giantess at heart.
she now awakens.
dwarfs the city.

life(?)

I always wondered what it must feel like.
Then I saw her.
Acceptance in her eyes
She knew.
How?
She knew.

I held her head in my hand.
It fits in my palm.
Like a baby’s head.
But, degenerating.
Muscle deteriorating,
Skin pulled tight over bone.

I can see it in her eyes.
She asks me if she will see him soon.
She asks me for promises.

My shoulder is moist.
Form the tears that flow.
What about mine?
Strength they seek in me.
But then I see her.
The look in her eyes.
Does she see the reaper over her shoulder?
In the corner of her eye?
I wonder.

Today is his birthday.
Life has been less than kind to him.
He looks to her for strength.
They look to me to stand strong by him.
I falter in my speech.
I choke on my voice.
Tears in my eyes.
But I must.
For him.

Does she see the reaper standing by?
I wonder.

Man Of Constant Sorrow

I am a man of constant sorrow
I've seen trouble all my days
I'll say goodbye to Colorado
Where I was born and partly raised

Through this open world I'm a-bound to ramble
Through ice and snow, sleet and rain
Im a-bound to ride that mornin' railroad
Perhaps I'll die upon that train

- dylan

On this day,


01.
The four walls which once formed a place of mental peace have started to close in, suffocating me. I need to get out. I decide to travel twenty kilometres south, to afford mental space and calm.


02.
Today evening I walked up to the ticket clerk at Borivali station and asked for a monthly First Class pass. It reads, “BORIVALI TO MUMBAI CST CHURCHGATE VIA 2RT>>VDR.”
I feel empowered. The city is now within arm’s length. Have I become larger or has the city shrunk?
As I step once again into the arteries to be transported south, I don’t feel alone anymore. I am one with the city again.


03.
I am learning to deal with new emotions/feelings these days.
Head feels heavy.
Neck feels burdened.
Heart sinks.
Chest seems vacant.
Lump in the throat.
Larynx does not produce my voice.
Eye is moist in the corners.
Silence.


04.
This feels liberating.
Cold wind blowing in to the face, caressing the body as it enters through every available space where fabric meets fabric and body.
The wind relaxes the nerves and the arteries which have been carrying with it the systolic pressure to the head for the past 36 hours.
The lungs are filled with fresh air.
Calm takes over for the time I sit with back turned to civilisation.
I am startled as I write, by a cat that walks below my cantilevered foot on the tetra pods that line the sea.
Twice I feel the presence of some body who wants to occupy the empty space on either side of me, but I turn to find no one.


05.
I am alone in the first class compartment of a Borivali bound slow train.
This is a first!
Is this the same city?


06.
Train(song).

train(song)

".. nothing at all in my head to say to you,
only the beat of the train I'm on .."

makar shankrant - a memory

I remember this day every year of my life until eight years ago. I remember waking up to an array of noises; each one brought along with it excitement and a promise of a joyous day. I remember waking up with the warm sunlight on my face that would enter through the open balcony door and cover half my body as I lay on a mattress on the floor in the bedroom. I remember waking up to the noise of paper fluttering in the wind, a noise unique to that particular paper pulled in tension between two thin sticks held in place only by tape which more often than not matched the colour of the paper. I remember waking up to noises of cheer, to the battle cry of boys and men shouting, “kaaypo che!” or, “lappet!”

This was a day that came once a year, but the joy lasted for at least a week. This was a day that had a lot of careful preparation around it. I remember walking from home to Parle Market, down that station road which would be consumed by the festivities of Makar Shankrant, with kite shops cropping up almost everywhere along the length of the street from S.V. Road to station. The vibrant colours of the kites invited me to go and select my kodi or pack of twenty kites. Yet, I remember travelling to the very end of the street with my firki or spool in the hand to an old man whose shop was bustling with activities. I remember going there only because my elder cousins used to purchase their maanjha and patang from him as he apparently got it from Surat, which implied the highest standard in quality.

I remember running up to the terrace in the morning with my kites and spool, only to be blinded by the sun in full display. I remember hurriedly tying the kanna to a formula 0-1 or 1-2, and getting it wrong every time and redoing it. I remember hurriedly tying the end of the manjha to the kanna and flying my first kite of the day!

When I was younger I remember making attempts, and failing. That is how you learn. I remember waiting for one of three elder cousins to find their way to the terrace so that they could fly the kite and hand it to me once it was up there, one with the sky, steady in the wind, ready to take on others that would dare cross its path. I remember my kites getting entangled in the lovely aasopaalav trees in the front of the building or the badam tree at the back.

I remember going to Dhiraj in the evening to collect a parcel of thirty vada-paavs, I remember my mother and aunt putting together jugs and jugs of neembu paani for the evening when all my cousins, their friends would gather on our roof top, at 14, Prasad, K.D. Road, for the biggest party of the year. I remember at least seven kites being flown from the terrace. I remember kite-fights breaking out with the Jhasanis across the street and the Bhagats diagonally across. I remember sitting on the parapet walls with my sisters admiring the kites in the sky, and tapping our feet to music that was being blasted on two large speakers on our terrace while enjoying the Mithibai vada pav and neembu paani. I remember staying there till the sun disappeared, only to watch the kandils that were put on the manjha, one of the most fascinating images of those times.

