tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51717983827054719182024-03-09T03:10:35.274+05:30pirouetteFrom a certain point onward there is no longer any turning back. That is the point that must be reached. ~ Franz Kafkarasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.comBlogger54125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-32490941174034881662013-01-07T21:54:00.000+05:302013-01-07T21:54:12.337+05:30<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
दुःख की तासीर गर्म है क्या ?<br />
दूर , उस सर्द देश में ,<br />
उन्हें ठण्ड क्यों नहीं लगती ?<br />
<br /></div>
rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-19364793096231575782012-03-13T15:22:00.000+05:302012-03-13T15:22:20.695+05:30Marked<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Let’s let the walls remain bare.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Let’s not play any music in the background.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Let’s not come wearing fragrances,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">And labels.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Let’s just meet here,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">And nowhere else.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">So that when you go away,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">I wouldn’t be stunned by places,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Smells, ideas and melodies,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Into the torture of your absence.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">The crushing truth of it,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">The convulsive,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Slow,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Death of hope.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">So that,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">Each morning,<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">I would just have me<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">To remember you by.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;"> ***<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">©Rasagya Kabra, March 13, 2012<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span style="color: white;">"A certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect" ~ Haruki Murakami, <i>Kafka on the Shore</i></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><br />
</div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-14830277814703812082012-03-04T21:34:00.000+05:302012-03-04T21:34:30.276+05:30The Balancing Act<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Hold on t</span>o the thread of reason,</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A little longer,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Just a little longer.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Imagine dawn.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">How do you like your sky –</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Blue, orange or golden?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Isn’t it a beauty?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But breathe this night,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The desolate moon, the sleepy stars.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Mourn its impending death.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Know in your heart,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That when the day grows too bright,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">You will miss this quiet night.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, March 4, 2012</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-45785094311090379582012-02-18T22:44:00.000+05:302012-02-18T22:44:33.744+05:30Eerie Glory<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">It is a face,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Reluctantly holding out</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In the wake of the doom within.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Asking,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That the secret insight it guards</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Be hunted</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">With fingers and lips and tongue.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Warning,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Of the doom </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That comes with it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Resisting this face</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Is a hard feat.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Getting doomed</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In its eerie glory,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Is easier.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, February 18, 2012</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-90349170486077097802012-02-08T23:20:00.000+05:302012-02-08T23:20:00.926+05:30Hourglass<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I want to apologize</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">To that girl,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">For turning her inside</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Into a deep dark jungle.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I can see her shoulders shrug,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Hear her laughter echo,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Her walk beat against my memory.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I know you deserved better,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I want to tell her.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I want to touch</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The sparkle in her eyes,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Feel it in my veins,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In my blood,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And hold onto it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I’m so sorry, I want to say,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And cup her face in my hands.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">If she doesn’t run away from me,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That girl in the picture,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I want to smile at her</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And tell her</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That all isn’t lost,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That all can never be lost</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">So long as one is alive.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, February 8, 2012</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">"I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?" ~ Ernest Hemingway</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><br />
