Dear muse

Dear hills,

Writing to you while I am sandwiched between three unknown people who looks like they belong from your territory.
Writing to you while I stoop forward in the last seat of the jeep as it slips down in one of those snaky curves of your green lush body.

I see you taking houses butt-way sticking out from your pine forests. I travel through you as people dig through your skin and put cement and sand to seal that pattern. And you stand, protest-less, mute, observant, still peaceful, still a mother.

I keep coming back, like a little kid does, to the garden where he finds his favourite flower. I keep coming back, guilty to wipe out the last drop of peace you have to offer; but then you dont have a last drop. You keep refilling.

I keep coming back like a voyeur to see how you make love to the clouds, all through the day, from the first drop of sunlight that dilutes all over the sky till the darkness of the night kills the last bit of the sun.

And then there are people who choose you, over advantages of a city, over privileges of an easier life.
I see them choosing you over everything that every other textures of the nature can offer.

And I feel more guilty.

I keep coming back and you keep smiling, arms out with your rhododendrons, mosses out from rocks untouched, valleys that are slowly turning into lifeless cemented snakes.
You breathe into me calm as birds return back trading through a golden sky changing leads, as squirrels carry nuts into one of their holes in your soil that they call home.

People call you an escape. People call you a momentary vacation. People choose you selfishly only when they want to breathe little different from their luxury-spread sofas back in the plains, and I choose you as homecoming.

I choose you because you make me cry just by being there, just by groping the sun back into your curves, just by showing me that after one uphill road of sweat comes another easy downhill of leisure, just by whispering into me oxygen when all my mind can think of is violence.

I have so much more to write to you but just then the jeep passes dangerously almost-hanging the cliff's side, and I see clouds possessively trying to hide your curves with it's shadows from the sun, which shines selectively through the clouds into your valleys.
I have so much more to tell you but just then it begins to rain and I see every bit of you celebrating the showers.
I have so much more to say but your beauty numbs me, and this numbness is so addictive, I keep coming back.

And finally I realise why 'hill' and 'heal' sound similar.


From someone,
who drinks shamelessly from your valleys, the elixir of peace;
a drunkard.

Little aesthetics please?

Mine's been nearly a year in Bolpur. People keep saying there is something very addictive in it's air; once you're here you keep coming back hopelessly for another little bit of dosage.

Well, I can't tell you anything about that. Almost a whole year here and it's been not addiction for me, but a habit, like you brush your teeth in mornings, and let me tell you, some days I simply hate brushing my teeth.
Anyway, the only thing I like here is how disturbingly quiet it is, and how disturbing silence can be for nights, in a place that merged solitude and loneliness for me.

I have a lover here, and a bicycle that I took, borrowed. So, afternoons of cloudy days, or days when the sun is just little less hard on us, we ride away slowly to places undiscovered.

The lover is always the one doing all the labour of circling his feet on the paddle, managing the balance, and also carrying this weight behind him who is mostly shifting in her seat screwing his balance scheme, asking bizarre questions; answering which demands some mind off the street and into contemplation.

I usually have nothing to do, except gazing at slowly fading landscapes, people, trees that hug the sky and lush greenary.
This whole idea of writing came to me when my lover told himself in half consciousness of appreciating a golden-hour lit stretch of green beauty, that how perfect a village it is.

And it occured to me, that indeed it is; a perfect village. Sad that it forcibly keeps trying to change to a town. Imagine the failure a poet would get if he tries his hand at cricket!

And for the most of the journey, I kept looking at how perfect it is. How perfect the sunset looks with the green farmlands in off-focus, and how awkward the smoke looks that is puked out by a nearby factory that the village could do without.

I pass mud houses set in the middle of the stretches randomly, with perfect petite black windows, mostly closed. And when they are open, they let in to the visuals of dark walls with marks left by raindrops that ran down through leaks in the terrace, Hindu devotee pictures in ornamental attire whose brightness has been smudged by regular smoke from incense sticks, polythene bags randomly hanged from hooks on the wall.

I keep passing, and the sky grows darker.

By the time I reach the nearby market, each shops have electrical lamps put up, and I wonder how aesthetically correct it would have been if they had fire-lit lamps put out hanged. How aesthetically soothing it could have been if the perfect evening had a perfect halogen flavour to it!

How perfect it could have been it the perfect village would not have tried to be something that wipes away the remaining beauty from it?!

Ennroute- who cares?

Enroute who cares?

As i write this I am sandwiched between three other passengers. Occasional gust of wind I am looking forward to, pungent washroom odour dipped in human sweat, conversations, chaos hitting the senses as I write.
Enroute? Who cares.

