Homeward Bound

One of those things for which you leap out of bed at two in the morning and reach out for paper and pencil. Orthodox readers might find it slightly blasphemous (Please don’t take offence. This is between God and me). Please tell me if you find this juvenile.

* * *

I am here sitting
On top of the greatest pyramid that’s ever been built.
You know what I’m going to do?
Build another step and then climb it.
And again.
And again.
Then maybe let somebody else climb.

–

Last night I was chatting with God in a chatroom.
He promised to talk to me on phone soon.
Then one day I’ll meet Him.
And maybe shake hands with Him.
And definitely kiss Him on the lips.
Then one day I will be Him.
Home.

There’s a long way to go!
But every moment is going to be more exciting
Than sky diving!

KISHORE KUMAR

The Long ago Lakes

I remember the days
Of the green vales
And the blue lakes
And the long drives along them

I have later moved
From small town to city
From Faber-Castell to Staedtler
From basic science to medicine

Now I miss the vales
And the lakes and the drives
But what I miss most
Is the face in the passenger seat

KISHORE KUMAR

The Enchantress of Florence: Quotes

I’ll try and write a review for this masterpiece of a book in some time. But before that, a couple of memorable quotes.

* * *

‘There is no particular wisdom in the East,’ [Qara Köz / Angelica] said to Argalia. ‘All human beings are foolish to the same degree.’

The curse of the human race is not that we are so different from one another, but that we are so alike.
Niccolò Vespucci, or Mogor dell’Amore, to Akbar, Emperor of Hindustan

(From The Enchantress of Florence, by Salman Rushdie)

Tagged

Awais tagged me. Well, this is the first time, and here I go:

* * *

1. Last movie you saw in a theatre?
Khuda Kay Liye. Fabulous. Before that, The Lives of Others, whetever it is called in German. Fabulous again.

2. What book are you reading?
The Enchantress of Florence, by Salman Rushdie. The guy’s a genius.

3. Favorite board game?
Umm.. Scrabble?

4. Favorite magazine?
Readers Digest. Well, Maybe.

5. Favorite smells?
Old books, After-rain smells, Freshly mown grass, Liril Soap (the kind they don’t make anymore), Mom’s closet.

6. Favorite sounds?
Rain , A certain voice.

7. Worst feeling in the world?
When the person you loved ardently all your life tells you that you are a humiliation, a disappointment. See “Compromise” below.

8. What is the first thing you think of when you wake up?
How the hell did I sleep for so long? Anyway, thanks for another beautiful day.

9. Favorite fast food place?
Any of the unnumbered Cafe Coffee Days in Pune. Or the McDonald’s at SGS Mall, Pune.

10. Future child’s name?
Apollo / Minerva. Well, depends 🙂

11. Finish this statement. “If I had lot of money I’d….?
Of course buy a lot of books. And travel all over Europe.

12. Do you sleep with a stuffed animal?
Not now, not in living memory.

13. Storms – cool or scary?
Cool!

14. Favorite drink?
Coffee. Hot.

15. Finish this statement, “If I had the time I would….”?
Well, I think I do have the time.

16. Do you eat the stems on broccoli?
No Broccoli for me either.

17. If you could dye your hair any color, what would be your choice?
I wouldn’t dye it.

18. Name all the different cities/towns you’ve lived in?
Vijayawada, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune

19. Favorite sports to watch?
I don’t watch sports. Wouldn’t mind F1 though.

20. One nice thing about the person who sent this to you?
One would be difficult.
He reads my pathetic blog, leaves very encouraging comments, even gives a reference on his own blog on a good day! He’s a philosopher who’s been in love and hence understands things quite well. As I understand it 🙂

21. What’s under your bed?
Empty cartons which couldn’t go anywhere else.

22. Would you like to be born as yourself again?
Definitely! Er.. Do I have a choice?

23. Morning person, or night owl?
Night owl. Almost invariably.

24. Over easy, or sunny side up?
Sunny side up!

25. Favorite place to relax?
My room. Well, maybe also wherever someone is 🙂

26. Favorite pie?
Naah.. No pies!

I tag Vasudha, Aditya and whoever reads this.

