Love, Language, Literature

Her words
The ones she had borrowed
From love
Life
And literature
Left my palms aglow
As I rubbed them softly
Between my hands
Firmly pressing them into
The meandering lines of destiny
Filling up the cracks
Caused by an undone future.

The haste of chronicling
Her unbridled, scattered utterances
Dried up all ink I carried
But the nib continued scratching
Invisible letters
I later caressed
And comforted with my fingers
Sans comprehension.

Am I supposed to get meanings,
Or intents?
Am I to follow language,
Or expression?
Am I to catch words,
Or flow with the flow?
Am I to find myself whole,
Or scattered in fragments of her story?

The language of love
And of literature
Often leaves a true student illiterate.

Image Source - http://gihsphoto2.weebly.com/assignment-9-book-photography.html

A Heady Brew - Of Poetry and Winters

Recently, Taneea Aggarwal (my could-be future student) interviewed me for an digital portal which seeks to publish stories of inspiring people and events. It is quite Icy-Tales - a rather wintry name itself! I am truly humbled by the kind consideration on the part of the interviewer and the Editor of the portal to have considered me worthy enough for featuring here.

In an conversation which lasted more than an hour, there were two responses which I particular enjoyed myself. Recalling just the two, but you can read the entire interview by hopping over to this link.

Why poetry? What attracts you most about this form of art?

I wasn’t very fond of poetry during school or college. I never think any teacher was able to make me own poetry the way I own it now. My love for it is not academic at all. Roughly two and a half years ago, I met a lot of self-asserted poets and started understanding the stories behind poems and it’s power to subtly reveal things you don’t want to express directly. I am attached to it now because I have seen it’s power as an empowering medium. There are so many things we want to say but so many times the correct way of putting them in words is through poetry. Poetry depicts little but leaves a lot to be interpreted and applied to one’s life. It’s ability to inspire and connect with the people reading it has always left me in awe. Poetry can take you over on a dark night when nobody’s around you, and give you peace when you’re in a throng. I love the musicality of it, maybe because I love singing. Poetry has opened me up to my roots and made me explore different languages. I believe some of the best poems are written in Urdu, Hindi, and Sanskrit. I like the simpler poets. I have my favorites in Faiz, Neruda, Harivansh Rai Bachchan and Wordsworth. But at its very basic, poetry gives me pleasure. It makes me happy.

Which is your favourite season? Which season gets your best work?

Winters. Firstly, because Delhi is the most beautiful at this time of the year, and it is the best time to be out on explorations. Secondly, there is something very charming and romantic about this season which makes my mind a lot calmer. It makes the romance of life, nature, existence, and relationships become apparent to me. On my blog, most of my writings have clustered around the winter months. It’s also a very nice time for nostalgia, maybe because the year is closing. This is the time to warm yourself up. The idea of sitting in a quilt, with a cup of coffee is very inviting and relaxing. My best thoughts visit me when I am in that zone. I believe that winters are necessary to feel warm. My imagination and creativity are at the peak during winters. 

A Heady Brew - Love Cracks You Open

Love cracks you open.

This dawned in a dilapidated nook of SDA market, where I sat with a listener and seeker, a few weeks ago. Silent nooks fascinate me. I look out for deserted and underutilised spaces, which allow themselves to be owned. Habitation and laughter are fond companions, for those who can afford them, including inanimate spaces. And who is to say that the lifeless do not dream of life and laughter? I mean, what if the same nook now dreamt of being in the company of some lively youngsters each day, who hug like its their last meeting, and who laugh like they are the rulers of the world? Dreams, alas, are creatures of discomfort and desires. I don't plan  on going back to the nook anytime soon.

Source- hdwgo.com

But I do plan on going back to the 'cracking' phenomenon of love, rather hastily. You see, this post is one of the more oxymoronic and moronic in general, the way it is forming inside my head. Like a heady brew, if ever any was fermented in my mind. I love taking risks which are emotional in nature, but at a detached distance. Is it even possible, you ask. Well, in a strange, convoluted way, it is. I am not entirely capable of explaining this, but this whole life is going to be a series of trial and error episodes. Let this one be no different.

