And then I wonder, why?

In the face of gentle lies, I lie to see the pale blue sky,
To feel beneath my fingers - a tingle asking me to fly,
The cold, sharp and wet grass takes me by surprise,
I look below and then above and then I wonder why?
Why do I live in a world where cars move on roads?
Where people wearing shiny shoes are always passing by...
And dreams walk in svelte clothes while we watch in awe,
Seated in our new red chairs with a sparkle in each eye,
Can't I be the dream I lived when I was dreaming last?
Brave and smiling to face the end that was drawing nigh...
Then again and again the dreams seem losing charm,
When I let my mind run wild and let my silence cry,
Asking but the cosmic void if this is not a dream?
To breath and smile and walk - To be what they call I,
And take a chance with everyday to fight or fly or win,
To write a story in the end of great wonders with a sigh..
And yell out into the shimmering screens, into a hollow dark,
Where dreams dream of being me while staring at the sky!

-Anubhav

-------
Just watched the movie "Avatar" - a truly amazing spectacle and then was just wondering of various things about movies, how they take us into a different world which seems so much more exciting than our own... so just penned down some thoughts thereafter...

Lonely woman

Lonely woman
Originally uploaded by Anubhav Kushwaha

Was just thinking about this woman who is probably confused, wants to do a lot and is feeling lonely... played with the colors and some expressions and this is what I got...

Taking that step

You need hope, love and happiness,
To walk across and hold his hand,
He needs nothing to look at you -
And to ask for more of each of
What you don't have and crave for
But then you are still figuring
The odds that he is poorer than you
For only if he is more needy -
Will your ego let you take a step
But then you have to be selfless
For that leap can take you further
Away from the one that is walking
Towards you to hold your hands...

-Anubhav

Just some Haiku

Silent victories / In random evenings do galore / But at dawn they hide

Find a small shadow / Hide your weapons and yourself / Wait for life to pass by you

He smiles but only / Of rare moments telling him / Slowly goes blank again

 

An evening near the lake

If I were fungible what would you barter me for?

“If I were fungible what would you barter me for? Would it make sense to buy coffee or tea or any of your fast moving consumer goods with me? Would they sell it to you in exchange? Would it rather make sense to buy some time instead? Or is there something else that I am worth?” – What a thought to end your day with? Not wonderful, not pessimistic, just an introspective trail.

I looked at the wall, the floor, the table, the computer, the two markers (both red & black), the board pins and almost every significant article in the room - Significant in its essence to be able to capture an impactful region of the visible zone that my brain was processing. I was able to attach a “value proposition” or an “existence rationale” or whatever you want to put it as; essentially I was able to attach some worth to almost everything. I was able to say “if I did not have this, it is going to affect my life negatively (or in some cases positively)”.

Then I tried imagining those things looking at me - What was their perception of me? At first I said to myself “It doesn’t matter”, “I don’t care anyway” but then I let myself accept the premise that I do care for a bit. I thought about it for a while and I was not able to find a direct correlation with myself. I was getting answers like, “You are good with your peers”, “You are useful at your job”, “You sometimes come up with sketches that look alright” and so on. There was no direct “You are a table and I need a table” or “You are a keyboard without you I can’t type” type of a perception.

I was forced to think about it while driving home and eating my rather mundane dinner. Somewhere between the rice and crashing on my bed, I started thinking of other people and their perceptions from a third person view. It turned out that my perceptions were not very different from the perceptions of the tables or the chairs. I thought it but realized that the perceptions of the inanimate objects were my own imaginary perceptions and offered no real insight into human worth. It was one man’s opinion. That is when it struck me, human worth is usually just an opinion and it all depends on who you’re asking.

The dolphins might absolutely abhor our nuclear scientists. Most poultry would detest the person who introduced the idea of cooking... well I am digressing but therein lies my point. I would refrain from opining that it matters but I have a hunch that I might be on to something. So I think some more, and start reading some biographical notes. Let me take the example of Jean Jacques Rousseau, the influential philosopher and writer, who seems to be connected to most of modern human social thinking regarding politics or education. Now there may be a lot of people who think that his contribution was pointless or otherwise. Or let’s take Adolf Hitler for example, it is very likely that a lot of his colleagues thought very highly of him and to them he was worth his life. In my opinion, although his life might have impacted ours but our opinions today do not impact his life.

That brings me to be second point, self-worth of a human would usually be a reflection of their perceived worth by their peers and contemporaries. Which is what would have driven people like Adolf Hitler to be confident and determined to do what they wanted to do... The train of thought continues, leading one subtle turn to another and I finally ask myself, “Do I care for my perceived worth for people after I die?”, “Is my sense of strong or weak self-worth driving me to do things that would negatively impact the lives of others?”, “Is that something I should really worry about”, “What is my true worth?”.

On further introspection I circumvented myself to the proverbial finale. Eventually, I realized what truly matters, is our own opinion of our worth. Our true worth is determined by what we think our worth is. So if what really made Adolf Hitler happy was to do things that would lead him to world conquest at the cost of the lives and happiness of a large number of people, then that is what his fungibility would have bought him. That was what his true worth is. Sooner or later each one of us has to realize that they cannot package themselves in flashy wrappers and sell themselves as something that they don’t believe in. The mystique and gibberish would ultimately give way to the bold letters on the white board with someone chiming, “I told you so”, to someone else. Some people whose opinion might not even matter in the bigger picture and they would have wasted a significant part of their lives changing that opinion or keeping it influenced. The greedy algorithm would not work in this case and you have to delve deep. One has to visit every corner of their entity to find out what really makes them happy, what makes them go crazy, what makes them fall in love, what makes them wake up early, run faster than they ever have, yell out in pleasant approval... Find the thing that you think you’re worth, the thing that you think you should be perceived for and go do it.

If I am able to do that, I would have a consistent answer from the tables, chairs and my friends. I would have an answer that would make me smile and would not make me worry about what people say when I am not around. It is our own assessment of our capabilities and lives that will define our choices, our gambles and our parts in ramshackles. Everytime I ask myself the question, “If I were fungible, what would you barter me for?” and to begin with I would say, “I know for sure that it is not coffee or tea or any of your fast moving consumer goods...” And some day, I would say “I know for sure it is...”

