In Limbo 2

  I am Ram. Who are you? Are you Ram too? Well, that makes two of us...an ♾️ of us Today is Diwali. Somewhere a son has returned home after an epiphaneous journey. Tears of happiness flow, prayers and gratitude rise in murmurs. Faces shine like gods'.  Today is Diwali. The brainfever kept announcing it with its crescendoing  whistle, and the sun with its golden brilliance. After the overcast monsoon skies, such days dazzle the being and invite it to partake in a pageantry of blessings,  seen and unseen.  Today is Diwali. The laptop is flaunting a brand new RAM.  It is now entitled to a fresh lease on life...an opportunity to prolong its raison-d'être before it is mangled and dumped in the landfill to pollute. Today is Diwali. The dancing sparks of light fill the air, shattering the darkness and touching us awake. Having meandered in and out of the labyrinth of Unconscious, we step into Light. We return home to ourselves, to the song of the wind and flo...

                    Early morning, driving through narrow pot-holed Tindivanam road in an old, rickety Ambassador always spelled home and the promise of a beautiful sunrise.  Tamarind trees with white bands on the trunks ran along the road, revealing its darkling contours, in little parcels of oohs and ahs. "They are protected by law. They will never be chopped," the driver told us. So innocent was his faith, so firm. A decade later we were driving on a six lane Tindivanam highway... " This beats New York's hwy-87 anyday, right darling?"  In no time, India had metamorphosed into a global powerhouse. Highways after highways piled up with mad drivers in a hurry to reach somewhere, anywhere where the roads would take them. In some cases, people protested against the indiscriminate clearing of green belts, be it towards landing of a VIP helicopter, building of a new mall,  extension of a metro line, or a bullet train! But, pro...

(Dec. 31, 2023) i could see  it tip as down down and down  it went tiptoeing into a negative infinity: a big round ball tossed across the sky by the chariot  dream where  time meets Timelessness the monks file  past, entranced. hand-held mallets strike the gongs, echoing silence stills the evening into wakefulness  crescendoing  call of a brainfever  sends a yellow- -wattled lapwing  wading through  water but lo the stone bench which  seats me has  turned cold and indifferent like a tomb with its sepulchre silence of the  year slowly departing: all the yesterdays like skeletons lie interred  in the gentle folds of  eternity  stoking for one last time the fiery rims of the sunken   sun, i bid    farewell    to 2023

I seek refuge in  wordles, scrabble, spelling bee  and in whichever online word games I can find in order to get myself high on dopamine. The kudos so generously hurled upon me by inanimate emojis on the screen keep the mind abuzz and ticking, ready to challenge itself with even  greater gusto. How easy it has become to escape one's own emptiness. The desire to spill paint or words on scraps of paper has all been consumed by this unmomentous pursuit for a superior score; the deflated ego momentarily ballooning up.  This post is a confession of my addiction to online word games. They are the reason I have not penned anything in a while. Every little bite of my free time gets shamelessly swallowed up by this new indulgence. May be it is a sign of  'getting on' and sinking into general  decadence. At least it saves me from myself and my dogged need to think, feel, be, understand, watch the shadows shuffling under the chairs. I am spared my own intensity, my ne...

  she fell and broke her foot. her head bled and they cried 'get some ice," a voice screamed. 'may be I am dying. glass rain,  piercing, cruel, hot. "All my precious  ceramics and china!" detachment coerced upon the heart that loves; lying in bed the bare walls enclose upon her, resounding with blabbers  of children and grandchildren: first  words, first steps, falling crying  laughing. She smiles. The rupture  in her head hurts. Like a kitten  tangled up in a ball of wool it had  never intended to unravel, she lies there in the debris of daily life,  softly moaning. Eleven birds in the twirling depths of  skies: craned neck, eyes squinting  trying to communicate with the  dancing song of the winged beings "take me  with you, I who wanders  alone these stretches of red earth  looking for feathers, stones and  some meaning lost and never found";  a snake slithers past shy unsure  shedding the s...

  write to me with the spume and spray of the rumbling  ocean; write to  me with the  susurrant gold of barley fields  swaying in the  wind; write to  me with the  soft smudge  of the inky  clouds hovering  over a lonely  porch; write to  me with the  cool breath of a winter morning leaning against  bay windows  wanting to  sneak in; write to me with  twilight silence  clamped over  the silhouette of the tall sycamore in your backyard; write...

  1. Someone nudged. I turned around and screamed. Her calm eyes caressed my confusion. "Back off," I shouted, despair ringing in my voice. She refused to budge.  "Please take her away from me," I pleaded with the dhaba-wala, who seemed rather amused by my reaction.  "It's almost done," he said without looking up. I thought he was announcing my order was nearly ready, even though at that moment, with  her   breathing fire down my neck, food was the least of my concerns. But, before I could say anything, he was next to the enormous creature with kohled eyes and flared up nostrils. While one hand gently rested on her back, the other sweetly fed her freshly-made soft chapathis smeared in ghee. Overwhelmed by this gesture of spontaneous bonding, the trauma that had gripped my being earlier, quietly departed. Feast over, he patted the beast and then folding his hands in reverence backed away. She snorted with contentment and joined the evening traffic on th...