Perception-wise

"Have you ever wondered how strange this is? This basic assumption that you see the world in the same way as I do?"


"Like perspective-wise? Yeah..I don't think any two people can ever have the same set of beliefs or preferences."



"Yeah. But I meant it in the more literal sense. Not about preferences, but about perceptions. Like, what if you and I perceive color differently? What if everyone perceives colors differently? I mean when you were young, your teacher showed you a color and made you and everyone else identify it as yellow, and so you and all the other kids learnt that the color they saw was yellow; may be all of them saw it differently. And all your life when you look at a dress and called up your friend and said, "Oh! That was a very pretty yellow", she pictures a completely, or may be slightly, different pretty yellow."

"Umm...okay. Let's clear this. What color is that car?"

"It's a dirty yellow. But you miss the point."

"May be I want to miss it." *smiles*

Gathering Dust

Picture by Rob Hanson

Its been a year

since the end of anticipation

since the last of the million times

she picked the receiver

to check if the line still worked

and placed it back

with shaking wrinkled hands

He had said he would call

to tell her how high 

the jet had flown

How inviting the sky seemed

even at war

'Although there are
no borders in sky'

She had observed and sighed

He was thrilled beyond words

Too thrilled to hear the prayers

she muttered 

beneath her shaky breath

Then one day, the phone rang

and severed the last thread of hope

in her tiny fretting heart

Yes, the battle is won,

but he was her only son

The phone, his victory, her life

since that day, gather dust.

The picture that inspired this poem is taken by Rob Hanson, who is interviewed today at One Stop Poetry, and lends his picture for the Picture Prompt Challenge. If you are inspired by his picture, or if you would like to read other entries inspired by it, visit One Stop Poetry. 

Of Dreams and Him

I was going through some old pictures and came across this one. There is something about this picture that I think is very deep and meaningful. It takes me to some lines of a beautiful poem I read when I was probably 7 or 8. 

आदमी का स्वप्न ? है वह बुलबुला जल का,

आज उठता और फिर कल फूट जाता है,

किन्तु फिर भी धन्य ठहरा आदमी ही तो,

बुलबुलों से खेलता, कविता बनाता है|

This poem is called 'Chaand Aur Kavi' (The Moon and the Poet) written by one of the most celebrated Hindi poets of the modern era: Ramdhari Singh who wrote by the name 'Dinkar' which means 'The one who brings the day' or the Sun.

The poem talks about the moon talking to a poet, and expressing his exasperation at the tendency of man to create his own problems and then to get entangled in them. What amuses him more is the fact that in all such situations, man decides to stay awake and restless all night, and to weave dreams. In the lines above, the moon says, "What are human dreams but bubbles of water that are born today and gone tomorrow. But man - he incorrigibly plays with these bubbles and creates poetry." The poem goes on with the poet's retaliation which talks of the impossible things dreams and the power of imagination can achieve.

A lot of what I write tends to center around dreams. I think dreams are special. I think they make us more than complete. They make us look forward to the unknown, to go on when things are tough. They are something like the idea of Him, the higher power, that I believe in, not because of reason, but because of faith. Because it feels right to me. It calmed down the monsters of night in my childhood, it brought me home when I was a lost little girl, and it taught me to hope, and to dream for something more in every day of my small but magnificent life.

P.S.        I had once written a story around dreams, interestingly on the same day that this picture was taken. You can read it here.

P.P.S.     Yes, the girl in the picture is me.

The Village of Dance

I am thankful to my friend for directing me to this link. Nrityagram is a word with Sanskrit roots that means 'Dance Village'. I am not a dancer. Yet. But I have always dreamt of being one. And knowing about places like this inspires me immensely. Some day, I'll pack my bags and head for this village, to learn and live dance. Not being able to dance has always felt like a handicap. I wish to be able to express myself in this beautiful form of art that has the ability to transform one to a realm of greater things. I wish to experience the liberation of portraying a story - human, dramatic, real, surreal. I wish to be able to communicate to something deep within me, positively dark and unknown, something glorious and unexplored. I wish to be able to dance some day and forget there is, or ever was, an audience.

Some day.