</span></span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-49773537719363290182012-02-02T17:15:00.000+05:302012-02-02T17:15:46.622+05:30What have you told them?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I can feel their eyes on me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Eyes, that know.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Who are these people?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">What have you told them?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">How do they know?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Each day,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In familiar alleys,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">These alien eyes judge me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I know the texture of that glance.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal">The glance that sizes me up,</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Compares me to a newfound standard,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And then, sometimes,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Tries to nudge me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Once, a woman,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">You know which one,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Walked across a whole goddamned lawn</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">To see who I was.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">What <i>am</i> I?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">An endangered animal?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A dangerous animal?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A dangerous endangered animal?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And what have I done to be exhibited so?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">You know,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I’ve never hated you,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Not even remotely,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Just don’t make me feel</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That we could never have been on the same side,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Because <i>that</i>, </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Is not true.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, February 2, 2012</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-17639580123977063322012-01-31T01:31:00.000+05:302012-01-31T01:31:42.154+05:30Happy Birthday, Blog<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Hello there. The blog turns a year old today, and I thought I’d just write to you, and thank you for coming here every once in a while. You keep this blog alive. You complete the loop of which I’m only a part. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">I hope you enjoy reading this blog. You know you can tell me what you like and what you don’t, by way of a comment/ email/ facebook message. Please feel free. I’m very interested in knowing what you think.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">Here’s something I have for you. So, several months ago, I read this lovely, lovely story by Molly Giles. It’s called <i>Pie Dance</i>. If I know you really well, I must have already made you read it. If not, then here’s a podcast <a href="http://castroller.com/Podcasts/PriSelectedShorts/2270403">http://castroller.com/Podcasts/PriSelectedShorts/2270403</a><i> </i> . There are three stories being read one after the other, and the one I’m talking about comes at 38:22. I couldn’t find a written version, so you’d have to do with this. Or do you like podcasts better? Then we’re good. Me? I don’t know, I’m just a little old fashioned I think.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">So that’s all I have to say for now. Do come back later this week to check out the new poem/story. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-8913841297501344512012-01-25T20:02:00.001+05:302012-01-25T20:42:04.602+05:30Band Aid for the Soul<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">No,</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">I can deal with my bag,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Thank you.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">The man at the gate looks at me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">I’m wearing earrings that</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Two of my exes,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Were somewhat fond of.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">My sweater,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Is a little too big.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">It insists on resting off</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">My left shoulder.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">I don’t mind.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">I’ve never had an issue with my shoulders.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Let’s see what we have here,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Pink walls,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Overflowing ashtrays,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">A cloying room freshener.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">The woman at the reception is distracted.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">She doesn’t pay attention</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">When I tell her</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">That I have a room booked in my name.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">She keeps looking at the door</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Which keeps swinging from my entry.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Guessing her perplexity,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB"> I say, </span>I’m by myself.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Oh, she says.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">She looks at me,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">At my earrings,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">Searchingly,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">And finds her answer in the band aid that</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">My sweater has decided to reveal.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">She furrows her brow a little.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">I practice my smile on her.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, January 25, 2012</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB">------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">एक अजनबी झोंके ने जब</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">पूछा मेरे ग़म का सबब,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">सेहरा की भीगी</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">रेत पर,</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">मैंने लिखा</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">आवारगी।