I have forever liked train journeys not because it lead somewhere, not because it leads to new acquaintances, but because I have lived most of my childhood in them; upper berths, vendor screams, blue draped seats, and stories.
My father's job gave me wonderful things. He mostly used to stay away, sometimes distant district of my own state, sometimes elsewhere.
All the memories I have of childhood, I usually have of travelling, sometimes Jharkhand, sometimes Bihar border, and the memories are always this faded sky blue coated eastern railway-isque. My father's job took my father away mostly, and gave me trains.
I don't know how to say which one is better now.

Anyway, coming back to this, I didn't get a window seat, so I'm mostly peeping from a mid-aged man's shoulder to see the passing lights of the night. The moon is bright up there somewhere, which I assume because the silhouettes are too bright. The train pass and so do I, and the silhouettes backwards. I keep looking.
I usually find more beauty in the soothing night visuals than the screaming morning light. They don't come with the obligation to be seen by you.
Also you put in a little bit of effort to see the night sky; and what is beauty if its not yearned for?

The train in its own mood, and I in mine, we travel.
Enroute? Who cares?

Bolpur Blues: Episode 5

Episode 4 is here!

Durga puja went away in a jiffy. When I try to recall the one long month, I see passing images of lights, friends, food, and colors.

Happy month!

But somehow, the quirk and me, we would always keep in touch. Also, on one of those nights of midnight texts and laughter-inducing banters, I gave him a nick name, which later I found out, means ‘bacteria that causes food poisoning’.

Weird happens to be my forte too!

Also, we got so happy, just by conversations, he later started calling me his ‘happy hormone’.

I returned back to Santiniketan after a month, but he didn’t.

We would keep calling, each other, usually in the dead of the night, just to talk about how the day went.

Nyctophilliacs in synchronization.

One month went away, and one day me and my Kala Bhavana beat partner, who introduced me to the quirk in the first place, we got some weed for us.

Enough for four joints, and more than enough to get us shit high!

There is this place, which happens to top my little list of the places I find solace in Santiniketan; behind one of the theater houses, a stretch of land, used by students of painting and sculpture for practice.

A land, surrounded by abstract sculpture, structures designed for people to sit, and a half-broken wall, injected with concrete flowers, which was earlier a stage used by performance arts’ students for presentation.

Me and my Malayalam partner, we sat there, rolled us four joints, and had all of them together.

In some time we got to realize the sun was going down, and we could hardly get up.

All dangerous places are seductive, they say.

This place had no light to guide us in the dark, and it was a damn long walk to the main road through what you would call a overgrown forest.

I got up after giving efforts to my head and my legs for almost fifteen minutes.

The sky was putting out his last bit of light, when we two high people, unable to grab anything that was happening, walked to the faint source of the light; streetlamp of the main road that was visible from there.

After walking for what looked like a mile, since weed messed up our timeline too bad, I realized my partner was not beside me anymore.

May be I freaked out, maybe I tried to find my phone which I couldn’t, the last memory I have is me trying to open the gate to my house, where I hurt my palm badly. I felt no pain then, only after I was back to my senses, I saw the blood clot.

At around 9 pm, I woke up in my bed, by a phone call. The quirk!

“Hey, I booked my tickets. My train’s tomorrow.” The cheerful voice and I could imagine that big smile which is his patent.

“So in three days, you are going to be here?” I was so happy.

“Yes. Just three more days. Will you come to the train station when I reach?”

“Can’t wait to hug you a welcome.” I cut the call, and hummed a little happy song.

In three days, he was back.

Struggling with his two huge luggage, came out of the platform, searching. I was standing right in front.

I hugged him a welcome, and we started walking.

Station happens to be a half an hour walk from the place where we wanted to go, and only midway, we came to realize, we were so busy in conversations, that we forgot to get ourselves a transport. Apparently he has shifted to a place, which was in my locality; I mean just the lane almost opposite to mine.

We came to his place, dusted things, made him settle down, and he came to drop me off to my place.

That goodbye for just the night, I tell you, was the most confusing one.

I wanted to shake his hands, and he came closer for a hug.

Finally, we laughed and settled for the hug.

To be continued…

Bolpur Blues: Episode 4

Bolpur Blues: Episode1

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

Bolpur Blues: Episode 3

Songs, music, walks, conversations, happened to increase in the weeks that followed.

My routine for the day remained the same. Wake up early, text my virtual boyfriend, go for classes, come back, go out on a tea date with myself; only the thing that severely changed was, this time I would keep on bumping into the quirk, almost every day.