उन सबको बिलकुल भूल गए

उस एक अमर कठिनाई का कुछ और ज़रा विस्तार करो,
जिसमे लय हो कर के तुम हर दिन ही तो कुछ भूल गए,
कुछ भूली बीती बातों का वर्णन तो एक बार करो,
या मृगत्रिष्णा में तुम अपने ऊपर से ही झूल गए

क्या मायावी वो चाहत थी की मिट्टी को अंगार किया
और लगे महल तुम कहीं बनाने, ले हाथो में धूल गए,
अपने छोटे से घर में तुमने साहस का आहार लिया,
पर शायद साहस की रोटी लालच में तुम तूल गए,

कहीं तुम्हारी चाहत है ये कुछ लोगो ने तुम्हे कहा,
पर तुम अपनी चाहत में उन सबको बिलकुल भूल गए,
औजार लिए वो हाथ तुम्हारा कील कहीं है ठोक रहा,
पर तुम उसके नीचे सी ये हाथ हटाना भूल गए...

- अनुभव

Bubbletoon

I finally started updating BubbleToon again. Check out the latest strip at http://bubbletoon.blogspot.com. I am wondering if I should start posting them here itself..

My spects on an old copy of The Alchemist

My spects on an old copy of The Alchemist
Originally uploaded by Anubhav Kushwaha

I realized that my spects have done me a lot more good than any of the other things that I have owned, so I thought of paying respect to this amazing piece of optical engineering.

Visit my flickr page for some more shots - http://www.flickr.com/screenedinnocence.com

उनकी ज़बान को पानी चाहिए

आज फिर तुम आये हो कुछ सपने बेचने,
पर तुम ये समझ नहीं पाते हो आज भी,
की तपतपाती धूप में इन भूखे लोगों को,
तुम्हारी हर बात एक सपना ही लगती है
उनकी हकीकत तुम्हारी हकीकत से बहुत दूर
अकेले बेचैन सी खड़ी है और चुप चाप
तुमको देख कर कुछ बोलना भी चाहती है -
पर उनकी ज़बान को आवाज़ नहीं पानी चाहिए...

तुम सोचते हो की आंसुओं पर पानी फेंक कर,
उनके दुःख को बहा दोगे और वो मुस्कुराएंगे,
तुम्हारे नंगे इश्तिहारों में उनके चेहरे,
कुछ बिकने योग्य संवेदना दिखलायेंगे,
जिसको बेचकर तुम्हारे ये सफेदपोश साथी,
तुम्हारे लिए एक अतुलित राज्य बना देंगे,
और फिर तुम्हे यहाँ इस मायूस से गाँव में,
इन भूखों के बीच बैठना नहीं पड़ेगा...

आज तुम एक बोरी चावल से खरीदोगे,
इनकी भूख, इनकी सोच और इनके वोट को,
पर तुम जानते नहीं हो की भूखे पेट,
सोचना कितना मुश्किल और बेवजह लगता है,
और शायद आज ये सब बिक भी जायेंगे,
इनकी मजबूरी ही ऐसी है और फिर कल,
जब तुम आराम से फलो का आहार करोगे,
तब ये लोग फिर से भूखे बैठे तरसेंगे...

और फिर भूख में भी ये सोचने लगेंगे,
की तुम झूठे थे, कोई भगवान् नहीं,
हर पल ही ये तुम्हारा तिरस्कार करेंगे,
और अगली बार ये चावल तो शायद ले लें,
पर ये बिकेंगे नहीं इतना तो तय समझो,
फिर भी किसी दिन अगर तुम यहाँ भूखे आओगे,
तो ये खुली बाहों से तुम्हे बुलाएँगे,
क्यूंकि इनका सच तुम्हारे सच से अलग है...

- अनुभव

मनुष्य हो ये ख्वाब है

मनुष्य ही तो हूँ मगर पवन बनूँ ये ख्वाब है
चले तो आंधियो सा मन, रुके तो आफताब है,
अलग अलग तरफ सही, अलग थलग सी लग रही,
इस ज़िन्दगी की रात में एक आदमी ही आब है...

जो मन से ही अनंत है, जो खुद का ही खिताब है,
समय के इस ठैराव में, जो एक ही सैलाब है,
फ़िक्र नहीं जिसे की वो मरे, जिए या गिर पड़े,
वो वक़्त के सवाल का मुंह तोड़ सा जवाब है...

जिसकी बात सोच कर, चाँद तक बेताब है,
अक्स के वज़न सी ही, समुन्द्र इज्तानाब है,
ख़याल जिसका कर के ही पहाड़ बढ़ नहीं सके,
सांस जिसकी चलने सी पल भागता शिताब है,

समस्त ताकतों का वो एक इज़तेराब है,
खुले हुए गगन को भी जो नापता हिसाब है,
वो ही तो है जो आज तक बना नहीं सके हैं हम,
आदमी बहुत से हैं, मनुष्य हो ये ख्वाब है...


- अनुभव

The child's roses and dreams

I was once strolling by the lanes in the city,
When I saw the little form, silent like a shadow,
She was holding on to roses, selling them off,
The bangles on her wrists had been broken -
The remains still dangled on, much like her,
She had questions in her eyes when she asked me,
To buy a bunch of red flowers for my lady,
I said I didn't need them, she said she did,
I was almost frozen when I wanted to cross over,
To the other side of the road where she won't -
Follow me, look at me, make me wonder why?
Instead, I turned around, looked at her again,
"Why do you do this little child?", I asked,
"I don't know", she said when I realized that -
She really didn't have a reason, she had hope,
That somehow she will manage to survive yet -
Another day in the gruesome world of hers,
So if roses got her that, it was roses,
Or it could be tulips, lilies or balloons,
Her dreams could not be beyond the life,
That she has, or that is what I thought,
So I asked her, "What do you want to do?",
She closed her eyes before looking at me,
She said, "I want to touch the blue skies -
- While, I am floating on the sea",
She had dreams much deeper than mine!
With so much meaning, such a wonderful want!
And I told myself that dreams are not like us,
They go to whoever has the heart to call them,
Not just to those that shall bear them fruit,
I bought a bunch of roses, I am not sure -
If that would change her life but mine -
It had changed in that moment of reality,
I knew I had to touch the blue skies,
One day, while floating on the sea...

