"Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torment of man."

-Friedrich Nietzsche

Holding a flashlight, up to the sky, to look for the stars...

Sometimes it feels like we're doomed for sadness. That the dry river bed of tears is not barren yet. The dark we hide under, the shadows of the past, of regrets and old habits, shielding us from the light. Would we go blind if we stare at it for too long? Something so beautiful and life giving that we're terrified of what it might bring, what it might nurture from years of wasted presence, the microbial dreams it might destroy. Sometimes it is just fear cloaked under more courageous virtues of boredom and laziness that prevents us from walking out into the light. One new day, when we are too lost in the darkness to realize, the light will creep in and illuminate us, toe by toe, finger by finger. When the clouds above rumble and threaten to flood the rivers, when the wall we lean against seems farther and farther, the light will rush to us and slowly whisper "Wake up, it's time to go."

The tiny explosion of dust
As a rain drop hits the earth
The distant rumble
Of approach, anticipation
Runs through my veins
As premature release
Lets my restraint
Evaporate like virga.
The coolness of the blade
Against my wrist
Tiny puncture wounds
Discrete, slow, methodical
Unfasten me.
Waves of consciousness
Crash against the surreality of my brain,
You are the only universe
Visible, probable, possible
The breath caught in my ribs
Releases in your tight embrace
And falls short
Of a few inches
To touch your hollow heart...

Be kind, rewind

I walked alone on the long winding road when you came along and offered me a ride. I should have refused. But it was a hot day and I was tired walking all by myself. So I accepted the offer and you got me closer to my destination, on my path towards self destruction.I'm not out of breath at the very least. The journey seems shorter now.

P.S-It doesn't make sense to me either. Love this song by the way.

Your name is the splinter.

He adjusts the wick with careful fingers and reaches over for the canister of palm oil.He lights the lamp and joins hands in prayer.Outside it grows colder as the oil gradually solidifies.

The crow has flown

The past few days have been going so well, with every little event making me go "I'm so going to write about this!" and then promptly letting it slip my mind.There used to be a time when there were so many words and phrases going through my head that I just had to pen them down.I miss those days.Sure I wrote a lot of stuff that was silly, unoriginal and hackneyed but I did write, dint I?Maybe I'm just too, un-feeling, these days.You know, I write when I'm either too depressed or too high(hyper excited, hard to settle down type).Lately I have been happier, and not just sporadically.The graph is going constant and that bugs me a little.I have been reading Murakami and I'm still too speechless to write anything about him or the book('Kafka on the Shore'). I will write something about him, he's too much on my mind to let go that easily.Let me get my thoughts back.Right now they are off tracking cats with Nakata.

P.S- It is sad that the first few searches that come up on Google when you type 'palm' are something to do with Personal Digital Assistants and Operating Systems.Palm is so much more.

She looked at the air conditioner with disdain. Just a few minutes ago, as little drops of sweat rolled down her back, the spoiled brat, her employer's son, had turned off the AC muttering something about a bai not needing it.She swept the dust off the floor in precise movements so that little specks of it would not remain behind.The brat had now moved to his room, after trying to avoid stepping on the dirt and making an even bigger mess.She sighed.Kids were so clumsy nowadays.She remembered how she'd had such a graceful gait growing up that everybody thought she'd make a great dancer.Even now, men looked at her retreating figure with appreciation and women with envy as she strolled past the Saturday market, picking up tamatar and methi, never bhindi(Rs.12 per kilo!). She sighed, dreading the prices that'd be put up this week. She continued sweeping, beneath the couch, behind the bookshelf, stray strands of dog fur(they had a big dog with long golden fur, it was quite ugly) kept entangling in the broom. She stopped for a few minutes and looked outside the window.Her eyes automatically searched for the wall clock on the wrong wall and then rested upon it finally and she registered the time.Rich people and their tinted glass windows, no sense of what time it was and how the day would be. She remembered how cloudy it was that morning.Maybe the same weather had continued.After all, she'd already spent three hours on the twelfth floor.So many things could have changed outside.She took a few steps towards the window.She had the strong urge to push it open and let the fresh air in(it was a sliding window, she instantly realised a second later).There were little droplets of sweat on her upper lip and her scalp felt wet with perspiration.Her breathing was heavy.Somehow, with the subtle, invisible beckoning of the window, she felt her day and her life letting go of her.There was nothing to worry about, not the absent husband, not the son's education, not the dwindling currency in the small, metal box she hid under her bed, not the past which she rued so often, the longing for days in school before she left to join her mother to see the inside of people's dirty laundry and hear the scrape of steel wool against aluminium.Life would all be good if only she opened the window.She felt light and easy as she slid the frame and let the air in.Behind her, the gathered dust particles scattered and settled into positions they were looking for.

P.S-No title yet, if you can think of a good one, please do.
P.P.S-If you relate the Rs.12 per kilo bhindi thing to 3 idiots, you have serious issues.However if you do realize that tamatar was once Rs.40 per kilo, you've my blessings!