dil-e-khush feham ko hain jinse ummeidein

"meherbaan ho ke bula lo mujhe, chaho jis waqt,

main gaya waqt nahin hoon ke phir aa bhi na sakoon."

Turning kind towards me call me back anytime you want;

I'm not like the time bygone that cannot be recalled.

Ghalib, Translated by Dr.Sarfaraz K. Niazi

Hope-it fluttered for a moment or so

A drop of tear upon it fell

solidifying it into amber.

There to stay,

till it mustered enough courage

to hope again.

Belief-it died a hundred deaths

Retaining a shred each time

it was knocked flat by cruel fate.

Till the last ember burned

itself away-a thin wisp of smoke

lingered for oh so short a while

(that I doubted its very foundations)....

One Art
by Elizabeth Bishop

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

--Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

Bits and pieces

The inevitability of events.

The mutability of priorities.

The forecasted consequences.

When you set to salvage

matters non existing,

matters you yourself had dispensed with.

No hope, no fear.

A hope? ah deferred now.

Drowning thy pronounced absence

or ubiquitous presence-

in the dim mechanicality

of everyday actions.

And failing. Betraying.

Was life any easier?

Solutions any cheaper?

No. And yet...

An added ardour

lent by thee,

thy mere existence.

Life goes on neverthelessly

with or without anodyne

long, unending, drifting....

____________________________

Wordsworth: "emotions recollected in tranquility"

In real: fake mimesis and exaggeration

In defence: no expectation(genuinely)

An afterthought: extending my allegiance to Wordsworth

when I sat to brood.

Your pronounced absence seeps into every task at hand sucking out the chirpiness out of it and instead leaves behind a thud of resentment and irritation.

Whereforth did it gain such strength to impose itself even on those things from which she never imagined she could be distracted?

Answer: from within her own self.

How can one yearn for space and the very next moment not only demand possessiveness but raise tempests upon its denial?

Chaos and confusion within and around.The environment/surroundings without faltering or betraying even once truthfully reflect our mood.

Add to all this the intrusion of Ms.Deshpande's Binding Vine.I should congratulate myself on the opportune moment I chose to read it.The timing couldn't have been more apt...

...If I was in a lesser state of agitation, she made sure to let resurface all those matters which I cautiously keep shut down.If anything I was forced into brooding and not on any simple thing, but the psyche and that too the utterly complex female psyche.

Why don't you spare me all these???

Ya, ya I know ....idle musings.

Third person limited narrative mode

Chapter 1

"Who all are there in your family?"

I answer absent-mindedly, channeling back my thoughts to the present uphill task at hand i.e. filling her slam book, which she has imposed on me.

"Who do you love the most?", comes the next question.

Dividing a split second into four parts, I weigh each one of them, and then come to rest at ma.I just stop short of delivering my verdict and then with a false conviction I answer, "I love everybody." I don't remember whether I stressed on 'love' or 'everybody'.

She wasn't satisfied; I knew and I didn't allow her to pursue that.So I asked her, who all were there in hers.She counted each one of them for me and then said, "soon, mama'll be there too.This time when I'll go to see her, I'll request her to come back with me." After that she again burst into a tirade of accounting each of her family member's traits, quirks, pitching in-her nine yr old's- opinion here and then.All these time I hadn't lifted my head or eyes, though concentration had long since parted my company.

I attended to the 'Favorites' column, with a shrugged indifference, to all those questions regarding favorite actor, food, movies, music etc.It was getting late and I was tired so I told her that I'll do the rest the next day.And with constant reminders and dire threats of what lay in store for her if she wouldn't complete her lesson by the next day, I took my leave of her.I know she won't learn and she's well aware that I know.

She uses words like 'request' and she didn't say it sadly or in reflection.nah.She told it as a matter of fact, so sure of herself."All that remains now is for her to make her request and bring her back." sigh.She has played this conversation many times in her head...

Chapter 2

And now for the upteenth time she was discussing it with her friend.She was bosom friends with Hope, right from kindergarten.They started by sharing that table for two on their first day, then tiffins, crayons and then it blossomed from exchanging gossips to sharing minutest details.Two minds and two hearts, at four corners of square, diagonals drawn, each vertex connected to every other.Between them they had hatched this plot, some two weeks ago.Hope helped her, encouraged her friend.Together they had changed many a word, polishing them, finding loopholes and correcting them, manipulating their gestures, adding a facial hue here, changing an intonation there, perfecting every move of their 'request'.And now as she was hearing her out today, Hope wondered if she'd let her friend into the latest news delivered to her this morning.But she stopped.She knew there would be a scene if she came to know.And anyways her friend had too many things on her mind now.Hope stayed mum.

Lying in bed that night, Hope was sad.She knew she won't be there next term.She was changing schools.She just couldn't get herself to say it that morning.She had all her appeasements prepared like they'll still be in the same city,their long hours of talking over phone won't change, their vows of remaining 'best friends for life' won't change.They were and will always be that.No, nothing will change.She'll always be there for her....But she couldn't muster up the courage and say all these.

There was this new girl Verity.Hope wondered if she'll take over her place.She felt jealous.But they'd both liked Verity at the first instant, even though she was a helluva lot different from them.Maybe she can introduce Verity to their group.Now that she was leaving school.She was worried 'bout her friend.She made a point of talking to Verity tomorrow and then she'll ask her to take care of her friend.

to be contd...

Witching Hours...

Of nights

moving ever so slowly

with the temerity - unyielding,

relentless - of a persecutor.

clemency overruled;

futility stamped hard;

yet vain expectation, never fails

making a virtue of necessity

endurance at the end of tethers.

Patience yielding,

paving way.

solicitude steps in...

spare me the agony

never,never shall I stray again.

P.S. - courtesy Roget's Thesaurus

letting it go...

What were you worth?

Ah! nothing.

Just a few wet pillows,and wiles

some inconscious, other indulgent smiles.

All those fleeting hours, and late(s)

and some more of excruciating waits.

A festive season's - lone winter interlude'

and some years of endless solitude.

Some have to/wouldbetelling yous

and day's idle thoughts, facial hues.

'My' stray words without a rhyme

a passing wind's unforgettable chime.

Done.

Then she opened her fist.It wasn't tightly clutched but ever so lightly, just covered...she was wary of wrinkling the thing.She looked at it and smiled; wouldn't let wind do it(unh huh!).She took it among her fingers and blew the feather away.

"Is it easy to give away dreams?"

"Yes" said Comfort.

"Yes" said Deligence.

"Yes" said Action.

"Yes" said Convention.

A small almost inaudible "no".

Who did he listen to?

I know not.

He just hoped, hoped against all odds.

Hope being the only thing allowed to him.