotti , rescued after years of struggle in the trenches of France in WWI , might have done - complete with tattered rags , grimy hands and hollow sunken eyes , signifying if anything , the utter lack of any real purpose in his existence. Before I could open my mouth to remark , the inimitable Puneet next to me saves me the requirement

...."Baba has just got rid of all the troubles that were plaguing his life....the plate and the sputum....he is now cleansed of all his sins...and at complete inner peace with himself."
....and then as if to reaffirm the aforesaid, the old man dipped and rinsed his hands in a pool of holy water ( read.... a muddy rain puddle on the dirty platform) , wiped his mouth in the same purgatory , and lay himself down and slept like a baby amidst all the cacophony of the surrounding humanity.

Oscar Wilde wrote - "Romance is a privilege of the rich". I am tempted to add ..... so is etiquette , civic sense , conscience , morality and ethics ......in other words , all the supposed behavioral patterns that separate humans from their so called lesser evolved brethren. As survival pressures enmesh their web tighter, the weak societal memes are shed unabashedly in exchange for those, evidently more suited for immediate survival. What cares our old man about global warming, melting glaciers, booming oil prices and vanishing food stocks?
For all our loud boasts of conquest over nature and its laws , we are unfortunately fettered as tight as the cavemen ages ago….. simply that we choose to ignore it or bury our heads like the ostrich in ill conceived notions of superiority.
We aren’t better than other organisms really….just dressed comically for a pantomime of sorts…..indeed …. “All the world’s a zoo, and all the men and women merely caged animals” ….. the cages which are only torn down when faced by the bare realities of life and the struggle for survival.

“But where shall wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? Man knoweth not the price thereof ; neither is it found in the land of the living….for the price of wisdom is above rubies.”

Monday, May 19, 2008

The Sound of Her Wings


Life, at times shocks you into stunned silence….for all your misplaced claims of “been there…seen that”…..and unemotive cold-heartedness…..there are times in the practice of this wretched profession, where you are reduced to a helpless pathetic bystander…..left shaking your head at the enormity of all that we yet do not comprehend….and have no answers for.
The other day I saw an 18 year old boy stricken with Ewing’s sarcoma….a particularly aggressive malignancy of the bone, and pretty much incurable at that. Wherefore the youngster….who should have had the whole world before his feet….in an instant finds himself staring at a tumultous 6-8 months, maybe less , of life. Already stricken with the debilitating course of the disease, as the days progress, the cancer will slowly eat away into his bones, causing sustained pain of a nature that cannot be explained to one who has not felt it....and through the course of it all , he will be given chemotherapy that will drive away the appetite , cause intense nausea and wretching along with complete hair loss and a mileu of other problems.
Then there was the newborn infant, born prematurely at 30 weeks of gestation, who came through a torrid spell of nearly fatal birth asphyxia followed by sepsis, kept only by some extraordinarily heroic neonatal care – yet to what purpose??? The child is likely to have suffered irreversible hypoxic brain damage during his cataclysmic perinatal course….which in all probability shall culminate in one or all of the following: severe mental retardation, partial to complete hearing loss , severe lag in motor development ( i.e. inability to sit up , walk , grasp objects and so on)….to make matters worse , he is likely to survive to well into his 2nd decade if not further….pretty much as a human vegetable….you cant help ask yourself….is life the only thing that is sacrosanct , and does the quality of the same have no bearing whatsoever !
For a moment then, leave aside all the possible nefarious possibilities and unethical practices, but purely from the so-called humanitarian view (let aside even science) , I think there should be a provision to allow one to pull the plug…on his own , or a dear one’s inevitably wasted and traumatized existence. I can scarce fathom the inexplicable desire to clutch vainly at the flimsiest of straws.

If this is sanctity….grant me damnation!

“Death is before me today,
Like the recovery of a sick man.
Like going forth into a garden after sickness.
Death is before me today,
Like the odor of myrrh,
Like sitting under a sail in a good wind.
Death is before me today,
Like the course of a stream
Like the return of a man
From the war galley to his house.”

Walk with her , humanity….hear the gentle beating of the mighty wings.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

On Family....

" The bonds of family bind both ways. they bind us up, support us, help us , and they also are a bond from which it is difficult , perhaps impossible to extricate oneself"

I wonder how many people really find solace in their family....and how many just go along with the whole 'family' -thing because its the socially acceptable thing to do.........and for the previleged few , of course , the family is like a gilded insurance policy - a veritable stariway to heaven.
Well hypocrisy is the human way after all.....thoughts and convictions are scarcely meant to be practised in the eternal struggle for social acceptance and recognition.

Sunday, May 04, 2008

The Crime of being 'Single'

It is a veritable crime to be single in today’s world. A status of single entails that you have nothing to do , no passions , obviously no commitments and therefore are the natural choice to do all the undesirable , time consuming , and ‘after work hours’ jobs that the more privileged ( read married…committed…betrothed and so on) lot cannot take on.

I have lost count of the number of times people have ‘requested’ me to do a bum job assigned to them…..

