Ai Du

"Trust and faith in your fellow man has no equal.
If you have experienced trust you will know its strength.

You must know yourself before you know others."

I lived through a mellow high, as if sipping wine. The piece starts pouring into a rhythm while it tries to catch up with the beats that tenderly start picking on the strings. I’m sitting with my eyes closed and almost imagining the guitar doing a waltz with the beats. Slowly forgetting what I was thinking and the guitar almost preparing me for some light blues. Just when the beats got me used to them, Toure pitches in with words far from understanding. The haunting appeal of his voice drags across the piece playing with my imagination.

The first sip rich in Malian flavours being nudged by the subtle blues and the beats keeping me high. The coarseness of the vocals adding the depth that I just don’t want to let go. Toure pulls me down and leaves me floating back in space. Just when I realize he’s playing with my longing for the flavour to return, he comes back to flirt with the melodies of Mali again. The wanton camaraderie of Malian rythm and the blues bringing a sudden melancholy while I feel an unbearable lightness. A mere seven minutes that could explain humanity beyond language. Just emotions. Pure music. 

O My God!

Remember that couple that was trying to conceive a baby to kill the demon next door? The demon that was creating havoc in the city for the past decade? Yeah! They finally decided to have a baby to kill him. Similar to how we get lazy when there’s a fire in the house and wait for the rains to put it out. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Was breezing through some of the Hindu mythologies today. I’m sure they have plenty of metaphors that got lost in translation over years while a bunch of dunces translated them from one language to another. The Chinese whisper ended up creating far more ridiculous stories that make Immaculate Conception look real! And now all that’s left of them is larger than life characters whom we can blame for every puddle of shit that we end up stepping in.

This post is not an intention of hurting any religious sentiment but just an attempt of reasoning and questioning. Had to insert that line before I get dragged to the court of justice. India is a free country after all. Any citizen is free to drag me to the court for what I write in my personal space here. And they can practice this right very shamelessly. So, not taking any chances.

Now, coming back to my question of the day. Why did gods have to reproduce individuals for objectives like killing demons and monsters? Why couldn’t they do it on their own? Taking the example of Kumar Sambhava, poor Kartikeya had to be born and trained by Shiva to kill TarakaSura. Logically, it looks extremely stupid that the gods deemed it fine for people on earth and heaven to keep suffering till they felt a need to kill this Asura and finally conspired with everything possible to get Kartikeya to finally take birth and kill him. I can’t even come up with words to describe how ludicrous this entire idea seems to me. It all started with Shiva meditating on the top of Kailasa minding his own business. Kamadeva, the Indian cupid went and messed with his affairs with his nosy arrows and brought upon himself the wrath of an individual who’s famous for his anger. Should I call that utter stupidity or reckless behaviour? Nevertheless, at the cost of Kamadeva’s life, Parvathi and Shiva unite to give birth to the God of War, Kartikeya.

My question: Why couldn’t Shiva ‘The Destroyer’ kill this Taraka guy himself? Why did the gods have to wait till the complex birth (that’s another story!) of this war kid, wait for him to grow up (which did not happen overnight), get trained by his dad and then finally proceed towards his objective in life? Apparently, some very smart God had endowed this Taraka guy with a boon that only Shiva’s son could kill him. Ha! Technicalities. Hindu mythology always comes up with excuses to have kids. No wonder our population is bursting at the seams. Not just that. The kids are born knowing why they are born. If only I was lucky enough to know the reason of my existence. Gods conceive kids to kill demons. Regular people have kids to kill time and I’m fulfilling every bit of that objective. Boons and curses were like tragic decisions made by the top management. Who in their right mind will endow a ‘Demon’ with powers that no god can handle? Very similar to reckless inventions of the present day.

After reading so much about Shiva and Parvathi alone, my knowledge about conceiving a child has theoretically been ameliorated. According to what I’ve read, kids can be born out of body dirt, hair strands and all other parts that have no contribution towards the actual act. I’m not letting another guy near me till I am ready to mother a child. Don’t want kids taking birth every time I sneeze, get angry or sweat. And the Indian government is providing me no privileges apart from the rising inflation. Nevertheless, these stories do have enough chutzpah to challenge your logic. I would suggest keeping that aside and trying to pacify your left-side brain by constantly assuring it that it’s just a story and nothing more. There can be as many temples and worshippers of these deities all across the world that manage to give a substantial number of people enough hope to fight with their demons. In the end, I guess that’s all that counts. Probably, these ridiculous stories have managed to keep the child inside satisfied with a hope that many of us have lost. The longing for a better day that many have started losing and the numbers are just getting larger. Probably, another demon in the making.

Low-point Sally

She’s not a guardian angel

to shield what she takes over.

Deem she’s an apparition

A task and Halo ‘pon her.

From the corner of yer eye

You’ll find her crouching silver

Nights you’re low n’ hurting

She feeds on it for supper.

Sally drinks your tears

meets over nightmares

watches the tossing n’ turning

In fear she lurks and ensnares.

Breezes through bouts of insomnia

keeps low but you can hear

when she gushes past on nimble toes

a cold breath when she’s near.

Sh’was there when you slept calm

When you woke up with no qualm

Follows you under the sun

Sniggered when you sang the psalm

Waits for you to fall

In good times when you stand tall

Looks out for gashes

You’ll sense pain when she’s around.

She’s the low-point Sally

Hate her and she breeds on it

Stays around till it hits again

Sears your soul bit by bit.

You’ll never escape her

She dwells in your shadow

When the sun sets again

In darkness she will wallow.
Time strengthens her grip
feels like a meth trip
every gasp, every scream
She's hungry. She will swallow.