</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">~ <i>Ghulam Ali </i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt9SmLmcx3Q">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt9SmLmcx3Q</a> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: left;"></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-50780604154822781922012-01-07T22:21:00.001+05:302012-01-07T22:49:20.135+05:30Journey<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Street lights,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Sleepy from fighting the fog.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A road</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That winds and winds,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Like a serpent,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Each stretch merging into the previous,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Becoming indistinct.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A strange writing on milestones,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That vanishes</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Upon nearing.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Amongst these,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Thankfully,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A gust of cold wind</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That meets hot, coffee laden breath</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And sends down a shiver.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, January 7, 2012</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-64311795499655273792011-12-25T01:29:00.002+05:302011-12-26T15:34:22.145+05:30Skipping Stones<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Bradley Hand ITC'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i><br />
<i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">May 12, 2005<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">“You hold it like this, supported by the middle finger, between the thumb and the index finger,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">I copied the curl of his fingers around the flat, circular, smooth stone, trapping it in my grip.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">“Now, spin the stone while releasing it, like this,” he said, and released the stone.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">His stone went click, click, click, jumping on the water. It skipped seven times before drowning finally.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">But when I released my stone, spinning it as much as I could, it went WHOOSH into the water. Dead.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">“Now that’s called a submarine,” he said. “You don’t throw it like that. You ought to keep it low, like this,” he said, and threw another one. Six skips.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">I tried again. Two skips.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">“Well, it should make an angle of about twenty degrees when it hits the water,” he said, and let out a breath.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">Now that was some sensible way of teaching. My stone skipped five times.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 18px;">“You scientific brain, you need to breed some intuition, some way of relating to things and actions based on how you feel you should relate to them, without setting down the rules and laws of the interaction beforehand. You’ll realize how much more you would learn,” he said.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Bradley Hand ITC';"><br />
</span></i></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Sometimes, I see your smile on strange faces. I recognize the way the lips, full and able, reach out to the cheeks, and stay there for a second, in a deep, knowing bond. I get so caught up in the smile that I register the face only a little later and by that time, whoever’s face it is, stops smiling and starts looking at me with a mixture of confusion and concern. The confusion needs no explanation. The concern probably springs out of how I look when I register the face.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Then I try to smile apologetically, as a person who mistakes somebody for somebody else would, but I realize that the concern on the stranger’s face just grows larger, probably because my face doesn’t do a good job of putting up a show. I feel my neck getting warm and the lump rising in my throat. I turn around and rush away.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">You don’t know this, of course, but I was around when they declared you dead.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">You’d never let me near you in any of the ITP spells. So when your parents came out to make arrangements, and I entered the room, I didn’t know what to expect.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="text-indent: -72pt;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="text-indent: -72pt;">Slowly, I lifted my hand to remove the cloth from your face, fearing that there would be red spots all over you, spots that you’d never let me see in the three years we’d known each other.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I shut my eyes, removed the cloth in one stroke, and opened them back again. And honey, there wasn’t a spec on your face. It’s so indescribably strange, but the fact that I didn’t have to see you like you’d never wanted to be seen, came like a sharp streak of light in the dark realm of my pain. I remember the relief at seeing how good you looked, and the uncontrollable sobs that followed, when I realized that it seemed as if you’d shaved just the previous evening.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I bent down and kissed you, and felt your lips one last time. The next I remember thinking anything was when I heard footsteps approaching. That was when I wiped my warm tears from your cold face.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Sometimes I think that my life would have been so much easier with you around. Now I have to figure everything out for myself. But you know, I’ve not been a submarine. Had you been here, you would have taken some pride in that.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I think, the day you died and I came to your room, I established a resigned understanding with death. Since then, while I know that the faceoff waits somewhere out there, I skip as a stone in an ocean, and defy the laws in that the successive skips aren’t smaller. Here’s to you, and to all the time we spent together.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">***<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">©Rasagya Kabra, December 24, 2011</span></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;"></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-58842047320761347262011-12-14T02:36:00.001+05:302011-12-14T09:28:11.838+05:30Little Things<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">It was late evening and we were looking at rock and mineral specimens from somebody’s personal collection, on display, in an old, forgotten building in CP. The particular specimen in front of us was a sparkling thing, some sort of a zeolite with a scientific name that was hard to pronounce. It had a beautiful broad base and finger like projections that dazzled under the pale light. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I looked at him, by my side, and we exchanged a little surprised glance.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-US">‘It is found near waterfalls. It looks like this because of being hit by the forceful running water, for hundreds of years,’ </span></i><span lang="EN-US">we were informed.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">The idea of becoming so interesting by constantly being in the way of something forceful seemed fascinating to me. The water didn’t matter to that rock anymore. But it was a part of the way the rock was, its pressure had been internalized and made into the shape and being of the rock. It was like life and evolution. Things impact you, things go, but the impact stays and becomes a part of you. </span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">We didn’t intend to go to anyplace remotely like a museum. Not that day, not then. We’d just come out to eat and take a stroll. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">It’s a little strange, but, for me the line between imagining things and recollecting them from memory blurs if there aren’t distinct external things that I can tag some of my memories to. Such and such a thing with person X in that restaurant, that street, that corner, makes the whole episode with person X easier to remember. It’s as if I need the physical world to testify to me that I’m not hallucinating, that things I remember actually happened.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">So we were out on a stroll when we landed there, in that gallery. Some sign board caught his eye and we climbed up the steps, curious and smiling in our languor. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">In a corner of my mind I knew that it was going to be the last hour or so we would spend together. We could go back to his room after that. But there wasn’t any point in that because he would need time to pack his stuff. </span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I came across a blue octagonal specimen that seemed to have razor sharp edges. It was frozen as an iceberg, with very fine cuts all over, that refracted light. I turned to my side to draw his attention to it, but realized that he was a few paces ahead of me.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">He was looking at a massive Scolecite, studying it with clean, simple attention.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I like looking at him from a distance. At such times, I tell myself that I don’t know that man. He’s just somebody I have seen for the first time. Then I ask myself if I find him interesting, like that, from a distance, as an outsider. Having asked the question, I try to answer myself. That day, the answer was a very violent <i>yes</i>. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I was still gazing at him when he turned to me. He noticed the look in my eyes before I could do anything about it. He smiled his measured, deep smile. He walked back.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">His arm felt warm around me. “That’s some good time together, isn’t it?” he said.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“That’s some really good time together,” I said. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">We started walking toward the exit.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“So, when exactly do you leave?” I said.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“By midnight.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I looked at my watch. “It’s about time you started packing.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“Packing’s done. I did it while you were asleep,” he said.</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">©Rasagya Kabra, December 14, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-46232802076379523582011-11-27T17:42:00.000+05:302011-11-27T17:42:19.501+05:30The Girl Who Burnt Bridges<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Once,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">When the world was still round,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And mornings smoothly slipped into evenings,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A really lost little girl</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Realized </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That she couldn’t do with rickety bridges.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">So she burnt them all.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And burnt some more, as she grew up.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“That’s not the right thing to do.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> The world is a really lonely place,” she was told.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">She said that she could</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Deal with bouts of loneliness,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But couldn’t bear </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The nervous drone of a life</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That moved on weak, rusting hinges.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“It’s good to have people there for oneself.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">It’s good to keep alive</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The <i>possibility</i> of mending bridges,” she was told.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But the girl,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Slightly crazy as she was,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Thought the whole concept of <i>future</i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Utterly misplaced;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The obsession with permanence,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Vulgar.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Now what do you do with people like her?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">How do you reason with them?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">These people,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Who would live either on soaring peaks</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Or in abysmal valleys,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But nowhere in between.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">People who want to make</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Each day</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A matter of life and death.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, November 17, 2011</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-2364511911055340612011-11-20T00:36:00.001+05:302011-11-20T00:59:39.973+05:30Molten Days<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“I feel like a dark house,” he said.