-Anubhav

The temple town at dawn

An evening in Paris

I just hate it!

I have a certain flamboyancy about me when I try to talk about hatred. I have always felt that maybe a part of me is cynical, even pessimistic to bring about such elaborate imagery whenever I talk about or listen to something that talks about sheer hatred. It moved me to paint a certain picture of myself in my head. It was not a pleasant picture. So I decided to go buy some new canvas. I threw away my old cans of paints and I bought some of my favourite shades from Williamsburg. I decided to paint a new me. I had a green picture in mind. Why green? Well everybody is thinking green these days and if I am thinking of an image revamp, well why not make it green?

I placed my tools and the rest of the paraphernalia under my bed. Then, I waited for Sunday. Sunday is a good day to paint. Ever since I was a kid, I had this soothing picture of Sunday in my mind. A nice warm breakfast with no rush to go to school. No bread-crumbs on my fingers when I did that last touch to my hair with my hands. Finding myself watching television at 11 a.m. instead of looking at my shoes while being scolded by a teacher. A lot of time to watch the ants move around the house with their little boxes of food. I will talk about that on another day but the most important thing about Sunday was that it was the day when I did things that I liked to do and not what "they" liked me to do. Sunday was a good day to paint back then and I presumed that it had not lost it character.

Sunday started with good vibes. I was about to flip the brush and do the first touch thing. Something made me stop. Now there is one thing common about both introspection and conscience. They have a knack for bad timing. Just like in the movies when they get good people killed. When they make the protagonist tell the truth and be slapped. You get the drift! Something inside me told me to ask myself about the last picture. What was wrong with it? Was it not very much like most other people?

So I brought up pictures of my friends first. I looked at them patiently at first but I soon found myself sifting through them rather fervently. Everybody had the same ugly purple thing on their left shoulder and a giant yellow hate medal. They loved to hate something. They were passionate about their hatred. They loved to talk about it, form groups with people who shared their hatred, wrote about it, painted about it and most frighteningly loved to motivate people to build up a similar hatred!

I told myself that it was probably because I was looking at my friends and they are likely to have similar characteristics as me. I fixed my tunnel vision and I brought up pictures of great people in history. The freedom fighters, the world leaders, the CEO's of household-cleaning-agent-companies, the car makers, the person who invented the steam engine, Mr. Bell himself, all of them. I was flabbergasted, shocked beyond reasonable comprehension and very scared. There was that purple thing and the golden medal. They hated things with all their heart. The stronger their hatred, the deeper their strife, the more wondrous was their passion and accomplishments.

So I argued with myself that they hated bad things. They hated the dependence, the dirt, the distances, the week-long caravans, the lost letters and what not. So maybe it was fine but I knew just then that I had wasted money on the paint and the canvas. The brushes? Well yes, on them too. I realized that it was getting more and more difficult to paint a different picture. I had to find a precedent but there was none in sight. I looked up the news, the television and even the monthly magazines.

There was love. There was beauty. There was glamour. There was all the amazing stuff in the world but there was a problem. Every single of those was like a coin with a bad side. We hate authority, we hate diseases, we hate misery, we are the modern knights of salvation and the mercy killing vagabonds. We are connected to the roots of reality with our hatred for being disconnected. Our chivalry lies in our crusade against the abominations of our lives. Our salvation, in our antipathy towards the loathsome entities of the universe.

We are ready to get on the Yellow Submarine and go disrupt the blue meanies. The blue meanies are ready with their anti-music missiles to disrupt our singing voices. We are sprinting our hundred metres on a landmine while we ready ourselves to pounce on the title of the fastest man in the world. Each one of us has a hole in his pockets that connects us to the constant void of the universe. The void that is full of belligerence, racism, unending spite, bigotry, malice and thousands of conflicts that represent our combined hatred.

I look around to realize that most of our lives, our buildings, our friends, our festivals and our celebrations have a story of hatred woven into it. We tell it nicely, even gloriously but it is there and you cannot ignore it. It is such a deep part of our lives that we do not really see it as a bad thing unless we see the dark side. If we see it at all. If we are able to perceive it's darkness.

So I leave the purple thing on my left shoulder and I put on my golden medal. I walk out of the door while I am thinking of places where I have seen or otherwise felt a proximity to a place and time without hatred. I realize that I have read it in some fiction text, as a conclusion of some mythological stories, as a rare end of a fantastical animation series. They are our fairy tales! Our hope lies in the fact that one of those people got it right when they described their Utopian world and that it will happen. Till then let's tell these stories to our children so that they have peaceful dreams in their otherwise frightful lives. Let's tell them to ourselves and let our mind wander in the dream worlds. There is no point in painting a new picture. It is ironical to try that. So I write something to express my hatred for hatred. How is that for an irony?

The human endeavour for a perfect life

Tyler Durden would have you believe that "this is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time" and sometimes that is what really dawns upon you. When you are at the coffee shop, sipping your creamy latte with a bit too much of sugar and you see the wall clock in your cup. Your eyes drift towards the wall clock on the wall. It's been 20 minutes and you have been at your coffee, working on it like a connoisseur without the discrete faculties to tell a Nescafe from a Lavazza. Essentially, politely speaking, a not so good connoisseur. Yet, we let time crawl around us and sneak up behind our backs while we roll through the various mundane loops in our day; Almost every single day of our life!

The Tyler in my head often asks me, "If you wake up at a different time, in a different place, could you wake up as a different person?" and I quip back, "What difference would it make?". At that point, Tyler smiles at me and walks away. Usually he doesn't like confrontations with me, specially when he knows that I got the point.

At the many different junctures of my life, when I have thought about the possibility of being Super-man (and well occasionally Bat-man), I have always found myself feel more lonely than what I started with. This brings me to a realization that power, popularity or any such thing which we either idolize or fantasize about, are usually also associated with a down-side. The fact that Newton realized that every action has a equal and opposite reaction, probably has a corollary attached to it. That in order to push something up in our lives, something else must go down. We become richer and unhealthy. Or healthier and dumb. Or smarter and lonelier. You get the point. The fact is that all of us have yearned for that perfectly balanced life at some time or the other. At least most of us have.