One day, I returned from my classes a little early, around afternoon. Since I had nothing to do till the sun goes down and the world creates the perfect ambience for a date with myself, I lazily kept scrolling my Facebook newsfeed, and came to realize, my boyfriend has gone off Facebook.

I tried Whatsapp and that account was deleted.

I tried his phone and that was switched off.

For natural reasons, that upset me. I kept calling that number once every ten minutes, only to listen to the same robotic lady telling me the same words.

Upset, heartbroken and worried, I decided to go out, have a cup of tea, and think upon what can be done.

Tea date with myself done, I lingered around the marketplace that day.

Dark, silent lanes were only accelerating the worries.

In one of those noisy, tourist-crowded shops in the marketplace, I met the quirk, checking out a burnt clay bangle.

I went beside him and asked, “For your mother?”

He turned around, little distracted by my words from his deep inspection of jewellery, “No, for myself.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, “Do men in Kerala wear bangles?”

I expected him to get angry, but he seemed equally amused, “No no, but I want to wear. See, even the color goes with my skin tone.”

My mind kept whispering, ‘Say hello to the quirk!’

He not only bought the bangle and made me bargain with the shopkeeper, but also posted a picture wearing it on his Facebook profile.

This time, more than amused, I was amazed at the straightforwardness of a person, in public.

Anyway, days went by, my virtual boyfriend stayed lost and gone, and came Mahalaya, and that only meant, Durga puja was just a week away.

Santiniketan organizes a fair on Mahalaya, where each department of my University puts up stalls. Ours had newspapers to sell.

I was hardly interested in the fair, but in the fact that the next day I was going home; for one long month.

After roaming in the fair for some time, and getting choked by the amount of crowd in a small place, I came back to the ramshackle halogen-lit tea stall for a late evening tea.

The quirk with another friend, walked in almost then.

After rounds of lemon tea, horribly made though, and appreciation of the vintage flavor of the shop, we were out to walk back home.

On the way I told him, “I’m going back home tomorrow.”

“Oh. I’ll go too.”

“When? Go home. Anyway, the holidays are on, and there is nothing to do here.” I replied.

“I’ll go. Maybe this week. Just little lazy to book my ticket.” He smiled back.

I returned the smile and the bent to my lane came.

“Okay then, see you soon?” He smiled and held my hand.

I faintly pressed his hand before letting go, “Very soon.”

He smiled and went his way, and I mine.

The next episode is up here!

To be continued…

Bolpur Blues: Episode 3

Bolpur Blues:Episode 1

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

By a week that followed, we had became friends; the kind that you smile at when you accidentally meet on the road. To tell you the truth, I hated this popular guy deep down for the quirk he was. But then I chose to be little civilized in the way I treat him.

And also, when favorite band merges the connection, and favorite song makes its way into human relationships, there is more than one reason to give it another shot.

The golden hour memory still very strong in the heart, and occasionally stretching my lips to a big happy curve, often advocated for the person I share the memory with.

I convinced myself saying the guy can break into jigs in the middle of the road, may be a warehouse of weirdness, but he is a goddamn guy to explore within.

And well, I needed more motivation to resume writing.

So why not get yourself a quirk character with a deep contemplative soul to write upon?

So another day, I was out on an evening date with myself, which I did ritually every day. I would come back from classes, grab a book, read a few pages, the chunk of the time spent staring through the window to the sunset outside. Then, when the sun had took away with itself almost all the brightness of the day, and just before the streetlamps would start coming out, I would get dressed and go out to the nearby tea shop.

I had a particular bench where I’d sit alone, looking away from the crowd behind, and dissolving the noise by the songs in the earphones.

I was little addicted to the view I got to see, every evening.

There was a ramshackle tea stall, mostly crowded by oldies; they would play vintage Hindi songs, and only lit halogen lamps.

The magical aura it had mostly come up for show after the moon came out.

The moon, usually on its waning phase, would appear just about the tea stall, crowded by stars.

I would often play Bhindeshi tara in my earphones and gaze at the sky; smile to myself wondering if there is a second soul not missing out this beauty.

Needless to say, the song would always remind me of the quirky guy.

By now, my subconscious, without my permission, had entangled his memory with my favorite song.

So, when I was done with sky gazing, and two cups of tea and more than two smokes, I started walking to explore the town I was new into.

Marketplace is crowded, the other lanes mostly don’t have lamps, shops are noisy; I was just deciding against going for a stroll and taking myself back, when I saw him. This time standing in a cigarette shop, not buying or smoking, but chatting with the shopkeeper; with that bright smile throughout.