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“A dark house,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">With a small window</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That overlooks a narrow lane.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“The window bestows me</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">With a small square of sunshine</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That melts my days</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And turns them into the air I breathe.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“Sometimes,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A smiling stranger walking down the lane,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The fluttering loose end</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Of a woman’s bright sari,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Catch my eye</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And I tell myself,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">‘You can see real things.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">You are not dead,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Not just yet.’”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, November 20, 2011</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-67861874680590159522011-11-07T12:11:00.000+05:302011-11-07T12:11:14.461+05:30Teardrop on Grey Rock<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The memory knows this place</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">From your telling,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Before the eyes can even</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Submit their version.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I walk along the sea</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That sparkles too bright,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In the sun too hot</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">For bare arms.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A small tear drop</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Falls on a grim grey rock,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And forms a dark liquid line</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Demarcating the path</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Between my longing</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And your rationalizing.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> ***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, November 7, 2011</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-14384485107287557662011-10-23T21:02:00.000+05:302011-10-23T21:02:44.331+05:30Strange People<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Jute bedspreads,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Fragile smiles,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Sunburnt fingers.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Nervous silences,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Vaporizing hope,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Piercing implosions.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Evolution.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">It is a strange place,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">We are strange people.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span> </span><span> </span>***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, October 23, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><br />
</div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-24853033710976046532011-10-13T00:00:00.000+05:302011-10-13T00:00:48.831+05:30Musical Living<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“There isn’t an answer to it, I know,” she said, “but sometimes familiar places and ideas dig up old memories and the fact that those memories are indeed true, seems incredible. You realize that you’ve come such a long way that you can’t even trace back the factors that led to this journey, this culmination of things that you never thought would happen to you, but that you ended up dealing with, nevertheless. With this realization comes an odd little jab somewhere inside, this little prickly feeling that just crops up. Somebody frames a sentence in a certain way, and you reply back in a certain way, then an invisible gear is touched in your brain and you are just transported back to a different time, a different place, a different person, but a similar conversation. And then you find it hard to believe that that conversation ever took place, simultaneously realizing that the conversation happening now will also be stacked up in the archives of your brain, and may become hard to believe in the future. But that’s not the point, and you realize that. You know this conversation will have its own nuances, its own rhythm and its own music. And it is in music that life breathes, uncoils and dances. It is this music that must go on.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">© Rasagya Kabra, October 12, 2011</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">"But he stays by the window, remembering that life. They had laughed. They had leaned on each other and laughed until the tears had come, while everything else- the cold and where he'd go in it- was outside, for a while anyway."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">-Raymond Carver, <i>Distance and Other Stories</i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p> </o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-44166810002847234222011-10-05T00:59:00.000+05:302011-10-05T00:59:28.452+05:30Mother<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">The baby has light eyes, unlike any of those previously born to her. It is a boy. <span> </span>He has minute eyelashes, a hint of eyebrows and a head of good, black hair.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">She looks at his little hands that end in nails like hers. Square. She puts her finger in his fist and he wraps his tiny fingers around it. She kisses his forehead. There are tears in her eyes. All of him is worth rupees two lakhs. That is his price.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">She puts him to her breast, for the first and the last time. He will not be told that she exists. None of them were ever told that she existed. She calls him Gopal. She whispers the name in his ears, the name by which she is going to remember this boy with the light eyes and the head of good, black hair. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">© Rasagya Kabra, October 5, 2011<o:p></o:p></span></div><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-84735519932225326192011-09-22T16:39:00.001+05:302011-09-22T20:52:59.144+05:30Some Things<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I like your mouth when it tastes of smoke.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">It’s one of the things I haven’t told you.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">You know you have this way of looking when you’re surprised, </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Head tilted, eyes startled, mouth smiling and forming an inaudible “what?”