I AM JUST HUMAN!

Ever since my mind opened its eyes,

Never got a chance to let it speak.

Oozing out the resentment

Suppression leaves me weak.

Can’t live this way

Hate faking it anymore

I deserve one more chance

To live the life I adore.

All the mistakes I made

Every time you thought I sinned

I chose to make them myself

I chose to stop the wind.

You listened to the words of the mouth

Never cared to hear my eyes

They were shouting all the time

While my words were full of lies.

Your words leave the soul tainted

Tears left the heart sore

I deserve one more chance

To live the life I adore.

Misery Of The Foolish Mind

It’s a tragedy of my life that God didn’t provide me with enough brains to save myself from being fooled all through my childhood. Though my mom recalls that part of my life as being the naughtiest phase of my life, I completely differ on her opinion. I guess its just to cover up on her conduct towards me that she labels me as the naughtiest and the strangest baby ever born. Life’s a pain when old memories remind me how an innocent mind was so easily fooled at home. One such excerpt from my pitiful childhood is worth mentioning.

When I was around five years old I had developed quite a questioning mind to serve as a headache for my parents, as if my constant jabbering wasn’t enough! One fine day when my mom and I were going through our family album I came across one picture clicked in Mussoorie with my mother holding me while trying to make me stand in the water. The weird expression on my face caught my inquisitive eye and hence popped a question from an impressionable mind. “Why are you holding me like this Mama?” Already fed up of the ‘Whys’ in the previous pictures, bang came the reply, “That’s where your father and I found u and got you home. You are not my baby we found you in the river!”

Before she could add more to the new revelation, she observed my lips curl down and my eyes started watering. Not being able to see the twinkle in my mom’s eyes and her joy of having surprised a harmless little me, I was left dumbstruck. Since childhood the uneasiness of being caught crying in front of someone else made me feel like running away from the couch and get to the solace of the familiar dingy place under the bed. Closing the album the next instant I said, “Enough for today!” and ran away from my mom.

Supposedly that incident was forgotten by the members of the family but not poor me. But the incident resurfaced once again after a lot many months and that too in front of a guest who might have quite enjoyed my misery. Somehow people have this inexplicable joy in receiving an answer for the silly question, “Are you your Dad’s daughter or your Mama’s?” Isn’t the answer quite obvious in most cases? As far as my knowledge favors me it takes two to create a fool like me. But after the new found information quick came the reply, “I’m nobody’s daughter, my parents picked me up from a river!” To my mother’s horror probably the scene flashed back and she snapped at me “What in the Lord’s name are you saying?” The innocent in me just poured out the whole incident in the presence of every person present in the room. It took more than a day to convince me that I was not adopted. Since the damage showed its after effects at later stages in life too causing a major embarrassment for my parents, many more served as a witness to my misconception. Hence making me famous as the girl who thought she was “Adopted”.

Yours Lovingly, "DEATH" !

Tiny hands holding guns

Bodies turned inside out

The beast is on the prowl

Save your daughters and your sons.

The black will spread soon

The sky will burn the soul

No calm in this light

Life has changed to coal.

Splinters shatter the hearts

Tears wash no sins

Bent with sickly minds

Forget what has been.

Innocence is extinct

All face the wrath

The dove’s left the nest

‘Coz blood is on the path.

Eerie is the air

Smoke is in my breath

Fighting the way to peace

Gifting mankind to death!

Slurping on the happiness

Souls are dry of evil scent

God will not free you

Your minds are still hell bent!

(This poem is dedicated to all the delhi bomb blast victims... god give them peace!)

Lost Your Number !

Sploosh! into the puddles I go

Every time your sight crosses my mind

Feeling so lost amongst the fast cars

I jump when one honks from behind.

A girl goes with a yellow umbrella

I see her green skirt sway.

Look upwards to the sky

I feel drops on my face play.

My shirt is all wet

Walkin’ in my muddy jeans

I feel the paper with your number

In my pocket it moistly screams.

This was all that I had of you

After days without courage.

Days of wait and repentance

Took me some time to break the cage...

Sploosh! Into the puddles I go

Thinking how to reach you

The rains drenched all my hopes

The dream was too good to be true.

Faces around seem to smirk at me

The bicycle guy enjoys my misery

The water is enjoying itself

Seeing me Oh! so weary.

TRAINING INDIA

It’s a good guess when I say that God has to have eagle eyes. This thought occurred to me while on a three day train journey to Kerala. Well, how else could one pore over us lesser beings from so far above? One has to take it from me when I say that a train journey wins hands-off when competing with an air travel. How can one relish the great creations of god and man together from so high above?

It’s wonderful how the human eye can catch so much in a gaze even through the fast swishes of nature while the train races through villages, over bridges and rivers, through forests and the deserted barren lands. Being a true nature lover I quench my thirst for true natural beauty by traveling by trains at times. Free from the nausea and drilling ear aches during take-offs or landing. Free from watching dressed up moving mannequins showing antics that impress no one! Sometimes I wonder, isn’t it humiliating to wave your hands for all the attention one asks for and no one even bothers except for a few first timers who are awed by this new art form just to be bored after a few more flights. The unbearably pretentious uptight ‘ness’ and the uncomfortably small windows that will show nothing more than “BLUE” after a while, is as uninteresting as a television with no cable! It is then that I start missing train journeys in all their colour. But if only the world today would give me that much time to travel by a train. Any tourist coming to India hasn’t quite seen the true form of it if not traveled by the Indian railways. It’s definitely not scented. It’s not as spick-n-span as the airways of the elite. you might rub shoulders with someone you wouldn’t imagine touching while out there in the open! It all might seem like the horror of horrors! But trust me you haven’t seen India without a journey in its man made lifeline. My father tells me that during his days one would be completely covered with soot from the smoke of the engine by the end of the journey. And it’s a smile and not a grimace on his face while he tells me that. The gentle swaying, the lovely whistle of the engine, the chai and the coffee wallahs chanting their calls through the bogeys… it all just adds up to the lovely experience. I still remember my train journeys as a kid climbing up and scampering down the upper berths of the compartments and making great friends through the journey. As a kid I was the least bothered about the dirt, the grime, the heat, the irritating passengers, or even my parents reprimanding me to not to forget my manners or keeping the volume down while I was busy with my short term friends playing antakshri or even hide and seek within the bogey! Now that’s what I call the good old days of yore! This memory was further strengthened when I saw the latest surf excel ad, where the dad insists on having a train journey so that his son doesn’t miss out on the experience.

After so much time I got to travel by train again. This time I realized what the extravagant quick traveling was costing me. The lush green fields, the solitary farmer ploughing his fields, the deep ravines roaring when we pass above it, the rivers alive with the fishermen casting their nets, the ghats with no life yet growling with mysteries. Sometimes it feels like I’m watching the beautiful “Mile Sur Mera Tumhara” video uncut! India’s landscape is so glorious that no visitor can stop himself from falling in love with this beautiful country. It’s truly ‘then’ that the true Indian-ness unfolds within. Being Indian doesn’t lie in cheering the Indian cricket team, or hoisting the national flag on the public holidays, nor in painting ones face with the tricolor and neither in jerking ones bones to the bollywood tunes. The real India is its villages, it culture, its geography! Every Indian who so proudly screams out his Indian-ness should first ask himself this question…. “How much of India has he really seen?”. The motto of our countrymen should be Explore India … the India that is waiting with its hands open and its beauty awaiting visitors to fall in love with… My India… Incredible India!