Kiss…

Melting dark chocolates... a shower of rose petals... the silent soothing fragrance of jasmine... the gentle breeze... the rhythmic swaying trees... and Yanni's poignant rendition of "Until the last moment...", she remembers her first kiss. She remembers the tears welling up in her eyes... flowing down her cheeks, only to be stopped by his lips the next moment. She remembers his comment… as if struck by a strange revelation… “Salt,” he had said smiling. She had looked into those eyes… intense, romantic, poetic… her heart beating fast and her breaths coming short. She had held onto him, never wanting to let go… hoping that he wouldn’t let go either… but things change… leaving just random images… dreams becoming delusions… cold… final… the end. Now as she stood in the cold with the rain pelting on her shoulders, she felt the wave of change again. She saw him…

Waves thundering on the silent rocks… a distant lightning… the pungent smell of love in the air… passions ignited… time standing still… he remembers his first kiss. He remembers looking into her eyes, seeing the tears in them… He remembers kissing those tears as they flowed down her cheeks, tasting the saltiness… He remembers hugging her tight… a moment that will stand the test of time… melting away in her arms… her own soft fragrance intoxicating him… and their hearts beating in perfect rhythm… everything perfect… no barriers… But then the tides stopped… there were no more waves to break the barriers of change… no more hands to hold… an empty bag of straws. She was gone. Now, as he stood in the rain waiting for the bus, he felt the tide building up again. He saw her…

The bus was late. They stood in the rain waiting… staring at each other, exchanging silent messages… rhythmic heartbeats… the longing in their eyes… passions ignited. Time stood still again… urgent, desperate, impetuous… and they came closer. He looked into her eyes, she looked into his… and they hugged. A moment later, he kissed her softly on her lips... she closed her eyes… melting chocolates, thundering waves, raining roses… After an eternity, he broke off the kiss, looked at her beautiful face and asked her, “What’s your name?”

Dark Wader!

The night was cool, the mind was not. I was walking back home from college and my hands were shivering. Not from the cold, but from a combination of some insane sorrow and some randomly generated images from my life. Poignancy filled the air with its vile innocence and I couldn't make head or tail of the thoughts that seemed to enter my mind and exit at the same time. Insane. Obscure. Abstruse. Then I understood. The hero in me was dying, to be replaced with a morally reprehensible creature who seemed to be completely indifferent not only to what was happening around him, but also to what was happening to himself. Indifference they said, was more dangerous than hatred. And here I was, wading through the dark. Dark wader.

I continued walking. 400 feet from home. Heart beating fast, blood rushing into my head... and I saw red... blood red. And I knew that I was beyond the point of redemption. I was metamorphosing. I expected to turn nocturne. I expected to grow black wings like the dark angels (were they really dark?!) I expected my eyes to turn red like they would show in all those B-rated horror movies (I wonder who thought that one up!). No more selflessness. No more helping others in need. Me, me and me. No more heroism. I was the villain. It's better to be the villain in these times. They always win. Oh of course there is the matter of going to hell. But well, that matters only to people who believe in hell. So to hell they shalt go. Not me. To me it is absolutely comical, the belief that people are burnt in hell and tortured in hell and fried in hot oil. I am always tempted to frustratingly retort "Dude, you leave your body behind when you die. You think the soul cares if its deep fried?". I hope someone comes up with a more vivid and better image of how hell would be (for all those who believe in the concept that is... coz I don't care). For me, loneliness is hell. Hence the metamorphosis seemed important to me.

250 feet from home. I thought of the times I had offered my help to people. I thought of the people who used me. I thought of all the instances where I had invested my entire time to make people feel better. I thought of how they had grown far away from me. No more worries. Hakuna Matata. Freedom at last. And I thought of my own misery. And no one to care. How the loneliness would hit me like a million pinpricks of gusty wind on a day of heavy snow. The skin burning with pain... nothing to show for it though... the winds are always deceptive... just like relationships... one can only wait for the burning sensation to stop... before it starts again. Cynicism. Sarcasm. Contempt.

50 feet from home. The heroism had to end. No more agony aunt either. People who have problems should deal with their own problems, I thought. It was the birth of the villain. The excitement grew. The darkness grew. And I let myself float into it... deep inside the long clichéd tunnel... I reached the door to my apartment. Someone was lying sprawled right outside the door. The guy who lived next door. Drunk. And cold. Out cold. The tunnel ended. The lights became brighter. It was time for respite... before it got dark again. I managed to drag him inside. The metamorphosis was interrupted. Hodgepodge! Denial! Resignation! Good prevails... and "hell" rules...!!!