…. “ I have to go shopping for jewellery with my wife”

….. “Its festival day tomorrow ,and the gods will be displeased if I don’t celebrate it with my family. You of course are an atheist , without any family and a culture-phobe at that ; so of course , it doesn’t matter to you, does it ?”….well , thank you for kindly forgetting that my free time and solitude matters to me…..and whether I use it to declare my infallible servitude to god or use it just to lie supine on my bed and stare at the ceiling is none of your bloody business!!!

….. “ Distant cousins of the third degree are visiting and hence….”

….. “my child’s birthday party”…well excuse me for not feeling thrilled and wishing your child the best of health!!!!
….. the most exasperating one …. “its Feb 14th tomorrow”….as if the tyrant sitting up above has promised special sustained orgasms for those who join in the mass stupidity of other humans in the nauseating celebration of ‘luurrvvee’ with their partners.

…As if these ridiculous explanations were not enough, so-called single individuals are treated with an extraordinary racist outlook…almost as if to say…. “you wanted to be in our position , you’re dying to be in our position….and since you obviously are unlucky or incapable , you deserve to pay for your utter worthlessness in society by serving more worthy citizens like us.”
The venerable organization where I serve takes this sentiment to further extremes..... married people are entitled houses , more luggage allowance during moves , extra allowances in general….and the crowning glory….given more leeway in leave.
Poor guys like us are left to face downright insulting remarks … “Why on earth do you want leave , you’re not even married. Look at him, he has a wife and a small child.”


Well, I have a dream…and not much unlike that of Martin Luther King Jr. That some day I and others like me shall be granted equal status in society , and this without having to remove the ‘single’ tag from my bio-data. That one day our abuse in society will be viewed on an equal platform as that of homosexuals , the non-whites and the socially backward.
To the so-called privileged classes I can only point my extended middle digit and the words of John Lennon…
“You may say I’m a dreamer…but I’m not the only one!”

Sunday, April 06, 2008

Tagged....

This is in response to a tag game that apparently does the rounds on the blog site...so I go along.....
1. LAST MOVIE YOU SAW IN A THEATER:

Juno….from a purely human relationships point of view…yeah , decent watch…but if the film’s supposed to have some kind of social message, then I either missed it….or the makers got it horribly wrong.

2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING?

Diagnostic Ultrasound by Carol Rumac….but I guess it doesn’t count….among non-technical stuff , I’ve been revising Jared Diamond’s “Why is Sex Fun”….splendid read that explores the evolutionary aspects of human sexuality.

3. FAVORITE BOARD GAME?

Chess , of course…bridge better than that (but it aint a board game)….also Cluedo , Scotland Yard , Monopoly and Ludo.

4. FAVORITE MAGAZINE?

Sportstar…the only magazine I have read for any length of time and have the patience to complete…in general not a magazine kinda person.

5. FAVORITE SMELLS?

The inside of my 15 year old much battered , moth eaten copy of Lord of the Rings…transports me instantaneously to Middle Earth. That apart….mary jane , old monk , El Paso by Lomani , and the smell of pretty much anything clean and far from the maddening crowd.

6. FAVORITE SOUND?
Of Silence….
…..also bluesy guitaring , baritone crooning and Jack Nicholson speaking .

7. WORST FEELING IN THE WORLD?

….god and religion and social customs replacing scientific and logical thought.
….indoctrination of impressionable young children.
....hollow patriotism bieng bandied in your face by people who couldnt care less.
....having to communitcate with people you couldnt care less about in the general course of everyday life.

8. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU WAKE?

…..fuck….goddamit.

9. FAVORITE FAST FOOD PLACE?

…Not given to fast food in any kind or form….much rather prefer a lazy drink and steak.

10. FUTURE CHILD'S NAME?

My favourite question….hee haw
Lets see…
Eblis o’ Shaugnessey
Turin Turambar dagnir glauranga
Rand al’Thor
Heathcliff
Sherlock Holmes
…that’s the guys…for a girl…
Death

11. FINISH THIS STATEMENT. "IF I HAD A LOT OF MONEY I'D...?

Lets see…firstly give up Medicine…
Then….open a rock n roll themed café….name it “Stairway to Heaven” or “Wonderful Tonight”….get my own ensemble band…and play the blues and rock n roll on weekends.
Or possibly…..
Buy the Arsenal football club !!!!

12. DO YOU DRIVE FAST?
….when I’m stoned.

13. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL?

…of course….I also wear…pink polka dotted underpants….watch all the saas-bahu serials (even the reruns)…bunk work to watch Sharukh Khan-Yash Chopra films (or for that matter most bollywood films)……pray to GOD 60 times a day....dance nude in a tub full of ox-blood every full moon night so that HE / SHE / IT does not send me to hell….ANYTHING ELSE????

14. STORMS-COOL OR SCARY?

hmm…inconvenient…mostly.

15. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR?

…if the childhood dinky cars are discounted ( I had at least 15 of those)…then none yet…fingers crossed…hopefully within the next 2 months.

16. FAVORITE DRINK?

Water….with Old Monk / Bacardi / Smirnoff….soda with single malt scotch….chilled white wine….bloody mary….heady beer on summer afternoons......strong coffee…black tea.