I drift back to the coffee and the wall clock with Super-man lurking in some far-off corner of my head. "What difference would it make?", I ask myself as I visualize myself in a blue and red jump suit. I see myself sitting there and sipping my coffee. Occasionally flying around to do something fancy but mostly letting life pass by. So is that it? Even if I wake up as someone else, I would still have to experience my diminishing life-time-remaining balance. I would still have to fear the unknown. I would still have to do something that would eventually make an agent go, "Only human!". Why is it then that we yearn for some sort of completeness? Why is it that we want the spot-less whites and the sprawling house? The Tudor mansion, the office on the 73rd floor, the business class tickets, the refrigerator that tells me my schedule, the antique lamp or just a Rolex. Timeless desires? Or efficient targets that help us in procrastinating reality? The closer that we get to realizing that we are just fragments of entropy in the universe, the more something inside us nudges to wave it off as rubbish. So we set goals and tell ourselves, "The day I have the Ferrari, I will have a perfect life". We walk, we toil, we waste ourselves, empty our tender insides and become hollow so that we can fly better.

All the while there is something inside us that is waiting for a Trinity to come and tell us "I know why you're here, Neo. I know what you've been doing... why you hardly sleep, why you live alone, and why night after night, you sit by your computer.". Well something of that sort. Some angel of realization that will come and lead us to a light. Help us free ourselves from the bonds that we have so intricately worked ourselves into! We wait while we further tie ourselves down. Making gas engines, jet fuel, microprocessor chips, machine intelligence, sharper televisions and what not. The consumer inside us takes the front seat. It makes us the knowledge worker, the business leader, the evangelist, the stock broker, the slave to it's whim and the means to its non-existent end. What is it that we consume after all? How does the plush carpet make us a better human being? The earnest truth is that we don't ask ourselves these questions. We want things. We want them now. We want to see Wayne Rooney strike the 90th minute goal in full-HD wide-screen view. That makes us perfect. Helps us conform to the checklist of success that we as the human race so keenly maintain.

I do not stand in judgement of that being right or wrong. I do not have a better answer, to life's questions, than anyone else. What I do have is an opinion, a perspective. Something doesn't feel right in all of this. Something does not seem to fit. They say that our galaxy is just a tiny speck compared to the universe. The earth is a tiny speck compared to our galaxy, the milky way. And we already know that we are a tiny speck on our vast planet, Earth. So I ask myself, "What difference does it make if a tiny speck on a tiny speck in a tiny speck in the Universe wears a Prada?". Something tells me that it doesn't really matter. Something tells me that our search for the perfect life, the ulterior goal, the eventual balance should culminate outside of the conventional image of success. Something tells me that driving to work every day is equivalent to a predator running in the Savannah to hunt its prey. There is no glory in it. There is something that we are not doing yet, that we ought to do. Something that will make the tiny speck matter to the bigger whole. Something that will set a chain reaction to light up space. Something that will make sure that we as humans are not just fragments of entropy. What is it? I don't know. Not yet but let's keep searching. For there is always hope. And remember the what Andy said when Red told him, "Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.". He said, "Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies."

- Anubhav

The painter and the fly

The fly stumbled across the painter,
And she looked into his dreamy eyes,
His sun-dancing brows rather still,
His hands scattering colours on earth,
His arms weaving magic through air,
And yet his feet won't move an inch!
The fly as curious as impressed,
Stood still. As still as a fly can be -
The kind that wanders the world,
In search of nothing but the trap,
That would help her say good-bye...
And here she was looking wide-eyed,
At the colours forming shapes -
Circles, waves and curves on land,
As if embossed by nature's will,
"As if", she wondered, "But he's a man,
With tools, pretense and petty needs,
Someone who wouldn't know his shades..."
She wondered while she stared -
At his shaky fingers and timid form,
His warm, and distant smiling face,
The grace, with which he moved.
His solemn mood and sullen voice,
That hummed into the silent dusk,
Just when the fly could take no more,
And she stepped forth and questioned,
"What is it that you cannot draw?",
"Is there something that you can't?"
"A shape that you don't know of?"
Questions followed questions before,
He completed his startled move...
And stepped back to look at her,
The fly with the myriad questions,
And he cleared his mellow throat,
Before he managed to collapse,
Into the arms of waiting death,
A sudden lapse, his final fall,
Just after his last whispers,
That echoed through her tiny ears...
If you care to know his words -
I cannot quote but you can try,
To listen to the humming fly,
While she repeats his last words,
"I cannot draw her tears", he said!
This, all flies tell their brood,
The story of the painter and the fly.

We are mirrors

Then if you say so, is it not?
That each of us is a mirror,
To something inhibited deep -
Within the folds of our palms,
Beyond the wrinkles on our faces,
Isn't there a shimmer that I see,
Or am I seeing mirages again,
Far, few and some more now,
And yet I see reflections of you,
In yourself, every now and then -
So why deny that if I shoot you,
I still shoot a mirror, not you,
For you will live on and on -
The shattered mirror though,
Has a different story to tell,
It won't reflect you no more...

-Anubhav

गौरव को संभाव्य करो

एक वचन सच करो मनुज
कुछ अर्थ गहो शब्दों में अब
सब व्यर्थ नहीं ऐसा सोचो
कुछ आग भरो कंधो में अब

नमन नहीं हुंकार करो तुम
दान नहीं तुम दमन करो अब
बनता है बारूद सच शून्य ही
अपने सूक्ष्मकार से नहीं डरो अब

जब समानता मिले नहीं सहज
अंतरद्वंद्व पर संयम करो तब
क्रोध केन्द्रित करो शत्रु पर
विजय पताका हाथ धरो तब

पीताम्बर नहीं लाल रंगों मुह
विचार नहीं युद्ध करो अब
अंतिम बार अंतिम साँसों में
गौरव को संभाव्य करो अब...

- अनुभव

क्या व्याख्या करू मैं इस संसार की?

क्या व्याख्या करू मैं इस संसार की?
कुछ अजब सी स्थिर इस मझधार की
शुरु से जो हो रहा है मुक्कम्मल
उस संताप की, सुरूर की, प्रहार की..

हर प्रारंभ के कोने में छुपते से
बेवजह छपते हुए इश्तेहार की
और अँधेरे में बैठे चुप से
बेबात की बात के उस सार की..