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I think you look so real like that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And I’m so glad you are surprised so often.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I like the creaking floorboards of your house,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The small kitchenette,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The splash painted walls,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And the way your canvases smell of oils and linseed.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Just burn that blue shirt with the stupid stripes</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And bury the ashes somewhere you cannot reach them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But how would you know all this?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">That this place exists,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Is one of the things I haven’t told you.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, 22 September, 2011</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-13492874996760687202011-09-13T02:14:00.002+05:302011-09-13T18:35:59.103+05:30The Dark Patch<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“It’s not the pup, it’s a kitten,” I say, while my mother searches her pockets for her glasses.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“Thank god,” she says. “But it’s still just as bad,” she adds, on afterthought.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">We’re looking at the small mangled body on the road facing my balcony. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">A dark circular patch has come to surround the dead kitten. It is spreading, coloring more and more of the concrete.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">When I go out in the evening the kitten has been removed, and I cannot locate the patch that had been bloodied wet. Nevertheless, I keep to the sidewalk.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">The stray puppy follows my mother. It has been supplied with some pet formula by my mother since its mother’s death and its birth two weeks ago. It has become friendly with my mother, and runs with her while she takes her walks.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">*<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I wake up late on Sundays. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“You still smile in your sleep,” my mother says. “You know, your first conscious smile was bestowed to a picture of Marilyn Monroe, and her billowing skirt. You were three weeks old and you had never smiled before, except in your sleep.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I turn to her, propping my head on my elbow. My pillow has yellow and green leaves, and there’s no trace of the dark wet patch that had been a result of last night’s crying. It’s gone, like the cat’s blood. There’s still the buzz in my head, and I cannot remember exactly what had made me cry. I just remember the relief I had felt in submitting to the tepid pressure of tears; the strange comfort in the long forgotten feeling of lukewarm drops snaking my cheeks.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">“You know, early baby smiles are a survival instinct," she says. "They are meant to make newborns more appealing, and thus keep them safer. If a baby can win the love of people around it, it’s likely to be better fed and cared for; the odds of its survival are greater.”<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">I smile at her. My survival instincts come to the fore.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, September 13, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #fce5cd; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #fce5cd; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That is one of the great secrets of life, that life is a movement. And if you are stuck somewhere you lose contact with life.- Osho</span></div><br />
</div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-61644685499651228582011-09-05T00:27:00.000+05:302011-09-05T00:27:25.540+05:30Still<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“That’s it. Now stand still,” he said. With thin brown wavy lines he drew her hair that was billowing in the wind. Three neat strokes gave him her imposing forehead. He painted her arched eyebrows and the eyes that were shut. Then came the part of her face he liked the best, the straight, thin nose and the cheekbones that looked grand when she smiled. But she was not smiling, so he made her cheeks as they were- somewhat prominent and potentially beautiful. He could draw her lips without needing to look at her. With final strokes near her chin, he said, “That’ll be it. You can take her away.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The two men who had been holding her, finally let out breath and placed her in the coffin.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span lang="EN-GB"></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, September 5, 2011</span></div><br />
</div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-46309092669745954532011-08-29T23:49:00.000+05:302011-08-29T23:49:30.455+05:30At Least That<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The fabric of our association</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Would have worn thin.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The fraying edges would have lost</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Their neuron like sensitivity</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And become numb, dead.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">We would have been left with</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">A hideous gauzy mess-</span></div><div class="MsoNormal">Entangled, live and burning.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Good we set fire to it</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">While it was still straight</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">And somewhat bright,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">While we could still</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Look each other in the eye.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">At least what lies in the grave,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Is something glorious,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Worth remembering.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">At least that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span> </span>***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">©Rasagya Kabra, August 29, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal">"There is no answer. It's okay. Even if it wasn't okay, what am I supposed to do?"</div><div class="MsoNormal">- Raymond Carver (Cathedral)</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><br />