17. FINISH THIS STATEMENT, "IF I HAD THE TIME I WOULD

.....….learn reading music….master the bass and classical and blues guitaring…..work on my ‘nipped in the bud’ drumming skills.....also….perhaps….write a book !!!!

18. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS ON BROCCOLI?

….I only eat meat.

19. IF YOU COULD DYE YOUR HAIR ANY COLOR, WHAT WOULD BE YOUR CHOICE?

…pretty irrelevant question…considering I’ve nearly lost all of it.

20. NAME ALL THE DIFFERENT CITIES/TOWNS YOU HAVE LIVED IN.

Jamshedpur…Kolkata….Delhi….Pune….Jalandhar…Lucknow…and…some god-forsaken wilderness in the Kashmir Valley.
( lived in..I’ve equated to…spent more than 30 days in one go)….
…also spent considerable amounts of time in…Ranchi…Bombay…Srinagar.

21. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?

Football….Tennis…F1…Golf….Basketball….Rugby….MotoGP….and cricket when Australia’s playing…..can pretty much watch each and very sport.

22. ONE NICE THING ABOUT THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU

.….that she’s from Kolkata….likes rock n roll….and doesn’t believe in god (or at least looks like it).

23. WHAT'S UNDER YOUR BED?

….I’m scared to look….mostly books…books…..and more books....lying there coz there isnt room in room to display them.

24. WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE BORN AS YOURSELF AGAIN?

….I’d much rather be spared the inconvenience of being born at all….to quote…I forgot who….Bertrand Russell..or Douglas Adams…perhaps…. “…considering that I’d been dead for millions of years before I’d been born and had suffered not the slightest bit of inceonvenience from it”.

25. MORNING PERSON, OR NIGHT OWL?

night owl…and also very early morning…it’s the sun high up on the sky that I dislike.

26. OVER EASY, OR SUNNY SIDE UP?

…neither….dark side of the moon…or better…dark side of the LOON!!!

27. FAVORITE PLACE TO RELAX?

……any place…away from the mad rush if humanity.

28. FAVORITE PIE?

Sheperd’s….

29. FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR?

…..all said and done…good ol’ vanilla…better….if its spiked with a dash of rum or khalua.

30. OF ALL THE PEOPLE YOU TAGGED THIS TO, WHO'S MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND FIRST?

...My blog’s pretty much a dead end…I don’t expect anyone to respond.

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Dictionary of a Cynic

I was tagged on to this by an unknown lady's blog....and the idea was exceedingly fascinating...hence here goes...an A-Z of all that matters...causes sentiments...passions...smiles and hurts.


A …..is for AFMC….the ol’ girl resplendent after nigh on 60 years….who says the flame has died…so what if there are no bikes for the cadets….so what if they actually attend classes and clinics …so what if they study any other time beyond 30 days preceding a university exam….there’s something imperishable about the air….the walls….the gardens……aahh…..quite simply…the show will go on.

B….is for Baggins…..quite simply the best surname in the real and fictitional world combined. I’m sorry Bilbo , ol’ chap….there was nothing Tookish that made you probe William’s pocket , riddle Gollum in the dark , ‘Attercop’ and ‘Tomnoddy’ the nasty spiders of Mirkwood , and not to mention engage Smaug in banter only hobbits can…it was all Baggins….we loves it…we loves it…we loves it forever!!!!


C…..is for Coffee….of which, I get through 8-10 cups in a day…..of any sort and kind…filter , black or machine brewed.

D…..is for Darwin , Dawkins , Dennett , Diamond…..the scholars who gave , structured and simplified the theory of life for us ….. Evolution....the simplest , most beautiful though abominable yet inescapable truth about everything that exists ..and the way it exists.
Also…for Death…the eternal love of my life…oh to look into those eyes…to hear the sound of her wings
Also…for DNA…..the magic molecule of life.
Also…for Dylan ( Bob)…the greatest poet of the 20th century ( Nobel prize or no)
…wow …in other words….D was simply the most DIFFICULT.

E….is for Einstein…the man who changed the way the world looks….the way it functions…and pretty much brought to a naught all that existed the way it did before his time…….all things are relative…but in human society …he seems destined to remain the only constant.


F….is for Football…the most beautiful game on the planet. A toast (and looking forward to many more) to the lip smacking Premiership / La Liga / Serie A weekends , late Tuesday and Wednesday night UCL fixtures….not to mention the summer Euros and WC’s.
For a long suffering fan like me…here’s hoping…
…Arsenal win a champions league title
…Holland finally win a World Cup
…Christiano Ronaldo and Didier Drogba get banned for life for diving and cheating.
And…
…Sir Alex finally hangs up his boots at Old Trafford.

G…is for god…..to sum it simply in the words of Richard Dawkins….
“……. arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction : jealous and proud of it; a petty unjust unforgiving control freak; a vindictive bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniac, sado-masochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. Those of us schooled from infancy in his ways become insensitive to his horror.”