Open Diary - 27th October

I feel it too often these days-this strange déjà vu, this tendency to cling to sadness when I ought to be happy, to be celebrating. There’s something amiss in the picture of life, or may be there’s an extra piece somewhere that I can’t remove no matter how hard I try. The wind- it makes me so numb, so blue as if I’m not where I ought to be or I’m somewhere I shouldn’t be. It brings with it such distinct, fresh memories that they refuse to register as memories- they become the here and now with every hollow breath, every single sensation alive. I dive deep into it, knowing it leads only to nowhere. Darkness has a strange charisma about it. It invites you with open arms and you somehow melt into them. There’s a certain glory, a liberation in every single tear you shed. Its as if you’re accepting, embracing, and may be even forgiving yourself for your mistakes. I just figured why life does not have a rewind button. Its something like a computer program with multiple threads. It takes different paths of execution every time you run it. So may be even if you had a rewind button, you couldn’t go back to exactly where you wanted to- the butterfly effect of life…

Open Diary-21st August 2008

The college has already started looking like a soon-to-be-past thing. Thoughts of the future have affected the present so much! I go down for a coffee and see a swarm of new faces, and it all appears like a big cycle that I’m a very minute part of. Not just the college and the passing out, but life on the whole. I don’t know why and I don’t know whether this is good or bad, but my mindset has suddenly become very spiritual. I try finding a purpose in things I do but I can’t see it. There is a big blunder somewhere in the whole equation of life that we’ve set for ourselves – all of us running this mad race and trying to work for ‘happiness’! sacrificing today’s sleep, rest, talks, smiles and laughters for a better tomorrow- I wonder where this recursion ends. Sometimes all I long for is utter peace, absolute beauty, pure nature and the ultimate solace of being in the company of myself. I wonder whether this phase will pass too; may be tomorrow when I have hordes of responsibilities scuttling up and down my priority queue, I’ll come to terms with the meaninglessness and obscurity of life. But right now, at this very moment, I find myself wiser, older and all the more inadequate and ignorant about the gift of life, breath and spirit that I’ve got.

On The Midnight Stroke of Independence Eve 2008

Its midnight and a wild crowd of students adorning expensive brands, riding expensive bikes and exhibiting an expensively rare surge of patriotism have come to celebrate Independence Day at kc. It’s indeed not often that you witness nationalism in one of the costliest engineering colleges of the country, where ‘sense of duty’ awakens, stretches lazily, shakes off the dirt on it and gets down reluctantly to work not more than ten days before sessionals, or 20 before end sems. Its amazing to see how events and occasions like the independence day transform mundanities like Indianness to stark realizations. I am a true Indian. My throat enmasses with awe at every reminder of the long tale of independence and the incredible sacrifices made so that I could be born into a free country, breathe free air, get the best education, have fun and try out my own little destiny in the crowd of a billion. We’re a very fast progressing nation- a young population: armed with unlimited technology, instant communication, clear cut visions and hoards of our ancestors’ mistakes to learn from. We roam around with plugged ears, lensed eyes, chemically straightened hair, electrically razored legs and a mobile database of everything we consider essential. But then when I look down the highest histogram of progress, I see a deep abyss, staring back with helplessness, still waiting to be filled. I see my counterparts in J&K trying to figure out a way to keep themselves and their families alive in yet another avatar of the age old communal tension. I see politicians playing an evil game of chess with innocent lives as pawns. I hear of an engineer like me believing in, dying and killing for the principle of terror. I read about heart-rendingly high figures of domestic violence. I question and I wonder. And I crawl into my bed and sleep. May be tomorrow, the newspaper will be a more heartening read. As Independent India turns 61, I know I’ll still swell up with pride and melt with humility before the flag of my nation. The white between the green and the saffron will still be there and it will definitely give me the promise of a day when we shall be free. After all, imperfection is what keeps the world going.

It is one of those nights, ah well its 3.30 in the morning, when the consciousness of your existence makes it impossible for you to repose in slumber, when the heart races very fast to keep pace with your thoughts, when you think only of yourself, your 'perceptions' of the world, your dearest domain of plan and activity where nothing challenges you, when you can look straight through the obstacles as if they are not there.
I am usually awe-struck at the thought of how amazing I am, or you are, or humans are in general- the intellect, the emotions, and above every other thing, the power of expression. I marvel with pride at a baby making its needs felt, or a patient of cerebral palsy, unable to speak or even move, expressing his joy, anger, disappointments and utter euphoria watching a cricket match.
Your inner world is the mirror of the outer world. How you perceive the world depends on how deep you have dug inside yourself. I might be a tiny speck in the universe, a conception of too few dimensions, or may be I am not even there, as followers of some schools of philosophy might claim, but the very fact, or illusion of my existence makes me question and analyze my thoughts and actions and thus those of the entire human race. My beliefs have changed as I’ve grown and they will continue to….without cease, but there is one thing that I’ll never stop believing in, and that is the power of man, because it reaffirms and exalts itself more and more each passing day. The more you try to tie him down, the stronger he becomes. We are inherently curious creatures and when our potential is challenged, the curiosity to see where the limit lies can work…..well….wonders- that’s what ‘impossible’ things are called once they are accomplished.