जिसकी तलाश है मेरे दोस्त को
वक्त की बुझती हुई उस मार की
जिसके थपेड़े आज भी हुंकारते
अफ़सोस के माहौल के उस तार की

आखिर चला जो आखिरी था आदमी
मन के उसके कौंधते विचार की
मशगूल जो अपनी तरह से हो रही
ऐसी ही एक बहकी हुई सी हार की

शाम को गोधुली में खोती हुई
एक आदमी की कोशिश एक बार की
क्या व्याख्या करू मैं इस संसार की?
कुछ अजब सी स्थिर इस मझधार की...

- अनुभव

Dying of hope

Of the myriad summer yearns,
Of the sudden wistful churns,
Of the world in dark satires,
Of the sullen silent fires,
Of the girl with grim eyes,
Of the dream of starry skies,
Of the signet on your name,
Of the rough and wasted fame,
Of the subtle-loud sunshine,
Of the things I can call mine,
Of the blots on cotton checks,
Of the pointy hairy wrecks,
Of the winding narrow roads,
Of the long forgotten bodes,
I am dying of the hope of life,
Of better things and beyond.

-Anubhav

Fate or them

Silence keeps the brood alive,
At least far from slit throats,
When they huddle to a corner -
And lay as almost dead, quiet.
Inexistence is a virtue, almost,
As they shudder at fate,
The unknown master that holds,
The strings of their lives -
Hostage to its own whim.
They ponder then in the moment,
Just before the judgment,
Of the hands in the cage,
Is it Fate or the hand,
That shall forsake them soon...
The question that we don't ask,
But one that we surely must,
While our brood is still alive,
If fate indeed is to blame...
Or are the hands that hold -
The mantle of our lives,
The true slayers of our kin.

- Anubhav

Crawling Dino Productions

Sambhav

Finding home

9:30 AM, Frankfurt Airport, Terminal 1. Gate A 65
It is cold here in Germany. Cold as you imagine the word to be. I have a rather sore throat and am already missing home terribly. I am not sure if it is the illness, the distance or the place but I do not feel good. Not as of now. Lonely is one thing that I hate to feel and that is exactly what I am feeling. A tickling feeling, butterflies in the stomach, a pulsating head or an aching heart – you name it and I have it!

Tracking back a day in time, I was with my girl, my friends and in a place that I am attached to. A rather clichéd remark comes to mind (but as I told someone a few days ago, sometimes at the right moment a cliché is the apt thing to say or do) – Sometimes we don’t realize how important some things are to us until they are not around. When the touch-feel-see proximities are violated and the time-space quantum separates you out...

Slowly but steadily, the earnest reality of the moment sinks in and you look around to see people you do not know, to hear languages that you do not understand (apart from the occasional danke and guten morgen)... You start enumerating more than your brain is supposed to process – The philosophical context of the phrase "feel at home", the surreal feeling of almost not existing, how shiny the floor is, the rivets in some of the walls remind you of the "German war machine" that you read about so long ago, the silver foils covering the air ventilation ducts, the fact that more people around you are wearing brown shoes than black shoes - The fragments of moments from the past coalescing with your present in excruciating bonds...

10:09 AM, Frankfurt Airport, Terminal 1. Gate A 65
After being hustled out for check-in all the passengers were sent back to where we were sitting! Efficient usage of space or pointlessness – I am not sure. So here I am, around 20 feet away from where I was 20 minutes ago. Closer to the glass windows which are letting in some sun, I am feeling slightly warm and better. The endless enumeration of the world though, still continues. The sun or perhaps the boredom has triggered a bit more of chit-chat around here and this place seems to have received a fresh inoculation of life!

I can see at least 7 aircraft outside the window, some parked and others being pulled around by tow trucks. And here comes another one landing down. The asphalt, concrete and rubber uniting with an unpleasant screech... The airport vehicles moving up to the newly arrived craft... The smaller vehicles that are carrying officials moving at faster paces, the buses giving way to the vans – Organized chaos!

A silent crane in the distance seems to be staring back at everyone looking at it, reminiscent of its might perhaps. An old broken building lying at its feet, the old consumed to make way for the new... The laws of nature and mankind, instantly evident, almost revealed...

There are more people coming in and this place would now seem to be qualified to be called crowded – or not? Why not? Well simply because even with so many people there seems to be some kind of a wall or may I say some great barrier in an unknown dimension separating them out.

And well the mythical high in the life energy levels seem to have subsided sooner than I had imagined them to. It is almost as silent as it was in my college third year ‘Electronics’ classes. Which I witnessed perhaps just once or twice but it was disturbing to sit in such a silent class!

Nostalgia is just one of the several things wrecking my brains as of now. Wrecking maybe too harsh a word so let’s stick with ‘passing through’... The organized chaos outside of the window continues like clockwork...

The announcements have been made and the journey must continue. On to Seattle for now...

Quotes by Me

"There is a thin line between irrational and pointless"

"If you wait for the fresh green pea whose surface area is a whole number then you will just end up waiting to join Euclid in the afterlife"

"Eventuality is boring. Be weird - Save the world!"

"I thought that I was trespassing the bandwidths and was landing up in someone else's modulated section"

"Ah! Jobs always stink. They are there to pay for the perfumes"

-Anubhav

Puppets - You & I

Sometimes when I hold out my hand,
I grab some air, some dreams,
Some lost speeding wagon from,
The train of thoughts I yield,
And breathtaken speaks to me,
He who has no heart to share,
And he who has shared all of his...
Spared victims of vice, love,
Convicted fairies stand, close,
Holding on to the threads,
That they suspend in ether,
Puppets move, puppets fly,
They flinch and puppets die,
Smeared faces, teary eyes for us,
As they sing the funeral songs,
For the puppet fairies and I,
Hold on to something and hope,
Its not a thread, just air.