</div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-58275000331804521792011-08-20T20:09:00.000+05:302011-08-20T20:09:12.649+05:30The Mud Man<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: left;">In the pit, he turns, creeping into the shadow of one of its walls. The sun is still beating down on the extreme left of his back. He raises himself along the wall, lying on his side. He thrusts his face into the soil to blot any remnants of water.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">The pit is a dark center in the middle of a sea of cracked, barren land.<span style="color: red;"> </span>There isn’t a tree, a house; only dry, burning land marred with fissures running deep into a soil that weeps no more.<span style="color: red;"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">He forces his body against the wall with the last residue of strength in him. “This is the worst it gets,” he tells himself. “Just survive this. Survive today.” He tries to wet his lips with his dry tongue. <span> </span>He shuts his eyes and tries to think of rain. He pictures the beauty of raindrops clinging to smooth, green leaves; golden crops dripping with water, swaying in the wind; children dancing in the rain, splashing the water with their feet. The river is brimming with water. The riverside is green with grass. There are cows grazing. There are birds chirruping. Women dressed in bright colors and silver jewelry, are filling their earthen pitchers at the river, laughing and chatting all the while. <span> </span>He is dreaming of the happy times.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">His body lies shriveling in the receded shadows of the sun. He sleeps facing the heavens, his mouth open, his chest barely rising and falling. Every inch of him is covered with mud. There is mud on his eyelashes and in his teeth. He sleeps like a dead man, a man alive only in his dreams. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">The sun is like an orange ball and there is a wind blowing. The man sleeps, oblivious.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">The sky darkens, and still the man sleeps.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">A drop of water falls into his mouth and another on his forehead.</div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US">©Rasagya Kabra, August 20, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span lang="EN-US"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 150%;">A man has to fend and fettle for the best, and then trust something beyond himself. You can't insure against the future, except by really believing in the best bit in you... (D.H. Lawrence, in Lady </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 24px;">Chatterley's Lover</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 150%;"> )</span></span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-68237778806432855292011-08-14T18:56:00.001+05:302011-08-18T17:40:59.579+05:30Numb<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“My pain was so strange that at first it produced no tears. There was just something smouldering in between my ribs and my stomach felt as if I was on a ride that defied gravity,” he said.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">“I just couldn’t bring that torch to burn the logs, and her,” he said, turning to me.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">"All those people who had nothing to do with us all these years since papa died, all of them around me, and I just couldn’t get the bloody torch anywhere close to her dead body. My hands wouldn’t move,” he said, looking at the grand Deodars in front of us.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">He fell silent and his eyes were lost in that strange land which each one of us inhabits on our own and to which other human beings do not have access. </span><i><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Buddy;">The Palace, Chail</span><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></i><span lang="EN-GB">said the steaming white cup in my hand.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">He was stroking a blade of grass. His hair shone in the dying light. There was no other sound but the chirping of birds coming home at sunset. My body hurt because of the journey, half a day’s journey for a day’s stay. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“It was a different kind of love,” he said. "You know when I compare Lillian with her I think Lillian just has a smaller brain. That’s not to say that I’ve not been mad about Lillian, which is something I cannot justify to myself despite all its futility. It’s just that my mother somehow operated with me on another plane.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">His face was pale but less than how it’d been on his mother’s funeral. That day his face had crumpled into a wet sallowness when setting fire to the pyre, he dropped the torch aside. He had cried like a baby, his head on my shoulder, his hair smelling of an unknown shampoo, his tears mixing with mine, wetting my <i>kurta</i>.</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB">*</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">"There was something unchanging about her. She had been the one thing constant in the twenty years of my life.” He said. “Though I’ve always been the one to love the transitory, you will realize that we do need some things to remain fixed. We need the trees, this hotel, and this cottage to remain fixed, so that our motion can be defined relative to them.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I was contemplating whether to give him a piece of my mind on the dynamism of the seemingly ‘fixed’ things; on the need for playing an active, sensitive role in making a relationship work, when he said, </span>“When I was at school,whole weeks would pass without a word between us. Then she would write to me, a letter, an email, just asking me if I’m doing alright, if there’s anything I’d like to share with her. You know those early days when I’d be so lost in my life that I’d almost forget that she existed and then these letters would arrive and I’d either send brief replies or just not reply. Occasionally, when there would be some unsettlement in my life, my other life that is, the one that existed oblivious of her, I’d be more sensitive to her letters and give her vivid accounts of harmless things. She would sense something in my tone and write back asking if there was anything bothering me. Then I would pour my heart out and she would give her unflinchingly resolute take on my situation. I would just marvel at the clarity of her head, her ability to reduce the complex mess I always offered her, into manageable discrete components that had been invisible to me until she illuminated them. Eventually I would tide over the unsettlement and start sending her short replies once<b> </b>again,” he said.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“I was a jackass, treating her like that. She would be close at hand whenever I needed her, and then she would relegate herself so far away in the background of my life that I would almost forget her,” he said.