Safety is inconsequential and antithetical to love. I believe. Love is the greatest of risks, most potent of shocks and the ghastliest of desires. Initially, of course. As you grow in love, and as love grows inside you, you keep getting fragile - ready to act, react, respond, retract on the expectations of who you deem the centre of your Universe. The problem, my dear, is that there can only be one centre of the Universe - either you, or him/her. Yes, there are instances of two stars revolving around each other - but the gravity of one is always greater than the other.

We have no yet evolved to become such stars who have learnt to revolve around themselves. So, when love makes you fragile, and when hurts caused in love crack you open, you suddenly are lost and livid, and you have no idea what to do, except to curse the notion of love in full and plenty. And some more. As love ebbs in your system, because other, antithetical emotions are brewing stronger, you become constrained and passive, and you assume that to be a permanent state. Because you do not want to crack anymore. Because you think that any further cracks are going to be the death of you. Because you assume you are that brittle.

Only, my dear, you are not.

I am not.

I hate saying these confident sentences out loud, because somehow, the Universe always assumes that I am challenging it. It them employs rose-tinted trickeries to crack me a little more, but now, I am beyond the point of fear. Yes, when I will love too much, I will fear enough to be on the verge of breaking apart - but hey, has there been devised any other way to love intensely than to be attached to the point of mayhem? Can you truly be in love without walking long enough to forget the road which brings you home? And will you not give any and everything for even shreds of those dream sequences which bind your ordinary life to almost surreal heights of pleasure?

The point is, simply put, that love cracks you open. And while doing that, it brings you the closest to yourself. When it has to, let love enter you from all crevices, because, let me tell you, it won't last. This intensity which makes you ride to the point of brittleness, it won't last. The memory and nostalgia of it will - and that will kill you. Try and forbid that from happening, and you are good to go. You possess love, even when you don't possess the object of your love.

I reiterate.

You possess love, even when you do not posses your beloved.

Well, then, enjoy the cracking up!

Source - rhymeswithmagicart.blogspot.com

A Heady Brew - Part I

My interactions with various communities, organizations and individuals exposes me to questions about prose, poetry, literature and life, to which people are constantly seeking answers and resolutions. These conversations happen on phone, whatsapp, in person, over drinks, over coffee, on the footpath, in colleges, in plush offices, in ramshackle back-alleys, and sometimes, in my mind too. I don't attempt to provide answers, for, hello, this young girl herself knows too little. But sometimes, certain conversations give me points to ponder on, to deliberate, to keep close. And in my mind, all these conversations, irrespective of their physical reality, are always accompanied by the clink of two glasses.

Here is the first heady brew - not difficult to imagine, I suppose, once you add a sprinkling of rum on his collar, and lean in to drink to his thoughts. While he questions poetry, he probably also inspires some.

*****

"When people hear a good poem, they get inspired, and I get depressed."

Is it, haha! Why?

"Because I don't know when will I be able to write that well."

Hmm...

"Also, there is so much being written, everyday, every second, that I am losing the opportunity of writing original content, because by the time I think of it, someone might have already written it."

And here I was, sitting perfectly relaxed, thinking that poetry is so private and personal, that it can never be made to compete. Why write to counter something that someone somewhere might be writing. Why not write because it matters to you. Because it eases your heart. Because it defines your life. And again, because it matters to you, and when it matters to you. You're never losing out time or thoughts or concepts or words. Trust me on that.

"Hmm. You always make so much sense."

Because I am out of competition.

"I like to think of poetry as my way of escaping from reality, my third level. But it doesn't come to me when I need it the most."

Aah. Save poetry from all the pressure please.

I cannot imagine poetry not coming to anyone unless we ascribe heavy definitions to it, unless we are too keen to specify a certain way in which it should come to us. Poetry is a pouring out. It does not have to be profound by definition. But if it is pure or true enough, it will always be profound.

Put less pressure on the pen. Ink will flow easy.

"Oh dear!"

What?

"You're an artist!"

If you insist :)