The Suicide that didn’t happen

The only depressing poem I wrote until now. No meter. Just flow.

* * *

They asked me why,
I said I was tired of being a liability.
I asked them to leave me alone with my poetry;
They asked me why, again.

‘Cause I wanted to search my face, I said,
And asked the mirror whose guilt it was
That I wore so comfortably on my face.
Whose, they asked, again.

I did answer them.
I cut the radial artery.
Now they put these tubes into me
And make me a liability. Again.

KISHORE KUMAR

Happily Lost

The rhyme and meter evolve from the first stanza to the last line, as the lengths of the stanzas themselves decrease. Just as self dissolves as it increasingly becomes conscious of the Eternal.

* * *

The golden sun
Reflected in sand grains,
Giant waves dwarfed
To lap at my feet,
And Eternity blinking from across the ocean:

Sea breezes – shadows of mighty winds
Propelling ships, vanguards of history –
Ruffled my hair as I sat
Dissolving myself into Creation’s mystery.

Romanticism and meanings
Of things and atom bombs,
Merged in the peace that vastness brings.

Nightfall killed the shadows that sunshine brought
And it lit a thousand stars in me bright.

Foam, Fate and Firmament engulfed me, and I blissfully gave in.

KISHORE KUMAR

How it Happened

Just in case you don’t notice, and to humour my own vanity: There’s a certain play with the consonant sounds in the words in the first three lines. I don’t know what it’s called.

* * *

Bike seats and sweat beads,
Jingles and gadgets,
Coffees and freakouts,
They know but you don’t:
Baby I’m in love.

KISHORE KUMAR

Reflections: How I became a Mystic

Every child comes with the message that God is not yet discouraged of man. So said Rabindranath Tagore. My own realisation of this came in quite an unlikely place.

Doing my clinical rotations in the Neonatal and Gynaecological wards has been quite an exalting experience. Watching a young mother holding her three day-old infant son and chatting happily away with him, as if he understood every word she said, struck a chord somewhere deep inside me. It woke me up to the immeasurable love that goes into conception and into parenthood. Into creating something out of yourself. Into nurturing a new lifeform as part of yourself and then tearing it away from you in a process of almighty pain. Into seeing it grow into an independent being with an all new individuality. Such is the joy of Life.

This, I realised, is the same joy that goes into making an oak tree from an acorn, into making two bacteria out of one. The same joy that made women and men out of monkeys and mushrooms from LUCA’s. I could see the oneness of life – the proverbial unbreakable golden thread – connecting me to the brownest seaweed, my most intricate neurones to the gut cells of earthworms.

There, in an unlikely place, drowned in cries of infants and the insane babbling of new mothers, I became something I never thought I’d become. No, I became something I thought I should never become. (In one crazy moment which Abraham Maslow might’ve called Self-actualisation,) I became a mystic.

There, holding the infant in my arms and watching his fingers curl around mine, I was lookining the glory of all Creation in the eye. And just one step beyond, I could feel the raiment of the Hand that wrote it all. In the sparkling eyes of the newborn, I saw a million promises of life, as it was conceived billions of years ago. I saw the hope that man is.

That was a moment of such emotion, such exhilaration and ecstasy, that its intensity cannot be captured even in the rhyme of poesy or the notes of music. While my friend was busy asking if the erythema on the soles, and the clumps of scant hair, were normal, I fell madly, insanely, in love with the symphony called Life.

Call me a mad guy. But I know I’m a happy guy.

KISHORE KUMAR

Thank You

Can this be called Poetry?

* * *

Thank you God, for friends.
And for the troubles and the coffee.

Thank you God, for the seasons.
And for airconditioning.

Thank you God, for sex.
And for latex.

Thank you God, for Love.
And for roses and for tears.

Thank you God, for books and philosophy.
And for brutal war, where they don’t work.

Thank you God, for being God.
And for making me.

KISHORE KUMAR