This time I went and tapped his shoulder.

He turned, the same smile directed towards me, “Hey!”

“Just going around. Nothing much to do here after sundown, you see”, I said, and God knows why, I was pleasantly surprised that I had bumped into him.

Any day, a quirk is a better company to go around with than going back home and having no one to talk to.

“I am thinking of going Kasahara. You want to come?” He said while taking a phone call.

“Where is it?” I was clueless about the place he was talking about.

“It’s a restaurant. Come, I’ll take you.” He got all worked up.

We started walking, and he started taking, from Nietzsche to Lacan, from Philosophy to music. I was mostly listening, and somewhere far behind my head, Bhindeshi tara kept playing in a loop.

We walked lazily, sometimes taking the long way, through the halogen lit lanes, through the University campus, often bumping into my classmates and seniors.

Surprisingly, he knew all of them.

All these months in Santiniketan, and to this day, when people ask me what is the best thing about the place, I usually have conjured up images of the evening campus in my head; mostly dark, and some places brightly lit by yellow lights. Some places, the lights came through the leaves and created patterns on the road.

The lights made everything look like made of gold; gave a bright sepia tone to the visuals the eyesight met up with.

Coming back to conversations, I started liking the way he talked about the things he is passionate about; and I guess that is a good way to start with, to revert my opinions about him the other way round.

The fourth part of the story is up here!

 To be continued...

Bolpur Blues: Episode 2

Bolpur Blues: Episode 1

I had an evening film screening to go to, that day.

After a hectic seminar, where I slept mostly though, the air-conditioned auditorium with the lights blinded, was just another place to sleep in. I was doubtful I might snore.

Anyway we went and the popular guy went with us too. I thoroughly hated him for making me pay for all the transports we took. And then we reached Lipika, the auditorium where the screening was scheduled to happen. I got seated and looked around; the popular guy was gone.

I mean what the hell? We came together till here and he just vanished?!

I bothered less about him and more about the sleep that followed.

I had a virtual boyfriend then, who I was under the impression to be very much in love with. A PhD scholar settled in Australia, we met through Facebook and never met in real life.

My days usually started little early since Australia was four hours ahead of us.

So the day started with me waking up to good morning texts at around 7. After two hours of vigorous virtual love exchanged, I went back to sleep. I had no intention of going for classes.

Around afternoon, the hunger woke me up.

The most brutal thing about Bolpur is you don’t get meals after 2pm.

Even when you luckily do, they are usually leftovers; like they would give you if you pay or they have the dogs to the rescue.

Post a horrible lunch which I chewed less and gulped down the most, I met a friend while buying cigarettes. With no plans already done for the afternoon, I chose to accompany her to Kala Bhavan, the fine arts department for an adda session.

Since the first time I have went to Kala Bhavan, I happened to have an instant liking for the place.

Not for the vibrancy it is smudged with, not for the legendary alumnus it holds record of, not for the scattered sculptures all over it has to advocate its artistic backdrop, but for the trees.

The whole campus is hugged inside out with trees acting as shade for all; from students, to professors, to dogs and monkeys.

And maybe, it is the only place in Santiniketan where you’d find a professor and a student discussing something totally out of their syllabus’ vicinity, and the professor would offer cigarettes to the student.

Anyway, coming back to where I was initially, I walked the streets to Kala Bhavan to find most of my batch mates already there.

I sat there, having bananas, followed by cigarettes and lazy irrelevant gossips.

Around from behind, after sometime, the popular guy appeared.

He came and sat, and instantly asked for my cigarette.

I muttered horrible under my breath and gave him the one I was smoking, all the while with a disgust disguised in a smile.

And then he asked me, “Hey can you come for a walk?”

I prayed he would understand from my face that I don’t want to, but then he asked me again.

T o say the least, I was little bored in that gossip gang, so I chose the walk.

Also because, the sun was drowning by then and the scattered sculptures reflected the halogen-isque golden hour from all sides;

Who wouldn’t choose a walk in a time and place like that?

We went little far and sat on one of the benches kept.

He took out his phone and told me,”Hey can you please translate a song for me? I love the tune but I want to understand the lyrics.”

He played the song, and sometime from then, I just kept listening to ‘Bhindeshi tara’.

I smiled and said, “Who told you about this song?”

“Last day you were talking about your favorite music band, I overheard. I went home and Googled, this song came up first.” He smiled sheepishly; and everything from the golden hour, the shady trees, the song, the conversation, to the sultry stubborn weather just seemed perfect.

Click here to listen to Bhindeshi tara.

The third part of the story is up here!

To be Continued...