</span><span lang="EN-GB"> </span><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“Each time I would leave she would just wish me a safe journey and hug me tight, even when I left for the UK two years ago. Not a word more. She had this unsaying way of transfusing her feelings. When home, we’d occasionally eat together and mostly not talk about anything and still be perfectly at peace. I was not needed to say things unless I felt the need to say them. Whatever talking we did was so real that I can pick instances from my memory and tell you the content of what we spoke. In comparison, these whole conversations I have with Lillian are pointless. I cannot recall anything in the morning. We talk out of necessity because, between us, silence gets oppressive,” he said. “I just don’t know why I have been with Lillian. I don’t know if I can still be with her. I cannot, I think. I will have to tell her that, first thing when I get back.”</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB">*</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">It started raining, without thunder or lightning, and we rushed into his cottage. His cottage was clean, a kind of quiet order established in the four days he’d been there. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">I pulled out a sweater from my bag. On the tea table I could see the small earthen pot covered with a red cloth, which contained his mother’s ashes. He was going to disperse them into the Ganges after a week, on the twelfth day since her death, and then he would fly back again, into his other life where he didn’t need me. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“How long are you here?” he said.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">“I need to be back on the 16<sup>th</sup>,” I said.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“Stay a little longer?”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">“No, there’s no point.”</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-GB">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">© Rasagya Kabra, August 14, 2011</span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-42595623313049719132011-08-07T23:20:00.000+05:302011-08-07T23:20:48.127+05:30Life<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There are streaks of orange in the sky and in the river.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My wet hair drips water onto the smooth red tomatoes I pluck. Beyond the tomatoes the air smells of dainty roses, lined on the peripheries by ripe cucumbers and gourds. The sunflowers on the other side are beginning to stir. Swarms of honeybees are flying to the flowers, their buzz faint above the babble of the river. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Soon I will be asked to move away for two months. The river will start throbbing with rainwater, flooding the brown patch home to my hut, submerging the green tracts of my garden. The mighty water will force my shrubby plants, accustomed only to the love of the sun and clouds and the intimate affection of my fingers, into a harshness that will dissolve them. My plants will die in the water that gave them life all these months.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I will miss the sound of the river, its occasional roar and the continuous stir. Its lilting waters will echo in my memory. I will sing to the potted plants that I grow in the two months. I will tell them how the river turned blue and orange and golden, how it laughed in the rain and sweated in the sun. I will tell them how I live to meet the river again, and how together, we will bring to life the green promise of placidity.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">©Rasagya Kabra, August 7, 2011<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5171798382705471918.post-16651924851169633552011-07-31T19:01:00.000+05:302011-07-31T19:01:35.641+05:30The Lasting Fragrance<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He was waiting for the metro when her smooth arm stretched under his nose, as she pointed an exit to a passerby.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The sleek arm smelled of some exotic fruit unknown to him. It was so close to his face that he could lick it. But he didn’t, of course. He just let his gaze travel up, interrupted only by the small birthmark above her elbow and the black strap that lined her shoulder.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">She stood by his side and the metro started, packed with people. Just a week into the big city and he was taken aback by the abundance of smooth limbs around him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>‘Somebody needs to teach these things to the girls back home’<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">,</i> his soul cried.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Not just that, he was beginning to have well defined preferences over the city girls. There were at least three categories discernible to him. The first consisted of naïve looking girls who roamed in big groups, laughed often, and were very loud. The second type, which he liked the best, consisted of usually very pretty girls who moved in groups of two or three. They would walk gracefully, talking in muffled tones, their soft laughter sometimes spilling to reach curious ears like his. The third kind, which the woman standing by his side seemed to perfectly exemplify, was the one that unsettled him. Such women could move the way they liked, be surrounded with any number of people, but still remain just by themselves. They seemed to revel in the loneliness of a certain palpable arrogance. They would invariably be captivating, but you couldn’t imagine marrying them. They would just not pay attention to the people around them. ‘Why should your lot treat the world like that?' he wanted to ask the appetizing chit standing by his side. 'Why can’t you just look at me and acknowledge my presence? Why?’<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Her dark kohl lined eyes were riveted to a thin bunch of printed sheets. The white light of the coach ran smooth along her cheeks. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He could feel the rush of his blood. He was inflicted by a sharp urge to dig his fingers into her delicate neck, break the imaginary glass chambers that made her inaccessible as a goddess, and reduce her into a screaming, begging creature. ‘Should I teach you a lesson?’ he wanted to ask her. ‘Maybe I should. It would do you good. You would not ignore another man.'<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The metro braked violently. He lost his balance and his face rammed into the metal pole in the front. Blood started oozing from his mouth. Nobody stirred. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">He moved his tongue over his teeth to check if each one was in its place. He wiped his lips with his hands but he </span>didn't have anything to wipe his hands with.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">She touched his arm gently and handed him a tissue paper, new and very white. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">***</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">© <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Rasagya Kabra, July 31, 2011</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br />
</span></span></div></div>rasagya kabrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09213189147374591314noreply@blogger.com2