-Anubhav

Khoj laana tum khushi ko

khoj laana tum khushi ko apne uss jahaan sei,
hain jahaan par pariyon ke shahro ke jharoke,
aur laana pal mei tum daal kar khushbu bhi,
fir chalenge geeto par hum sawaar hoke...
nanhe raaju ke haatho mei khelta khilaona,
aur tu tina, tu kyu aise baithi hai chup hoke,
chal aa jaa ab hum sunaa dei apni ye kahani,
aur dil ki baatei bol dei bindaas sei hoke...
kya darna hai in logo ki mote chashmo sei ab,
akhbaro ke peeche chupte naraaz ye kyun hoke,
aao poochhei insei hum ki insei upar kya hai,
kyu hai inke aaju baaju rehte itne dhoke...
arre aao lekar khushi ko apne uss jahaan sei,
hain jahaan par pariyon ke shahro ke jharoke...
...

-Anubhav

Tu saraab hai ya dhoka

bada bechain nazro mei khamoshi ka sabab rehta,
na usse bolte hain hum na wo humsei hai kuchh kehta,
kabhi kulfat nahi hoti aqeedat ka toh pairaahan,
jo aansu tham ke rehta tha wo kaise hai abhi behta...
sitamgar tu badaa kaafir bana jaata hai kyun aise,
ki ab aahat bhi hoti hai, toh sannata nahi rehta,
mushtahir hai bada teri ada-on ka bayan-e-gam,
tera khayal-o-zikr bhi sukoon ka hai nahi rehta...
tu aakhir cheez hai toh kya, koi saraab ya dhoka!
khwaabo mei toh aata hai, par nazro mei nahi rehta.

-Anubhav

The other side of the mirror

A drop of dew against my face,
That shows through the mirror,
I wipe it clean, subtly, slowly,
With the tips of my fingers.
Lingering a moment too long -
Against my wrinkling forehead,
Or least, what looks like mine!
Smeared with stories & days,
Nights full of dreams, lush -
Thoughts and fervid forms,
Engaged in the thoroughfares,
Of the mundane, the nascent -
Silences and forming sounds,
That shape into long held
Memories; Spoken, forgotten.
You becoming you for once,
I being I as only I can be!
Striking similarities - none,
And yet so many to find...
In the world that stares back,
Into my eyes from the eyes -
On the other side of the mirror.

-Anubhav K

I aspire

A little piece of sunshine,
Or a shady dusk at hand...
I aspire to become me,
While you find reasons
To walk your dreams.
Take a stroll with me,
Run, hide, run, dance,
Take a bit of that chance,
To redeem your hopes,
Cherish your destiny,
Step aside while you do...
For I must walk past,
To the sunrise due east,
The one that I inspire.

-Anubhav K

I have always wanted to be

Sprightly and ever so brightly,
I leap into the reflection of me -
That holds my hands as free,
As I have always wanted to be!

Streaming forth my thought tunnels,
Is a beam of light, immense,
It its expanse and calidity,
Bouncing on its musical spree.

To find itself across the page,
Just beyond the lucid full-stops,
That make me pause and see,
My blurred form seeking clarity...

Staring off to the other side,
Of the coloured window panes,
I notice the pale, old oak tree,
Its arms extended in a decree -

Calling my name with the breeze,
Asking me to hold retrospect -
Close to my hope, next to my plea,
And to ask myself before I flee...

Away to the world that I occupy,
From sunrise to dusk and beyond,
And I hold my hands as free,
As I have always wanted to be, me.

-Anubhav

Life breaking through

Pencil on paper. (HB and 2B on standard A4 drawing paper)
Depicting the daylight of life as one of my friends puts this scene as. Becoming the greater marvel that we know from the sum total of its parts... Life exclaims and amazes... Life breaks through...

The wooden lady

Pencil on paper (HB & 2B on standard A4 drawing sheet).

Depicting the inability of the woman to express her emotions despite the millions of mysteries in her locked up eyes.

Happy blogging

So today I managed to hit the "200 posts" lamp-post by the side of the blogging road. Well in the sheer absence of any readers or atleast ones that I know of, I pat myself on the back and say "Way to go!"...

I would take this opportunity to thank the illusion of readers that the Internet creates and that continuously nudges me to write, edit, write, edit and so on to improve on the quality of 'work' that I produce... Over the years I believe it has led to many such incessant rants - Like the one here

Nonetheless, I believe this milestone will probably inch me towards producing more text per day, more photographs per month and some more illustrations. I will keenly follow the interests of my illusionary readers and perhaps try to feed their endless curiosity and want for literary as well as visual arts to satiate the thirst that they build up over weeks, months or years...

So happy blogging it is and hope that it will continue to be so...

The play with light

The sun peeping through the clouds hidden behind the silhouette of a tree... That was some moment. One worthy of closing shutter's attention. This is one of the photos from my recent escapades and attempts with the camera as an expression medium. You can look at some others at http://www.flickr.com/screenedinnocence/

She

She's amazement - I am just the one in awe,
Silly smiles, hands held, eyes towards the sky -
Dreams leading to dreams, hopes held high.
There's more to life, I see, there's more to me,
I realize, when I look into her eyes, silently...
Not blue but just a deeper shade of black,
The one that you would rather be lost in,
But she helps me find my way back to her,
Holding my hands while I say my prayers,
To whatever powers that made us be!
For I know that I couldn't walk the walk,
Or talk the talk with cheeky notes & smiles -
If it wasn't for the wonder that she is...
The good that she inspires, makes me, me!

-Anubhav

Point me to heaven

I stumble and then I ask for the way,
For someone to sway and answer -
To take a moment's pause but for me!
A while and no more is all I yearn for,
Turn for, in my ethereal hinted sleep,
And I hope for someone to tilt -
Their wise head, tip-toe to the edge -
Of the tar road and point their fingers,
Not to the sky but to somewhere near,
And whisper in my eager left ear…
Take that way; Straight to heaven!

-Anubhav

Convergent

Flights of fantasy lead me to an abyss beneath my thoughts,
Layered under my skin, skimpily clothing my vulnerabilities!
Breathless I be or become! Gasping for air when I jump…
Into the hypochondria of awareness, I lie awake and lost.
Looking at the sun outside the window space in the wall -
That I had so earnestly built around myself; My abode!
I feel the warmth glowing inside me, beyond the darkness -
That had so freely smeared itself on my trifle extents!
I see three birds flying gracefully across the calm clear sky,
Turning heads as they drift past each other, silent sarcasm -
The need to win; The greater need to have the others lose!
They float over two flowers as they fade away into the blue,
The flowers basking in the warmth, glowing in a subtle way,
Togetherness, alone in the vast void expanse of silence,
In a brittle moment held together by a little more than hope…
A hundred yards away from the silhouette of a lonely tree,
Overlooking the vivid fading world around its potent self,
And I looking at it, the smiling flowers and the flying birds,
The fading birds, the content flowers and the aging tree…
Then a little pause and I look at my own distant self,
The convergent reality of the moment slowly sinking in.