H…..is for humans…an absurd species that has lived for barely 50,000 years in the 5 billion year history of life on a tiny planet in the solar system of an insignificant sun, located on the fringes of a rather average sized galaxy amidst infinitesimally larger galaxies , stars , and black holes of the known universe…..yet a species which believes that the entire universe and everything within it along with the laws of physics that govern it , are made solely for the purpose that it could exist.
….to quote from Gaiman… “Ah , humanity ! You never cease to amaze me.”

I…..is for Intelligence…or the utter lack of it….which characterizes….the ‘H’ mentioned above….which is inspite of the best evolutionary efforts of massive calvarial and cerebral development. Yet humans remain , mired in petty hegemonies , entrenched in atavistic unscientific societal norms , and utterly resistant to intellectual and philosophical progress of any kind.



J…is for Jimmy ( Page ) , Jimi ( Hendrix) , John ( Lennon , Bonham , Paul Jones , Fogarty etc etc) , (Mick) Jagger , Janis Joplin ( the only double J) , Joan (Baez) , Jim ( Morrison) , James ( Hetfield)….the eternal imperishable spirits of rock n roll….who enable me to clamber out of bed every bleary morning…sustain me through my most trying and testing moment each noisome day…and soothe and lull me into the arms of Murphy at the end of it.


K….is for Kilroy…the ubiquitous , all-pervading , all knowing , rum guzzling , chain smoking , guitar toting ,Floyd quoting, rascally imp….who incidentally also manages to save human lives by practicing medicine.

L….is for Loyola….13 of the very best years…in the very best school….

“Those were the days my friend,
We thought they’d never end;
We’d sing and dance forever and a day.
We’d live the life we choose,
We’d fight and never loose,
For we were young and sure to have out way.”

M….is for Morpheus….the Sandman…the eponymous hero of Gaiman’s cult work….to his endless bretheren…the Corinthian , the immortal Hob Gadling …and all the rest….
Indeed… what power would even hell have if those that dwelt there dreamt not of heaven.

N…..is for Night……time for rest…for musings…time for the blues….to walk under the enchanted stars….and marvel at the lights of ages gone by.....to sleep…in peace for some…in angst for others…awaiting the arrival of the tyrannical sun.

O…is for Old Monk…the elixir of life….and my steadfast companion…whether it be through the travails of an uncertain final year at MBBS , bone chilling winters of Kashmir , or at the fag end of a weary day’s toil in residency.

P…is for Poetry…..anything…from the nonsensical ‘Man in the Moon’….to the immortal verses of Shelley, Keats and Coleridge.

Q…is for quantum mechanics….and the scarce understood, crazy world of strings, quarks and uncertainty, which blasphemous as it sounds , sets the ball rolling for everything that occurs within the universe…..I’m sorry Mr. Einstein , but if such an entity does exist.…it would appear that god DOES play dice with the universe.

R….is for Rock n Roll….the greatest discovery ( or invention if you like) in the history of human civilization…..the language of rebellion….of angst…..of sarcasm…of passion….of romance !!!!

S…is for Schumacher.... In memory of those glorious sunday evenings where the master would make a mockery of the rest of the field. 2 years on ,the sport is not the same…will never be again. A lifetime of my earnings to see one final ‘Schumi-Leap’ atop the victory podium.

T…is for Tolkien…for giving me Middle-Earth…my home away from home for the best part of the past 15 years….for giving me Felagund and Frodo….Aragorn and Aldarion…...Luthien and Arwen…Gondolin and Gondor….for making me weep , rejoice , bleed , feast , sing and philosophise over the countless revisions of the tales from the 3 ages. “Let us at last praise the colonizers of dreams.”

U…is for Us….us..us....and them...them...them
......and after all , we're only ordinary men!!!

V…is for Valhalla…and the childhood tales…..of feasting gods , bloodstained battles , rainbow bridges….the Thunderer , the All-Father and the glorious legions in their train.

W…is for Warne. ...For every bamboozling leg break , googly , flipper, zooter and have what you may that made him the best ever to ply the glorious art of spin. Just sit back and cast your mind back to the moments of magic….Mike Gatting, Basit Ali , Daryl Cullinan, Andrew Strauss…thanks for the memories, Shane!


X…is for X-rays…the mysterious discovery of Wilhelm Roentgen…that revolutionized medical science ….in whose company I am destined to spend the rest of my attenuated life.

Y…..is for Yesterday…in the fond memories of which, we while away our precious todays.

Z…is for Zeppelin.... In the world of rock n roll…first there is Led Zep…..then there’s daylight……..for the most haunting compositions , the most monstrous guitar riffs , the most outrageously orgasmic crooning , and sheer death defying , hell raising, earth shaking drumming……unquestionably the gilded stairway to rock n roll heaven.

Sunday, March 09, 2008

'Spit' - Fire

An sms from Puneet at his ‘phlegmatic’ best . I just had to put it down.

Had we Indians discovered some economically productive use for human saliva , we would have been the richest country in the world. I am at the railway station and amusing myself with the amazing potential Indians have to ‘spit’ - all colours and amazing maneuvers. Unfortunately, the only thing most can produce in sputum is AFB

AFB – acid fast bacillus….syn – Mycobacterium tuberculosis (the tubercle bacillus).