The Young Paladin

The young girl stood in the scorching heat outside the train station in Secunderabad, her unwavering eyes looking into the distance. She took in the whole city with her eyes; the people swarming about everywhere… people increasing their speed as they came near her… just another girl on the street with four siblings to feed… her only goal after she wakes up everyday being to keep her brothers and sisters from dying of hunger. Would she have dreams? I am sure she would. She would dream to be a grown-up… and walk the streets without a care… without having to worry about hunger…or destitution... And then when she grows up would her dreams change? She might wish to be a child again… to return to innocence as the cliché goes… But as she stood in the scorching heat at the moment and scanned all the faces that were passing by her, she was looking for help… a vigilante… someone who cared… someone who could help and would help… someone who wouldn’t tread on her dreams… Maybe the young man wearing glasses could make a difference. He is the one who passed by her, trying not to stare at her when her unflinching gaze pleaded with him and made his heart skip a beat. She gave him a smile when he turned back to look at her after walking a distance. She hoped that he would indeed make a difference.

Two months later, the young man flew out of the country for his higher studies. He entered a multi-ethnic culture… shocking, exciting and racist all at the same time. The inherent chaos embedded in the depths of this new society was difficult to understand. Still, the young man believed that there was a pattern. It was all about co-existence… the rich and the poor… the majority and the minority… people with different ideologies… religious or otherwise… there were a million reasons for conflict. The young man believed that people always cite one of these reasons to start a conflict all the time. But what about the dreams of all these people… do these conflicts start because of the dreams and hopes in the first place? If so, yes we should indeed tread very carefully… The young man thought about the wars being fought this very moment… the dreams being shattered at this very moment… and the hopes being made at this very moment. Simply breathtaking…

Awareness is the key, and awareness of course comes with knowledge. With the media of today, it is indeed quite difficult to separate the truth from all the other gibberish. But if we have people who are aware of the basic reality behind co-existence, then we have our paladins. Maybe, they would be able to make some kind of a difference. Maybe, the young protectors of this world could start immediately so that the young girl and her siblings do not have to remain hungry anymore… and maybe, just maybe the young girl herself would prove to be a guardian to others… In fact, let us all become paladins… what is stopping us but our own torpidness? We have powerful people backing us… people like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, to name a few… Let us make sure that those dreams come true… But let us all tread softly on the dreams lest we trample on the dreams of others… As W.B. Yeats poignantly said,

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Red...

"Thousands of years ago, the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light..."

From The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

Red...a color that denotes change, something the world seems to dread...a color that has been so deeply imbibed by the history of the world...a color that is deeply embedded in all the revolutions that rocked this world. There is also red, the color of blood...I suppose red is the most misunderstood among all the colors...a color that often gets drowned in the hypocrisy and narrow-mindedness our society seems to be embracing these days. A color misunderstood because of the spillage of blood...because of violence...but still the brightest of all the colors. Red...my favorite color.

The thoughts about this beautiful color passed through my mind the night I was returning after watching a very thought-provoking hindi movie called Rang de basanti. The impact the movie left on all of us was rather evident from the discussions we were engaged in soon after the movie got over. I was quiet during the time though, as I was thinking about the color...red. As I sat in the car on my way back, listening to the discussion my friends were engaged in, the color red took me back to Kerala ( these momentary trips to Kerala have become more and more frequent for me these days)...a place where the color red is very dominant...a state even though one of the poorest in the world, demonstrates a quality of life that challenges even the most developed nations in the world...including the USA...a state that has famous economists of the world scurrying to study and make sense of the bizarre behavior of the so-called "Kerala Model"... a democracy as opposed to a demo-crazy as seen in most places...no matter what anyone says.

A kaleidoscope of emotions washed over me as I further tried to hold my thoughts together and make sense out of them. I then thought about my college...the burning ember of enthusiasm that used to fill the air...red. I then began to think about things that were not even close to being glossy about the color red...the fights...the pain...the frustrations...the anger...the violence. I entered that room in my hostel in college..a small room like all others...one that had 3 students living in it. I walked to the window and remembered my uncle telling me about the unforgettable events that had triggered a major scandal that started in that particular room about 30 years ago during the dark days of the emergency. This was where the police had come to arrest a final-year engineering student named Rajan. Rajan was taken into custody, never to be heard from again...an event that had a notable impact on the politics in Kerala as it created a ruccus that successfully pressurized the chief minister K. Karunakaran to resign within a month of his taking oath in the office soon after the emergency. Rajan was arrested along with his friend Chaly and the dubious arrest was not shown on record. Rajan reportedly died of police brutality and his body was allegedly burnt and the ashes thrown into a river by the police. Ashes to ashes...dust to dust. As I stood in the room where Rajan had stayed, I felt the darkness around me...black...suppressing all the other colors. However, in an instant the room dissolved in front of my eyes and I found myself back in the car. The Rajan case had found its way into my mind because of an article I had read which had reported that there are calls for the re-opening of the case and that this time, they might actually re-open it. Hope again came in the form of red, I thought....or maybe it was yellow...

We were finally reaching our destination and it was time for me to close the pandora's box. One thing I did understand at the end of my rumination was that it would be impossible to restrict life to a single color. Life is after all like a rainbow...you need both the sun and the rain to make its colors appear. Let us start with red though...maybe it is indeed possible to make a change...a dynamic one at that.

As I then observed the small menagerie inside the car...the discussions were still raging on unabated...and one thing became quite obvious to me...that sure was one damn good movie!