-Anubhav

The morning sunset

From beyond the subtle notes of surreal truth,
A certain dawn beckons itself to manifest…
In the octaves of my imagination or otherwise -
To find itself an abode to dwell and flourish.
Or perhaps to perish in curtained pretence,
With the silks flowing on decaying bodies…
Finding note after note to rest their lies on.
A music springs forth thereof, to be heard,
In the hollow halls of proven hypochondria…
The ilk that forms a cocoon to hide reality,
With renegade scars as the only hints to undo,
That which perhaps cannot be undone now -
That which perhaps must be challenged!
With a question unto the scars once more,
That must tunnel through to reality or such,
With a resolve made with clenched fists,
To no more believe in the morning sunset!


- Anubhav

The boy who was my brother

I have known him for a long time. And with time i have grown to like him more and more. John is my brother. And I have been his window to the world. Together we share a lifetime of love, friendship and more.

When John was young he would often walk up to me and ask me to go to the river. Run on the banks and play in the sand. He was so fascinated with the flow of the river. His eyes had a sparkle of excitement on those sands. He wanted to flow like a river.

He dreamed like a poet; of the river and the yellow flowers and the many other things he held close to his heart. About the many "No"'s that life turned his way and about the several "Yes"'s which passed by as well. You could feel it all flowing through the veins in his bloodstream. His thoughts racing all over the place, his face flushing with hope. His fidgeting fingers unwrapping the mysteries of a little daffodil; one petal at a time. His chair rocking in the sun. His vision fixed on the fence and the dried up flower pots that lay near it. His mind trying to look for something in the parched earth, something so very precious. Something that time had taken its toll upon. Something which was no more.

He would pick up a small paper and fold it into a flower like shape. Then he would smile! And looking at it again, he would pass over into another world. And tears would mark his vision. Later he would put that paper flower on the window sill and look at it for hours. He would talk to me about the river which was no more the same, about the pathways that were no more the same and about our lives which were no more the same.

He would get up from that chair and start walking around, and then he would turn to me. Looking into my eyes he would speak of the years gone by and of the things that were lost in the transient world around us. Passing us by like people on a busy street. He was John and those were his muses...

Sometimes i think of the many things that John said and of the many other things that he didn't say. I turn over the pages of his notes and maybe I become him for while. I start thinking like him. Thinking about the chances that we take in life, the experiments that we do with reality that make us see the raw face of life. The truth that I see, that John saw, makes me shiver and shrug. I just sit and think, maybe just like he would. About how we decieve ourselves into loving things that we once abhorred. About how we dream of pleasant sunrises and bubbly brooks from our high rise office apartments and how we think of love while reading coffee table illustrations.

Ironic as it may be but we seem to have forgotten all those dreams that we once held so close to ourselves. Everyday we see people walking along the road, some smiling and some looking worried. Everyday we recieve phone calls from friends with varied stories. Some happy and others sad, and we talk on, and we go on. Living our lives as if this is what it is. Our capability to be unfaithful even to our ownselves captivates me and stuns me. Everyday we seem to be getting farther from our innocent dreams and everyday we tell ourselves that we are getting towards better things in life.

It's everyday that we push our true selves down the dark alleys of yesterdays. It's everyday that we make ourselves see the world through ostentation and deceit.
It is not everyday that we feel the cool breeze with the smell of freshly mowed grass pass through our hair. It is not everyday that we feel the touch of true faith and young dreams of our past. It is not everyday that we feel the purity of a soul that we held so dear to our hearts long time back. It is not everyday that we meet someone like John Duff.

He was a simple man. An average man. Someone who believed in the simplicity of his dreams. Someone who followed the truth of his soul all through his life. Someone who smiled when the flowers in his backyard bloomed and who cried when one of them withered. Someone whose heart flowed with the river...
Someone who could love and laugh so honestly. Someone who could hold your hand and walk all through your life with you, from this end to that. Someone who could conjure up paper flowers and feel so passionately about them. I met him, that was destiny. Something that changed so many things. My feelings, my views... maybe my life!

To me he wasn't really like a brother born to the same parents as me. To me he was a friend, someone who became a brother through the time of that life which we shared. Today is the 27th of June, the day that John died, an year ago. Life without John, is strange and lonely, but there are so many things to remember. He lives on somehow and many times i find myself talking to him, smiling with him... living with him. The diaries on the table, the photographs at my desk, they all add up to bring John back to me.

I live in here alone and so John just comes by to be with me in my lonely days, to stay with me through the dusk of my life. It is so much like John to do it, being when you are needed and vanishing when you are not. He has always bewildered me. Always made me wonder. The other day i found a thick set of diaries and letters inside John's old trunk. So many things, I never could have known or figured out the whole of it. The grey picture of John life. The missing colors. The thick edges confined by the torn paper. It was so hazy and so blurred. It was so vivid and alive.
So many letters. I never knew someone could write so many to John. Not that he wasn't interesting. Just that he never let people wander so close to him. I never knew John could write so many to someone. Paper flowing with ounces of emotions. So many words and yet so few. For a man who was so full of words. For a man who was so silent to the world.

There were strange notes. Long letters. Several pieces of poetry. It was something so fresh. To get to know John again. To get to read through his thoughts. They filled in the gaps, cleared the doubts and made John come around clearer than ever. It seems that it is only now that i really know my brother. It seems it is now that i can talk about him... that now i know him truly as John that really was and not as John that seemed to be!