Friday, February 15, 2008

INSOMNIA

Tossing and turning, and
rendering drenching wet,
The pillows and sheets with midnight sweat.
Though waking terrors
Plague the mind,
Easier to bear, and far
Less fearful, you find;
Than ghoulish figures that in your dreams are met.

The unsleeping pupil, dark and glazed, as if belladonna stained;
The restless heart, galloping, like some jungle beast untamed.
The mouth bathed and soured
By the ever rising, burning bile,
While the mind walks , ceaseless
Amidst some distant defile.
In such catatonia, you pray in fervour, for the night to wane.

Some moonstruck lover, bemoaning in sighs, his mistress cold,
Or cancerous crone, in writhing pain, yet vainly clutching the mortal fold.
The fallen lord, who lately
Hope in the bottle hath sought.
Or the uneasy, uncertain crown,
In the throes of unwilling battle, caught.
All lie in angst, and in the gloom, their uneasy sorrows mould.

The frenzied brain , glowing bright, in unimaginable hues,
Like artist in desperation, seeking his long forgotten muse.
Gates are opened ,
And instantaneously shut;
While teeming multitudes,
In senseless hunt
Ungirt the mind, and ‘mong the nightly demons, set it loose.

The body is drugged, the senses numbed, yet sleep remains,
As distant, as bright sunlight , from stygian plains.
Then the first gleam
Of a hopeless dawn,
Plunges deeper, the
Unrelenting , insomniac thorn;
From the limb and soul, all semblance, of life blood drains.

Monday, January 28, 2008

Have you ever seen the rain

“I am a brain , Watson. Everything else about me is vestigial and serves only to feed my brain.” – the incomparable Sherlock Holmes

Oh to be Holmes : to dwell in the uninhibited ecstasy of the glorious intellect , to be rid forever of that mansbane passion called emotion, to bind the truant heart in bonds of cold hard, logic and unemotive , calculated reason.
On a time , not so long ago , you deemed humans of all manner miserable : intellectually retarded and emotionally wretched. Yet , you could never stave the ‘human’ yoke off yourself. For all your chest thumping claims of misanthropy , your roots remained firmly entrenched within the same emotions you so loathed. Into every hurdle life had perchance strewn across your path , you stumbled haplessly ; and emerged irrevocably scarred yet none the wiser. Thereupon , true to your kind, you took to chiding life , the people and all else around you that the warped mind could conceptualise.

Yesterday, and days before, The sun is cold and rain is hard,I know; been that way for all my time.Till forever, on it goes,
Through the circle, fast and slow,I know; it cant stop, I wonder

Yet it never occurred to you that mayhap there was nothing wrong with the paths that you trod , or those that strode alongside you. Perhaps those paths were never meant for you. Since the time you held converse with your own reason , the one thing that struck you was how your paths always seemed sundered from those around you. Be it the family, friends or the ‘so called gods’ , your lot has always been aboard the ‘lonesome train’.
It is something you were always at peace with , indeed something you were proud off.
Ever the calvin-child , enconsed comfortably in the flights of your limitless fantasy.
Why then should you seek for the fruits that await the end of the journey more often undertaken , when you have it not within you to bear the toil or the briars on the road. When the landscape seems irksome to you , why do you expect a restful bed at the eve.
Matters of the primitive limbic centres were never meant for you. Your cortex has served you well till now, and will be with you when aught else has deserted and fled. Holmes is more fitting to your kind , not even the hewer of the caves and certainly not the one-handed vagabond.
So , my boy…keep your reason to yourself , let the mind do the thinking . The other organ was never the strongest part of you in any case , horribly fickle and disastrously treacherous. Bind it hard and true and heed not its poisoned whispers and you shall do well.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

to Purpose....or the lack of it !

48 hrs , tossing and turning amidst unquiet dreams and visions . The mind drugged by anti-histaminics and codeine based cough elixirs ; dulled yet receptive….searingly and painfully so, to a plethora of stimuli , of ever changing hues and shades that in an instant blind the eye . For the umpteenth time, in 48 hrs you resolve to read , you open your Sutton…before you comprehend, you find an hour, maybe more (in your state, time holds no meaning) has elapsed. Aghast you stare into the beleaguered text to find pencil streaks covering nigh 10 pages….yet you struggle to recollect a word that was written…and hence , for the umpteenth time , in the same 48 hrs , the book slams shut and you take to your bed.
You stare at the ceiling…..stare at the arachnid weave her traps , unmindful of all else save her next prey , her next mate….and her next offspring. What cares she of aught that goes on in the world . Is she really that different from you and bedraggled mass of delusional species that you call humans. Lying beside you, the 3 most unlikely bedfellows at the first glance…
…..3 volumes of Sandman - Heavens ! they should have banned these long ago , just like they should have done away with cannabis , acid, coke.
….Tolkien , of course. Can you imagine lying 48 hrs in bed and not reading a word of the maestro.
…and finally, and probably unusually, Dawkins’ ‘Selfish Gene’ (we shall see why, though)
….and flipping occasionally through these, you begin to think…..