This day has faded into a memory.

Maybe it because the people who were central to it are no longer around. My grandfather who was my partner, who always held my spool or that white ceramic hand wash basin on the terrace where I could put my spool and fly my kite solo.

Maybe it is because 14, Prasad, no longer exists.
That terrace that was my territory for a week was broken down in front of my eyes about eight years ago.

Maybe it is the fact that all the people who made the day what it was can no longer come together the way they used to.

I haven’t flown a kite in eight years now.

It is as though shankrant ceased to exist along with the building and the people.

All have become a memory.

Images, they occupy my mind.
Music, it plays on and on and on.
Text, it constructs images of worlds that seem real.
Nature has the power to move from within, inspire.
The sea never looked so powerful.
The sky was never a canvas.
The sun never seemed painted.
Magic was never around the corner.
The city was never as fascinating.
And discovery as exciting.

The world as my eye sees it, longs to become descriptions from my finger tips.

Now it feels like winter.
A tree standing, braving the season while the leaves fall off abandoning it.
They left the tree all alone.
While new flowers blossom and some leaves hang on.

12.01.11

bus love

a blog by sonal and ranjit.

a space on the web where love for buses, those red b.e.s.t. buses and their details, the objects that exist within and around it find their place.

drawings i made in my first year have found their way onto this space.
glad i could share it with sonal.
glad they liked it.

documentation - http://redbuslove.blogspot.com/2011/01/apurvas-first-year-bus-project.html

design for ticket box - http://redbuslove.blogspot.com/2011/01/apurvas-first-year-bus-project_08.html

thanks !

Magic!
I pray to thee do not simplify this phenomenon.
Do not explain it to me as a co-incidence.
Do not call it an art.
Do not call it a craft.
Do not call it a trick.
Do not demonstrate it by waving a wand.
Do not pull a dis/appearing act and call it magic.

Magic!
It is something that our rational minds cannot comprehend.
Magic is an event.
Magic is an occurrence.
Magic is a phenomenon.
A phenomenon that transcends the everyday.
I pray to thee do not call it luck.

When your eye does not believe what is in front of it and your brain takes time to respond,
when your jaw drops and the feeling of extreme excitement takes over making your hair stand, when emotions run high and you stand there, just stand,
not knowing what to do, a silent spectator to the display of a force unleashed.
That is magic!

Yesterday was lived as fragments of magical experiences.
The day was put together as if these fragments were part of a jigsaw puzzle, each one bearing a unique relation to its surroundings. These fragments come together to form a memory, an everlasting memory of a day that was.
Of a day I stood witness to, a day when time flew by in front of me, as I stood and watched each fragment unravel, leaving me awestruck!

One magical day!

somethings you would never do by yourself ...

that is why we have friends.

On a cold winter morning the sun light trickled in through the many layers of dense foliage that was visible through the window.
The light was warm.
She sat there enjoying the winter sun and it made her morning eyes glow.
The light filtered through, rendering each leaf on the tree in a different shade of green and formed a mosaic on the wall, the chair and on the body.
Two squirrels chased each other on the tree trunk, they too enjoying the winter sun.
The hibiscus plant is in full bloom, crazy reds shouting out while they sit on uniform green background painted with chlorophyll.
I sat in a corner, coiled, on the cool, near green stone floor at the edge where timber and brick and meet.
My eye catches the infinite shades of green and the golden glow of sun light.
Then, I see toes peeping out from the brown fabric which is made richer by the presence of flowers. They look like petals of a newly blossomed flower, glowing pink in the sunlight.
I happen to catch her eye, glowing, brown and beautiful!

" .. who implode into silence
after parading in the sky
after such choreography what would they wish to speak of anyway "

from,

White Dwarfs
The Cinnamon Peeler
Michael Ondaatje

" When I wake up in the morning, love
and the sun light hurts my eyes

And something without warning, love
bears heavy on my mind.
Then I look at you,
and the world's alright with me

Just one look at you
and I know it's gonna be -

A lovely day !

When the day that lies
ahead of me seems impossible to face

And someone else instead of me always
seems to know the way
Then I look at you
and the world's alright with me

Just one look at you
and I know it's gonna be

A lovely day ! "


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYi7uEvEEmk

A pattern is emerging.
I have a feeling in the pit of my stomach, for this has happened over the last seven years.
Bad feeling.
My nose bleeds might be related to the constant storm brewing/growing inside my head.
Psycho ?

stretched

There is this dream I have, a vision which appears and disappears. Sometimes I can see it crystallise, it begins to take form. It is within my reach. I extend my arm out to hold it in my palm and mould it with my fingers. It is tangible but, I cannot seem to hold it in my hand. Something weighs me down, I cannot reach out sufficiently. I lift my feet to take a step, make attempts to jump, but, I can’t.

I look down to find my legs entangled in a mesh of blood, my blood! I helplessly watch the vision deform and become a dream once again.

I feel the presence of a hand on my head, a calming influence. I gather all the strength in my calves and take a jump. Now, my body is stretched between the bloody mesh that wraps around my legs and my fingers reaching out to the fast disintegrating vision.