One of the notes is a simple piece paper, small, around the size of a regular envelope. Scribbled in John's hand are a few lines, that set the story going in my mind, all over again-
"When the dusk has come and the darkness seen, When the day has lived to what it has been, Just walk over by my side, and keep them there, My flowers, my daffodils, my lifeless affair... "

His flowers. His friends. His life. All mingled into a piece of paper. Staring at me so blankly. Asking me questions. Making me weak at the knees. I knew I had to read everything. Remember everything. Relive everything. Just for once, but I had to do it. Pick up the pieces lost around the corners that we turned so sharply. Fixing up the inconsistencies that time and silence had left in the picture. Make it complete. Make John come back and sit on the window sill and talk to me...

Poets who blog

Check out poetswhoblog.blogspot.com for interesting poets who blog. There is a lot of nice and interesting work that I found linked from there. It is a really good blog to bookmark if poetry is your forte.

http://poetswhoblog.blogspot.com

Calm distress (from my book)

Quiet paths; somber tones; long forgotten dreams of you,
Silent voids; unfelt songs; Thoughts melting into the blue,
Ever said? Never heard! Lost into my craving dreams...
Loneliness; A dark retreat; Blend into some callous themes.
Fervor numbed! Love undone! Days lost in endless nights;
Buried spirits; fallen men; Violent and blood thirsty fights;
A dearth of smiles; Emotions scarce; the final end of nothingness,
Lost and found; Alive again; the dream of more, the life of less...
Rimless cauldrons of boiling hate rising into our lives,
The young man loved; Lost; The old man - now he strives...
Cold calidity of passions long lost into his graves,
Calm distress - All he needs; Squanders all he saves...

-Anubhav

The shallow river of my mind (from my book)

The depth of my emotions -
- has not been easy to comprehend,
What I say? What I feel? What I pretend?
Sometimes when it looks so deep...
With unbounded emotions in retreat...
It is sometimes just a shallow river -
- In my mind, silently murmuring words.
Speaking to me and I to the world,
Retrospect’s of long lost days - today,
The river and time silently passing away...
What questions does it ask in starry nights?
What answers do I have? Do I have any answers?
The depth of my emotions flowing shallow -
In the shallow river in my mind...

- Anubhav

Cognitive silence (from my book)

Silence; Impeccable; Cognitive;
Reflecting sounds from within,
Sacred thoughts inside your head,
edging you to a greater sin,
Merging words; Muffled noise;
Grey shades of summer nights,
Fickle ways; A mellow song,
drift into the fading lights,
Can I speak? Will I be heard?
Is my whisper loud enough?
A clouded phrase and nothing said,
It smoothes into the rough...
Shrouded hopes; Hazy roads;
Steps follow the steps ahead,
Tired; Restless; Lost in the void,
Alive long after I am dead...

-Anubhav

Darkness (from my book)

End of days; No last respite; Fragments of nothingness;
What life conjures? Strange forms in shadows to recess,
Holding on to the hands of darkness I walk into the light,
But the shadows move all over and the wrong becomes the right,
With frightened eyes, I look around to find my long lost grace,
It burns on top the altar, and shines in shades of grays,
The warriors run with armors, and swords are thrown across,
And whispers ask to whispers, who’s gain and who’s this loss,
Amidst the flames of darkness, I see the shadows roam,
I hide within my thoughts and I run to find my home,
I crash with every step I take, I move back to where I was,
And someone tells me not to move till all the darkness thaws,
I see a huge gray armored horse, with knights of shadows trot,
I see more death and destruction, when I feel I've seen a lot,
They move around and I sit and wait for the long forgotten dawn,
And then I feel some blood on me, I die and I am born...

- Anubhav

In the light of darkness (from my book)

In the light of darkness I walk across the streets,
Muffled sounds of silence as loud as bass drum beats,
Steps behind my steps, when I walk away from me,
Fingers pointing sky-wards ask what the world would be...
Summer winds brushing through my hair, speaking in my ear,
Clouds moving in the skies; sky is never getting clear,
Dust rising from the ground, look what have I just found,
With every backward step, I find nothingness around...
Making bonds with yesterday when today is flying by,
I have found no reasons yet; so do not ask me why?
I cannot see what comes, I see what has just gone,
I move back one more step to feel all the more withdrawn...
What's your final word to me? What's my unknown destiny?
Tell me what is it I did, to end up where I end to be?
Should I step one more step back? Should I find you once again?
Would you hold my hand once more? Would you dance with me again?

-Anubhav

I stand in stillness (from my book)

I try to walk, but my feet won't move - not even an inch,
They are transfixed to the one spot that I stand in...
Petrified, I whisper to my own self, I beg my legs to move,
To take me back to my home, to let me crash and sleep...
I look up to the stars, its getting dark all around...
They blink at me - the stars - as if smiling at my pain,
Some more join in, and together they laugh,
Constellations from the cosmos, looking down at a man...
A man - alone - looking back at the skies,
Calling for help, screaming aloud,
And silence echoing back at him...
I try again, to move my legs but I cannot move,
My eyes start closing and the darkness takes over,
I dream of the past, when I could run...
Run around the place, beat life at the race,
Smile at the dusk and go back to my home,
And today I stand in stillness, in silence, paralyzed...

-Anubhav

Clouded vision (from my book)

There is silent way in which you move into my eyes,
I do not know if its you or if it is my heart that lies,
You move into my vision and you cloud up my thoughts,
I feel the world all silent even among the gun shots,
I feel so vulnerable when you move up in front of me,
I do not know whether to believe the love I see,
It is different, it is so silent and yet it is a storm,
Like a night full of darkness and a shadow taking form,
Unknown to the mind, the heart and eyes are lost,
Like a lonely warrior who is fighting in the frost,
I don't know if the blow upon my heart will make me dead,
I only know that through eyes, its me, the one who bled,
Silent darkness and you with the shadows all around,
I stand here entrapped, my heart and eyes all bound,
With you in my vision I do not know what else to see,
For with I do exist and without you I shall not be...

-Anubhav

Green water (from my book)

Hidden visions of your back yard, green reflections in my eyes,
I walk in my shadows to discover the depth in my tears,
Remembering when we dipped our feet in the water,
And sat there, holding hands, watching the sunsets in winters...
Whispering names to each other echoing with the rustling leaves,
Finding future in our reflections in the water,
And watching you walk off to your home while I receded away,
The dark nights reflecting the moon in the water,
The bright hues of your eyes calling my name,
And today I am watching reflections of yesterday in the green waters...

-Anubhav