…………it is all about the Purpose…purpose drives all to each and every end…without purpose, life as we know and define, it would cease to exist. However , you find in the whole thing a ridiculous oxymoron. If Darwin, Dawkins, Dennet and the likes are correct, as you do not doubt they are, then the whole gamut of evolution is purposeless. Things are what they are , simply cause that’s how the prevailing selection pressures over billions of years, moulded them. You , have no more purpose , than the stupid virus which infects you at the present moment, clogging your sinuses and nose.

The city folk had killed the cats and dogs because they might have helped spread the disease. Lacking the power , they imprisoned each other in their houses on the first suspicion of the disease. A rough red cross was painted upon the door, written on a paper the words – LORD HAVE MERCY UPON US.
The door was then sealed and a watchman placed outside , until all in there had been untouched by the disease for 40 days, or were dead.
She heard screams of 2 children high in an attic room, their parents long dead. A newborn baby suckled the milk, and the plague, from a cold breast....on the empty street , a corpse lay , waiting for the cart to take it to the plague pit.
……Despair walked the streets of London in 1665, the Plague year and she still stalks you. Her eyes look at you behind every mirror and sooner or later her hook will find your heart.

….you jump centuries , to a more familiar landscape…..


Plush offices and lounges , exquisite carpentry, tapestries of the finest (not to mention expensive) sort, spas, masseurs, billiards and bridge, golf and croquet. Ladies in their Sunday best sitting by the pool, the shimmering of the water in the glorious afternoon matched only by the dazzling jewels adorning the wonderful women, sipping tea and nibbling dainties .....outside, barely a stone’s throw away from this haven of luxury, in the streets a grubby little child carries a mangled, flea bitten monkey. Her mightily misplaced efforts at some kind of animal acrobatics at the traffic signal do not go wholly in vain. A few sympathetic coins are flung her way. He woos her with passion, fervour and relentless persuasion but he cannot understand her denial. She loves him, he can tell all too well…yet she keeps him at arms length. Not one furtive touch , not a single forbidden kiss, she waits….for the desire to channel to something more sublime….and then they make love, like flames…opening blending , burning…they make love like animals, like gods…………..

…and midst these scenes , walks a man….or one such being. There is something dainty in the fingers, but it is the eyes that enamour you, for they are golden like a cat’s. You are all marked as mine , he says, veritable honey on the forked tongue. You would fain ask , “ what dost thou desire?”.
“Everything, what else is there to desire. After all , being happy, and getting what you want are 2 quite different things. If you have nothing left to want, then you just wait until there’s nothing left to wait for.”
…the eyes glow ever brighter, like a forest fire.

…and so are all are lives wrought. Born into the rabble of desire and despair, dreaming often, delighting less often…and finally at death , being put out of our miserable existence. Some die at birth , some at 10, some at 100…..but each one has lived the same
, each of us have the same amount of time handed to us ….a lifetime…nothing less , nothing more….and in this lifetime, we forever struggle for our purpose , to justify our existence…and like as not, carry the questions securely into our graves.

All the talk of changing the world , healing its woes, making it a better place to live in , seem quite hollow to you…..even were it well meant, which in most cases it is not. But even if it were all well meant , and all perfectly executed…and sickness and famine were banished from human realms , no greed , no hunger, no wars, no genocides…..would that change anything. Would our desires be achieved, would we be free from want, would we forever escape the hook of despair….ha!

Suffer on , Humanity…. Be thou comforted in thy delusions of grandeur. For my part , I shall await, patiently, to look into her eyes, one final time.

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Cupid Rejected

One of my old works....alomost 6 yrs to the date.

O, poet divine, thou bard of the albatross,
Who long days at the whiles of ope’ hath spent.
Think thou thy misery hath gall’d thee more ,
Than that which fortune to me hath lent.
Thou spoke of pain
And fiendish sights,
And viper thoughts
On moonlit nights.
Of rot of mind,
Decay of will;
But hear me out,
Thou hadst with thee,
A love of life
Loth to depart,
Plighted troth
To thy soul and heart.
Though never met,
Ever with thee,
Like oil on waters
Of a troubled sea.

When barb’d with gold, the white feathered dart,
Sped from the bow of yon rascal, blind boy
Of Venus, pierced more than this unfortunate heart,
It bled the soul , eclipsed all its joy.
Thou maiden fair, chaste as Luna’s silver rain,
Thy lips as honeydew on coral spill’d;
Those dark cascades tumbling in their perfumed train,
Madam, do not now disown, whom thine eyes have killed.
Would that we could depart together, depart far from civility,
To the rustic hills, the lazy brooks, the ripening heather,
To the bliss of noontide, the verdant greenery,
In some forsaken nook, dream in peace, in our arms together.
Hand in hand, arm in arm, we’d walk in the unnamed woods,
There under canopied shade , I’d nestle ‘mongst thy tresses,
Astride mirth itself, we’d mock Apollo, “Mar us if you could”,
Myself as Orion, would then woo thee, my virgin huntress.

