The Distance between Delhi and Kolkata

The distance between Delhi and Kolkata, Falguni writes, is not elastic and you can feel the utter helplessness and homesickness around this time, that always creeps up and grabs the Bengalis hard. CR park cannot fulfill the aspirations of an entire race seeking salvation in duplicity of it's favorite festival. Although, it's a two hour aeroplane journey or an 18 hour long train journey, the Bongs still whine a lot, it's something about their weather. Parminder who cycled all the way from Multan to Delhi did witness radical changes every 5 hours, he wonders if he would see the same from Bengal to Delhi- he would know when the humid marshlands will give up to the ancient plains of Magadha, to the entire old world where people have grown like vermin, because life was too easy- because "ish Desh mein Ganga behti Hain". 

The distance between two cities is never much, by air, by rail, and yet these people are complaining, says Falguni, who took the Sher Shah route herself; and then her life changed. Like Parminder when she decided to cycle all the way from Kolkata to Delhi, she realized how far she was away from home. If one day, all the planes were grounded and all the railway lines were usurped, she would be locked in a strange distant land far, far away from home, and that thought was reason enough to feel the way thousands around her felt- helpless and homeless, a broken being yearning to return to places that were inside them when they were young, places that were them long before they became themselves- places with lush green fields, and rivers and fishes, where you could sweat and swim, where there are forgiving thunderstorms, the blackness of the sky and around this time the greatest festival of all - you know.

Notes from the Tide Country

NOTES FROM THE 

Tide Country

There’s a mangrove tree in my backyard
and like it’s roots, I too spasm out of
this muddy earth- this is my country
my own silted land where your words
will remain eternal (and your love too ),

as the rivers shift, and the seas rise- 

you will still find me here manning that little tree, 

hunched beneath the shades of 

a mud-thatched universe.

I wonder what Gopal was wearing that
day, when he went inside the forest,
names of gods in his lips, skies asunder,
was there a storm in the high seas?
That night Seuli went mad in grief,
the wind changed directions and
everyone on this bank shuddered 

hearing the howl of the beastly gods. 

Early morning next day, prayers were sung

for the departed; I wonder what Gopal
was wearing the day he got lost inside
the forest, only to return three days later,
bare-clothed, emaciated- a five and a half feet
mud figure- the gods had spared him;
they took Seuli to Calcutta and admitted
her in an institution for the broken-hearted;

in the tide country, lovers often get trapped 

inside their own grief vortex- never to move on,
intertwined lives, all for love.

All for love.

For love, Gopal doesn’t speak to me,
it’s his son who does the talking,
‘He doesn’t speak since that day’
a speck of black cloud hangs above our boat,
in some distant imagined darkness, a tiger
swims from one island to another-
in search of a mate- love-struck, lonely,
ravenous with its animal desire
yet stunning in its animal grace
the story of  all the lovers in the world
- rolled into one gentle beast. 

Isn’t it so?

There’s a mangrove tree in my backyard, and

years ago, when the tide had threatened my

home, my life, my love, something came over
me, a dream or  a god you may say, and
he asked me to worship the tree,
‘ Do you see that patch of tree there over the bank?’
I planted them all and the gods smiled at me. 

You lie there in the bow of your boat, painting the
moon. The silence is comforting, far away from the
city and its hulabula, your pulse slows down,

 the GPS lets you know your bearings,
most of the time. When the world was
water many lives ago, you were home at sea. 
You check your phone  sometimes with a smile;
 and there’s a faint signal and sometimes you tell your
stories into the night and the forests witness it all;
the tides let you know that there’s beauty in this monotony,
and in reassurances and simple things;

armed with all this knowledge you store
them for the years ahead; your eyes glitter with
all the dreams you have dreamt everyday,
the sea breeze salts your skin, and you ask
yourself many things- 

who put the moon inside your head? 

When the world was water,
you were home at sea.

And when you will make your
own world- with  a recipe of swollen
rivers, tides, lovers, beasts, gods, and
all the beautiful things you have ever
known- I wonder who you
would turn to.

Indian Circus and The Government

Many years ago, George Orwell wrote,
"He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past."
Most government in power tries to alter history. But no one surpasses the yen and enthusiasm of the present government. In Amartya Sen's book, Argumentative Indian, I had come across an essay where he points out how some artefacts were placed in certain places to Hindu-ize ancient Indian historical places (this was done during Atal Bihari Vajpayee's term and it had later been disproved). Also, this was before the use of rampant social media when the checks and balances were manageable. This morning I was reading about the history of the Indian Circus, and I came across the names of various fledgling circus back during the colonial days- most rising out of Kerala (if I were a Hindutva historian I would lose my shit) which was the cradle of Indian Circus. Altering names and history is something that you can trust your governments with impunity.Here are some of the names, that need immediate government intervention, as attempted by a right winger friend of mine:

Whiteway Circus ~ fair and lovely circus

The Great Lion Circus ~ the gau rakshak circus

The Fairy Circus ~ apsara cricus

The Oriental Circus ~ Bharat Mata ki Jai circus

Ramayana Circus ~ how dare someone use Ramayana and Circus in the same hemisphere; omitted!

To the Lady at Sea

This afternoon paints a torrid affair
My dog sniffs and barks in lugubrious ardor
The skies are hell bent on a thunderous endeavor
As I am headed to the forests of Sundar

Who unpacks my heart at such a lonely hour
Her tattered top windsails with tidal power
She plods in the yachts of otherworldly sire
Reminiscing a time when the world was fire.

Flash poem two

When we will grow bleak and senile,
broken backs and a toothless smile-
with all the portents long behind us,
and all the possibilities doused with time;

(in that time)

windless hopes will hover around,
regrets will kiss our deepest wound
but tears will be few and far flung
as memories wear quicker than a sad song.

Darjeeling 2018

The cold room where
we have put up
in the basement of
this old hotel,

where fires don't
light because
there's not enough
oxygen in the air-

where we breathe on
noxious metaphors
and stories we
told ourselves
as children

where my friend speaks
in the language
of his violin and
sometimes I
see tears between his
performances;

where I mostly strike
the wrong chords on my guitar;

where we make music,
troubadours from the plains;

where it's too cold and
we sleep on
separate beds,
deciding not to hug
because its gay, they say;

breathless and frozen
the nimble moonfull
night awaits- we miss
our wayward lovers,

jerking off to the
silence of the next
door couple. This
was the dream life.

Salvation Poem- from coal country series

One moment we are planning
trepid little movements, that
would trump the version
of a nightingale's love song;
and the next moment we say
farewell and goodbyes- because
we want what we want!

Somewhere closer to your home
that summer, I had just wanted
time to stand still- I had wished to
to move as fast as the speed of light,
to whiz past Universes and head right
into the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy;

to stand at the edge of visibility and
look at my future and everything
I know recede into a big black hole,
so that I could see every thing that would
and should happen in front of me,
and may be then I would do it right.