I had this beautiful woman friend in New Delhi, and when I say beautiful I mean it. This beautiful woman friend in New Delhi wanted me to exchange places with her- I know she meant it in a strictly poetic sense, but her loquacious nature also made her pretty honest at times and that’s how I got to know that she wanted to know me better. There was a time when I could pretend to be lost in my head, and I mean the word pretend because you know what, I hardly smoked any weed back then and yet I could redden my eyes and I could look at the sky and say ‘’hey I am groovy kinda high’’. Free of everything and by everything do I mean feelings?
It was a talent of sort they said, and then words would come fluttering out of nowhere. Damn them, words. That’s how I got to know her anyway- through words, but perhaps more through those accidental touching of skins while crossing the bruised traffic in rush hour, circling round and round through the edges of Connaught Place, unwary of the world. We could talk. We just went on and on. Our quibbles would touch forth the various spectrum of knowledge, sometimes revolving around conspiracy theories but mostly resorting to our mutual doped out ignorance of what the other deemed important. It’s kind of funny how we never settled ever for a truce- blaming our cultural and gender differences.
‘Let’s exchange places’, she would, say.
‘Fine let’s do it,’ I would tell her.
And we would keep on walking the sprawling boulevards of the new capital. Sometimes we would see peacocks. Sometimes we would see fornicating dogs. It seemed we could only agree in silence, in the unison of our vision, because in some distant corners of our heart perhaps all of these made a different sense. All of this meant something different to us. Yes, we were story tellers who would write each other letters at times. Sometimes she would mention her boyfriend who lived in some other city. I didn’t pay much attention when she talked about him.
I left New Delhi.
Here in Calcutta, there are so many people who dress and talk like me, who read the same books as I do, listens to the same music and radio- that sometimes I feel I have no identity here. I wish that I could go back to the capital where my beautiful woman friend lives, now with her boyfriend. Sometimes I do feel like exchanging places with her, only to know what she was doing. I don’t write letters to her anymore, all I can do is wonder. We are both busy in love. We are both busy in life. We inhabit different cities and when darkness settles here she is perhaps still enjoying the dim November sun in a Mughal garden. Does she still fight like that? Does she still fight for every word and everything she deems important?
All I can do is wonder.
I took a rickety-rackety government bus today from the southern end of the town where the lakes still harbor sea-weeds and fishes. I sat by the gate and watched the road with the corner of my large glasses. I put on the earphones and as I could feel Vivaldi dulcifying my ear with four seasons the bus hit a red light. A passerby hurriedly came up to the window and asked me something. I couldn’t hear him so I took off my earphone only to enquire what he was saying.
‘Lake Town?’ he demanded to know.
‘Haan,’ I shouted back.
This kept on happening through the entire arduous journey back to the north and I didn’t mind it. But at the end of it I realized that I had kind of exchanged places with the bus conductor. My heart ached a little only when I realized how back in those days, I was hopelessly in love with that beautiful woman from New Delhi.
‘Let’s exchange places,’ she used to say.
It was a talent of sort they said, and then words would come fluttering out of nowhere. Damn them, words. That’s how I got to know her anyway- through words, but perhaps more through those accidental touching of skins while crossing the bruised traffic in rush hour, circling round and round through the edges of Connaught Place, unwary of the world. We could talk. We just went on and on. Our quibbles would touch forth the various spectrum of knowledge, sometimes revolving around conspiracy theories but mostly resorting to our mutual doped out ignorance of what the other deemed important. It’s kind of funny how we never settled ever for a truce- blaming our cultural and gender differences.
‘Let’s exchange places’, she would, say.
‘Fine let’s do it,’ I would tell her.
And we would keep on walking the sprawling boulevards of the new capital. Sometimes we would see peacocks. Sometimes we would see fornicating dogs. It seemed we could only agree in silence, in the unison of our vision, because in some distant corners of our heart perhaps all of these made a different sense. All of this meant something different to us. Yes, we were story tellers who would write each other letters at times. Sometimes she would mention her boyfriend who lived in some other city. I didn’t pay much attention when she talked about him.
I left New Delhi.
Here in Calcutta, there are so many people who dress and talk like me, who read the same books as I do, listens to the same music and radio- that sometimes I feel I have no identity here. I wish that I could go back to the capital where my beautiful woman friend lives, now with her boyfriend. Sometimes I do feel like exchanging places with her, only to know what she was doing. I don’t write letters to her anymore, all I can do is wonder. We are both busy in love. We are both busy in life. We inhabit different cities and when darkness settles here she is perhaps still enjoying the dim November sun in a Mughal garden. Does she still fight like that? Does she still fight for every word and everything she deems important?
All I can do is wonder.
I took a rickety-rackety government bus today from the southern end of the town where the lakes still harbor sea-weeds and fishes. I sat by the gate and watched the road with the corner of my large glasses. I put on the earphones and as I could feel Vivaldi dulcifying my ear with four seasons the bus hit a red light. A passerby hurriedly came up to the window and asked me something. I couldn’t hear him so I took off my earphone only to enquire what he was saying.
‘Lake Town?’ he demanded to know.
‘Haan,’ I shouted back.
This kept on happening through the entire arduous journey back to the north and I didn’t mind it. But at the end of it I realized that I had kind of exchanged places with the bus conductor. My heart ached a little only when I realized how back in those days, I was hopelessly in love with that beautiful woman from New Delhi.
‘Let’s exchange places,’ she used to say.
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