Wherefore I lie now, on accursed Hela’s shores,
Darkness cloaks me, shrieks out in voices fell.
Stricken by grief and torment beyond portend,
O, that I never heard of thee to name or thy deeds to tell.
The thunderer
Mighty Mjoll has hurled,
The mountains tremble
And the stranger world,
Shrinks to a formless
Shapeless grey,
And evil shapes
On the mind now prey.
No human touch
Or piteous eye,
No light or hope
Do I descry;
The eagle descends
Now every eve,
Promethean pain
Is my lot to grieve.
Evenstar of my heart, now cleave to me,
Shut thine eyes an instant, wipe away the mirage.
Love greater than man’s wont , shall I bestow on thee,
Hence, beneath yon silver girt maiden, tonight, let our souls merge.
I stand now, knocking on heaven’s door,
Below, hell fires are lit, the legions of Satan await;
Stretch out thy hand, pull me onto the everlasting shore,
Else everlasting darkness shall be my fate.


In such hour of doom, do the heavens part,
Purple plumed and mantle of silver white;
A rider fair of form doth now appear,
With helm of gold and eyes Valinorean light.
“Come my liege
Shake of thy shroud.”
The blessed one
To me cried loud;
“What lacks thee ever
In wit or grace,
That should become
Such an ashen face.
Fie on thee,
If now thou will
For darkling tresses
Mighty oceans spill.
Hearken ever,
To thy mind not heart
And find thy brooding
Gloom depart.”


He spoke to me, words fair of form
Of wisdom ,enchantment, wizardry.
“Be warned, the greatest, of Man’s banes
Shall ever be a lover’s treachery.
Turn now hence
To the amorous realms
Of fleeting winds,
And leaping streams.
The burden’d boughs
And cooling mists
Shall serve thee better
Than thy aimless tryst.
Look on the glory
Of fair Ithil
From the living rock
Of Zirak -Zigil.
Seek for learning
Or bliss in art,
A mighty sword,
An enduring heart.”


The night is old, my messiah gone,
Like to the west wind, keen of breath;
He scattered the clouds, memory remains,
Of the disfigured dreams like an impotent wraith.
Hear me now
All ye men of worth,
Who in like pursuits
Have lost wit and mirth.
Lie fettered not
In unseen bonds,
But cast a glance
To the world beyond.
Earn wisdom, fame
And great renown,
Not despair under
The bejeweled crown.
Hearken to Athena
And Apollo now,
Dismiss Cupid
And his treacherous bow.

Monday, July 23, 2007

Dreams

The misty gloom at the fall of eve,
May serve to heal , and sever, from its wounded core;
The restless mind, and lend it wings,
Bid it speed to yonder surreal shore.
To rest awhile on fair starlit sward,
Sound the hunt in untamed beech and oak.
Scale the ancient snowy peaks,
Kingly clad in pearly moonlit cloak.
Or mayhap if thou glory seeks,
To fall or fell in the fields of death;
Which shall recount for ages hence,
The deeds of valour in one enamoured breath.
Walk in awe the enchanted streets,
‘Mongst heady fumes of incense divine,
Where bards create ecstatic harmonies,
Whence the maidens dance , and their lovers pine.
Hold converse with sages wise
On life and death and the unseen beyond.
Watch the forgotten tales, brought back
To life, with a wave of some enchanted wand.
Meetings aplenty in the Elysian fields,
With enlightened faces, burden free.
Soon perhaps your day might come,
To cross the river at the anointed fee.

Sunday, June 10, 2007

Farewell to Pain

The American National Conference on Pain describes it as having 2 components, one purely sensory and the other being an emotional or affective component. Morphine, the drug of kings, is still one of the most potent drugs available to man for the relief of pain. Morphine selectively acts on the sub-cortical pain perception areas of the brain and abolishes the emotional/affective component of pain such that the patient feels a strange alien sensation from the periphery but it causes him no discomfort

The mind is a strange creature. It is forever at conflict – against the body, against its own self, against others of its ilk ,and against all known norms of the so called civilized society. They say it is this property of the mind that sets humans apart from all other forms of life. The ability to think , to reason and equally , if not more importantly, to feel. Feelings, not simply subjective sensations of touch, temperature or pain which have been scribbled age long in the books, but the capacity to harbour emotions, to love , to feel pity and mercy.
Since as far back as you can recall, they began cathecising you . They taught you good and evil – dividing them by boundaries you have struggled to see even to the latest day. Then they taught you to love – your parents, your family, your friends, your country and countrymen, and above all , to love ‘God’. “Why ?” You would fain question but the reply comes swift and stern , “Hush child! You must do so because we all do, because so we are told, because so it is written in the great books and chronicled by the wise – whose wisdom and authority we have no business to question.” Later when you grow up, you hear and read of a heretic named Darwin who suggests something rather absurd -
That chaos gives rise to order , that all creation and life is mere chance – and that every succeeding generation is more suited for survival and consequently more smarter than the previous. They laugh at you, “ What a preposterous and vulgar suggestion. Man was made God in His own form.” They tell you when to laugh and when to cry , of the times when you should hurt and the times when you should be happy.
However all the teachings come to naught. You stand a bystander on the brink of battle, amidst countless slain; your feet splashing in pools of blood and squashing beneath them mangled human limbs and organs. A voice within tells you that you should cry, that you should feel pain….but try as you might, the voice is alien and you cannot obey! Sooner might the thinking brain command the infracted and failing heart – “Beat ! For so I command you.”
When have the cognitive centers of the mind ever commanded the subtle, brilliantly varied and scarce understood primitive centers – of pain and emotion…of sleep and procreation. Your age old teaching struggles manfully, screaming at that ill-gotten perverted seat of pain… “Make him weep!”…but all that ever happens is the endorphins, those natural brethren molecules to morphine in the brain, simply propound. You sense there is something amiss – with you , your mind or your world – but it scarce bothers you, no more than a gnat from the marshes bothers an iron scaled dragon of many battles.
You are not euphoric…indeed far from it, simply indifferent; not autistic…oh, no- simply weltschmerz.
Your once loved ones depart your world…you put on a façade of grief but it matters little to you. They murmur against you in whispered voices…. “Heartless, that’s what he is .” But those voices are drowned by the ones that surge within you , coming from you very soul…..you descry what it says…like to a verse you heard upon a different time….it is after all a voice of the endless…of a king of sorts.


