Pepper Mint

A word. Just about using every word there ever is. Causes a kind of an alien supposition. But under no supposition, even without implication or assumption, or any juxtaposition of superstitious fallacies can I be called a writer. A typist at best, that too by action and not by profession of proficiency.

Somewhere between being a feminist and a masculist, I am a ferret trapped in a human body. Do you think getting pregnant is a good idea? Depends on where you are standing - if someone asked me that, I'd just laugh myself to labour.

A question? Do you speak Indian? Yeah, like duh! Does India have a caste system? Like double duh! What religion are you? Ok, by now I am speechless and if it's a boy, I want to marry you.

A potato, a banana - no no no! Anything but a banana. I am discriminating against bananas okay - I am blatantly prejudiced against bananas. So we go again - two potatoes, two tomatoes, two onions, one aubergine and chicken legs. A dash of garam masala, tomato puree, a cheese cube, sunflower oil and a Hawkins pressure cooker. Yeah, I know how to feed myself. So I am not a drop dead gorgeous hunk who is in love with bananas, but I can cook. Yea baby - I am your beautiful stranger! Now, don't confuse that with being sexy.

I fixed the lamp in my room. I kissed a gorgeous girl on her cheek, to which she asked me: "Have you ever kissed anyone before?" Ain't I the handy man! Well I could have said that it would have helped if the neckline of your dress was nowhere near your bellybutton, but then that would have required too much effort. You know - to like take my eyes off from ...ahem... and talk sense. Have a heart!

I opened my mouth - Oh my god, you talk so much! I shut my mouth - Are you dumb or something? I half opened my mouth and the fly went right in. Moral of the story - when dreaming about eating, don't chew reality.

So in a span of 12 hours I have talked about being a single mother, finding a job, sibling rivalry, expectations, virtual reality, art in India, caste in India, Chinese food, Tibet, talking too much, how to correctly order a jug of water in French, global optimization and moving least squares, animation, festivals, football and the Wii. I have 12 more left to go before it is tomorrow.

A night's work

There is a weird calm in the air at 3 am in the morning. A calm that is not hungover on the night that is past and that has not pinned all its hopes on the dawn that is about to come. At the same time, my office room bears the scars of a work from the week before and the promise of work to come the next week. And just like the time, I am here on Saturday night, in-between life and after-life, talking to my computer.

The rain beats on the four large windows in the room. Relentlessly, as if trying desperately to run away from the darkness that surrounds it outside and seek refuge in the light that shines inside the windows. My fingers fly on the keyboard, typing lines of gibberish that I will not recognize the day after. My mind has taken on a life of its own, thinking effortlessly about writing logical gibberish and making my fingers dance to those thoughts. Everything else is blotted out into the background like the wet black of the night outside.

This trance like state of hunger and exhaustion is refreshing. There is no room for doubt or pity or hope or anything else except the single minded determination to get the gibberish right. The hunger claws on my insides as my eyes catch the glint off the insides of a KitKat wrapper. The light stings my eyes, complaining about being kept awake at this ungodly hour without another soul in sight. Fortunately, none of this bothers the marching of time.

The first tram back is at 5am. The people out at this hour are the all-night-party folks, perhaps returning in the hope of scavenging for breakfast somewhere. A barely teen aged girl sways in a drunken stupor and tries to touch a passing tram. A boy drags her back, possibly saving her life while she mouths a few curses at him. I look at them like an alien from another dimension. Another duo is arguing in the middle of the tram track. The roads, brightly lit, are shining wet. Kids.

The tram, for home, arrives. Inside the tram, life is back on its rails again. The night and the evening fades away into memory , to become the subject of a crappy blog post sometime.

I made breakfast before hitting the sack.

Anymore

Degrees of numbness
do not stem my breath
Like a broken light bulb
during a power cut.

Colours of silence
do not paint my dreams
Like strains of white noise
in a cacophony.

Curves of melancholy
do not sculpt my thoughts
Like a blunt chisel of stone
carving dry sand.

Pricks of pain
do not puncture my heart
Like a bent needle
sewing broken glass.

Life does
not
seem to make a difference.
Anymore.

Ijazat

Raat ke saaye chuppi saadhe soch rahen hain,
Ke hawa apne daure par kab aayegi?
Khamosh pedho ki shaakhon par chandni ke patte,
Sehme hue falak ke ishare par kan lagaye baithe hain.

Andhere lamho ka daman is qadr bheeg raha hain,
Jaise waqt ki surahi se madhosi beinteha beh chali ho.
Aise me ek pakizah si chuaan,
Sharmate jism ki dhadkan mehsoos karne par aamada hai.

Ae aarzoo-e-shararat, zara aahista se izhaar kar,
Kahin ye jannat ka noor bihkar na jaye.
Jo chilman ke paar se nikal kar husn hazir hai,
Tere harqat-e-junoon se use zarre si sikhayat na ho.

Meri janasheen, meri muskurahaton ka suroor,
Teri ijazat ke liye meri rooh ki sansen ruki hain.
Ye alfaaz teri mehfil me diye jaata hoon,
Is makhboot dil ki raat ke liye, ae mahtaab, teri roshni ka khwab kafi hai.