In Limbo 2

  Live simply so others may simply live". Do you know how many droplets are there in a cumulus cloud? 10 billion per cubic meter! This mind-boggling information is emitted to the neurons by a book called 'The Cloudspotter's Guide'. It hits me like a thunderbolt. I wish Anna Sébastien the 26-year-old Chartered Accountant who committed suicide last month because of work-related stress had known this trivia. May be it would have made her feel less alone in terms of 'feeling the pressure'. Yet, if it were up to the so-called 'visionaries' like  Narayan Murthy, CEO of Infosys, our youth would be reeling under a 70-hour work week and dropping like flies...the way 30-year-old Rajesh Shinde did at his work desk.  'Stress,' the medical reports claimed. All in the name of enhancing productivity, GDP, and in the process all manner of pollutants. How dare we consider ourselves the absolute masterpiece of Creation, the pinnacle of evolution?  We, who have de

  As a country, we embark on a new mission, a common cause to unite us all and reclaim our lost ancient splendour. Its aim: to ensure we produce the first trillionaire of the world. Wouldn’t it only be fair that the land that introduced the concept of `zero’, should be the one to flaunt so many of them at once? Certainly, it is not a `Mission Impossible’ either. For, as per a recent report published by Dubai-based Informa Connect Academy, while Tesla CEO Elon Musk is all set to become the first trillionaire of the world by 2027, our very own Gautam Adani stands the chance to follow suit by the year 2028. This is great news, and yet we can make it even more impactful by helping Mr Adani breast the tape in this `wealth' race to become the first trillionaire. Imagine the kind of tsunami it would create in the world, the headlines that would dominate the international media, the prestige we would glean from the global community! So, as the citizens of Bharat that is India, it is our pa

Seasons come and go. The fruit fills itself and drops from the tree. Across the jewelled streams snaking down the windowpane, a leaf trembles, wavers, swirls through the cool air. Heavy wheels of a push cart crunch upon the graveled road, and a dog barks. 'The Waves' by Virginia Woolf washes over me. The changing inner vistas of its many protagonists veiled behind blocks of monologues advance through the pages like the sea itself. Even though repetitive like the murmur of its waves, rising and crashing, each character carries with it its own hidden world, where no one is fully permitted, not even the reader. Can one, by feeding Virginia Woolf to AI, churn out similar literature, inimitable in its style and content? This is what the mind pauses to ponder. Would AI be able to produce a sequel to The Waves? Or mimic other masterpieces or emulate the singular urges of other great writers and artists which spurred them to create what they did? Lost and confused, like a pendulum I sw

Like Joe Biden, everything is making less and less sense. Seesawing between a simpering cry-baby and a Sioux chief, he seems eager to straddle a horse and ride into the battlefield. Fortunately, he hasn't mistaken Kamala Harris for a horse yet. Donald Trump rattles on, lying through his teeth, yet winning more points and accolades for his sheer confidence. Zelensky and Putin have fused into one. A senile white man is identifying himself with a black African American woman. Everyone is nervous. The world is trying to keep pace with this sudden spur in idiocy. Some are taking to streets, shouting slogans, vandalizing. It is their way to contain the prevailing madness. I am where I am, was, would be...caught in the still point of the turning universe. Day slips through me. Night covers me, washes over my dreams and drags me to the perception of a new dawn. Like a shadow, I chase the amorphous blobs of light which come in the form of myriad memories. Here are a few from Alaska Hwy: On

How to sift reality from non-reality? Pry dreams from fiction?  Our daily constitutional. In an inadvertent raising of the eyes, rust orange of a crow-pheasant in flight caught and released by the irises...scales of a snake dangling from its beak wring the air silver, merciless.   Further up, on a path crisscrossed by the trembling shadows of coconut trees, an explosion. Anvil hammers away on frail eardrums. Something bounces off the ground, grazes past the right foot: a humongous coconut. Mumsy is unperturbed. "They never fall on people," she reassures me, adding sweetly, "for they have eyes". She points them out to me. I pick up the deadly fruit and shake it: the sound of ambrosial water splashes therein. There is a triumphant smile on mumsy's face, "It is a good one," she exclaims. I am still fazed by this close encounter.  "How many people die from coconut falling on their head" I google. According to a British Travel Insurance Company, c

To be in this moment is to breathe deep the piquant sun, to have the summer air astir with the flight of butterflies, bulbuls and sunbirds gently wash over...and to be led by the vagrant fragrance of wild mogras and  lantanas. Today eyes do not search anything : not stray feathers, nor kumquats or cowpea blossoms. Today they walk along silently, poised in restfulness. A rufus treepie calls...a crow pheasant answers. Leaves twirl, falter, get trapped in spider webs and so sway a bit longer before falling to the ground. 1.  cascading shadows  laugh, tickle the wind  as it washes over them whispering who knows  what, but the birds might- butterflies inebriated  with light seek nectar from pulsating darkness  of summer blossoms 2. an owl splinters the evening  with its silent flight into a million shards of soundless sounds, red moon rises spilling  gold onto the darkling folds of  the slouching twilight;  Vesper  pale and alone moves westward leaving in its wake a flash of silver, a shoot