If you open your mind for me
You won't rely on open eyes to see
The walls you built within
Come tumbling down,
And a new world will begin.
Living twice at once you learn
You're safe from the pain
In the dream domain
A soul set free to fly
A round trip journey in your head
Master of illusion, can you realize
Your dream's alive, you can be the guide but...

I- will be watching over you
I- am gonna help to see it through
I- will protect you in the night
I- am smiling next to you....
In silent lucidity.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Shadows and Chains

The shadows of the twilight realm criss-cross through the waking world. You find yourself walking strange, nameless paths : under canopied forests, floors of which have not known light for ages unrecounted ; struggling over pine clad mountain slopes, slipping on the verglass, drinking from the icy streams; beaten down by the unrelenting malice of the raging sun in parched lands blasted to desolation by design or devilry beyond your waking or dreaming imagination.
Then, in an instant, the unfamiliarity fades away into lands, towns, and streets you know well. Familiar faces clog your vision…well, faces that should have been familiar. Something is different . The smiles warm not your heart, the casual friendly banter springs back off you like leaden darts, off armour forged by the lame smith. The meat and bread hold no taste….even the beloved rum seems strangely queer. An undeniable alienation envelops you amidst these phantom shapes in this seemingly phantom land. You seek desperately for some semblance of reality, but what is a dream and what is real – the boundaries have faded , well nigh irrevocably.
Why is everything so unfamiliar ? Are they unfamiliar?
The reality dawns. You have trodden paths from which mortals may scarce emerge unscathed.
“The higher you are, the further you fall…the longer the walk, the farther you crawl”
The words hit home with a chill. Nothing has changed, save perhaps you., so much so that the waking world which succours you seems an overwhelming burden. For a moment you toy with the idea of severing this burdensome cord….but something recalls Nietzsche to you, and his discourse on life and knowledge…and annihilation.
What then should your recourse be?
The Bifrost gleams invitingly…but mortals may not leave the grey lands of Midgard however weary they seem. In Asgard you would tire and fade away in an instant, like moths before a flame too strong.

“Mirror! Mirror! On the wall,
True hope lies beyond the coast.
You’re a damned kind can’t you see,
The tomorrow bears insanity”

Chains and shackles have scared you from your childhood days. You have forever refused to be bound. Some chains are inescapable- life is the most burdensome of them all , and all others are secured to it. However, not all is lost, there are many chains you may yet stave off; indeed many you have successfully done. They say, not all chains are evil ; every man must at a time grow roots deep into the earth and drink of the ancient wells. Somehow, all this talk of growing and digging does not appeal to you. You would sooner take wing, from airy bower to some distant mountain crag….
….but does it serve to think and speak of wings and flight, when all about you are growing roots.
Amidst such quagmires, you find no answers, ….but maybe we shall get some soon . Oh, yes! Indeed …maybe we shall , my precious!!!

“There are times,
When all the world’s asleep;
The questions run too deep,
For such a simple mind”

Sound of Wings

The urban woods are sombre, dark but not a trace of loveliness do you discern; like battlements and bastions grinning at each other across barren lands wasted by malice and anarchy. There are no promises that beckon - no oaths to be fulfilled…the weariness eats into your bones…but all that awaits you is endless, ceaseless, mindless toil; a veritable ocean; stretching wave after wave, mile after mile; beyond the sight of the keenest eyes.Sleep! Ah, Murphy….Sleep is not your lot, not yet anyway , not by a long way! You strain your eyes far into the madding crowd seeking her, the eldest of the endless, and those disarmingly mischievous eyes….at times you think maybe you see her…you hear in earnest for the sound of wings….but the algesic cacophony of the noisome crowd drowns all sound. The sound of the wings she brings with her, and she comes not for you, yet. The mind gropes the darkness in vain, till at last it hits upon him, the Dreamlord, alone and unaided, in battle before the legions of Lucifer…. “I am hope”…….You smile amidst your toil, the paths have to be travelled ….the wings shall find you yet!“Indeed, what power would hell have if those that dwelt here dreamt not of heaven”