Unfathomable Love

(Read the prequel here: Inscrutable Love)

“I’m on my way to pick you up. See you soon! :)”

Received at 19:01

I read the text message feeling both excited and dreadful. The last month or two had passed in absolute darkness between us. We had not met, as he was touring, and I did not even try as much as to call him during this time. It is said that absence makes the heart grow fonder; it was the exact opposite in our case. While I wanted to become sure about my feelings towards him during this hiatus, I was hoping that our bond will grow stronger by the end of it. I was hopeful that the distance and silence would strengthen the threads of love that were slowly binding me with him. Such was not the case.

His words were the sole reason I felt attracted towards him. Once those stopped to flow, I had nothing else to hold on to him. Every day of silence, was making me drift further away from him, and after a few days I was already too far away to even reminisce about him unconsciously. The vacuum that the absence of his words had created in my heart was soon filled by the charcoal smothered fingers of an artist. I first met the sketch artist at an exhibition, and soon again at my friend’s party, and then at the City Square, and so on. But I did not want the night to be about me or my new interests in life.

He had picked the perfect place to meet after such a long time. We were to have dinner at my favourite restaurant. The night was to be about him, about his tour, his experiences in the foreign land, about the people he had met. I did not want him to feel that things had changed. For all I knew, the sketch artist might just be another traveler you meet in this journey of life, who does not contribute anything meaningful or lasting to our journey.

I chose a blue coloured dress and white stilettoes; I left my hair open; and wore minimal make-up. I was ready in less than fifteen minutes and decided to walk down and wait at the lobby. I was playing the evening in my head the way I wanted it to go. We would walk in the restaurant, holding hands, chuckling at his witty humour and looking deep into his starry eyes. He would narrate all his stories and I would simply float in his soothing river of words. I saw the white lights of his sedan as he pulled up in the driveway. I started walking towards the car when he got off to open the door for me. He was looking ravishing in a black jacket over a pair of blue denims and a white shirt. He had a perfectly trimmed beard and was wearing very woody cologne. I could not resist the urge to kiss him this time, and I gave him a small peck on the cheek.

As we sat down on our tables, the corner one which overlooked the city, I realised how comfortable he made me feel. I was not pretending to be someone I was not in front of him, because I was always lost in his words, too disoriented to even think about how to impress him. As we placed our orders, he presented me a small, gift-wrapped, box. It was one of the most beautiful looking diamond pendants I had ever seen. I was too excited to accept it gracefully. I hurriedly put it back in the same box and handed it to him. I looked in his eyes and saw the love it contained for me. I felt ashamed and embarrassed to have tried to replace his love with someone else’s attention and affection. The honesty in his eyes, which confessed his love so effortlessly, left me feeling belittled.

I decided to tell him everything about the new guy I had met and make him understand how stupid and little I was feeling now. He was visibly hurt at my acceptance of trying to replace him in my life. He went absolutely quiet and I kept giving explanations. After a point of time, he wasn’t even listening to me; he was lost somewhere, comparing the evening to what he had expected it to be. I do not know if he was able to understand how much I loved him. I could not spell out the words clearly; I was too ashamed to express myself after being with someone else for a month. We ate the last of our food in silence; his eyes showing hurt and mine showing embarrassment. 


(Read the sequel here: Abstruse Love)

Peshawar

इस मैदान में खेला करते थे,

हम सब गेंद और बल्ले से । 

आज यहाँ पर खेला गया,

जाने कितनों के बचपन से ॥ 

सुनाई पड़ती थी यहाँ दिन भर,

वह पाठ याद करने की कोशिशें । 

आज यहाँ एक अजीब सन्नाटा है,

इन दीवारों ने सोख ली सब चीखें ॥ 

रँग-भरे हाथों से,

हम बनाते थे यहाँ तस्वीरें । 

हमारे लहू के रँग से,

इन्होने लिखी आज की ताज़ा खबरें ॥ 

जिन्हे अच्छे-बुरे की पहचान तक नहीं,

उन्हें अपने बंदूकों का निशाना बनाया । 

कितना गर्व महसूस हुआ होगा,

जब बच्चों की लाशों पर आतंक का ध्वज लहराया ॥ 

क्या कहोगे अपने खुदा को जाकर,

"तेरे लिए बेगुनाहों को मारा है"?

किस जन्नत की ख्वाब लिए फिर रहे हो?

तुम्हारे लिए उसने जहन्नुम तक नहीं बनाया है ॥ 

~ सौरव गोयल 

Abduction

23 November, 2014

5:47 p.m.

Five days have passed but I do not think I am still okay. I still shiver when I recall the four nozzles that were jutted on the four sides of my torso. I haven’t yet come out of the trauma completely. The fear that is always haunting you when you’re aware that one wrong word, or a single wrong move, can cost you your life. I still need some time!

25 November, 2014

11:53 p.m.

I visited a psychiatrist today. I wanted professional help to come out of the shock. I have been advised by the doctor to recall every single detail of that evening and write it down, as it happened and how it made me feel, to deal with my mental stress.

“It was around 4:15 p.m. in the evening when I decided to visit the construction site of our new hotel. The date was 19 November, 2014, Wednesday and I was supposed to collect some papers from the labour contractor. I parked my car outside the boundary wall and got down from the car. I had almost reached the gates when suddenly two people from behind the wall in front of me, and two people from the rear surrounded me and touched the mouth of their four guns on all my four sides. I was shocked and I felt my heart-beat rising instantly. My mouth dried up and as I thought about raising an alarm, the man in front of me guided his finger to his lips signaling me to keep quiet. He had a look in his eyes which gave out a clear message that he will not hesitate before silencing me for life. I gulped back the scream still in my throat and raised both my arms, offering my surrender. 

The four people grabbed my shirt and dragged me around the corner of the street. Some five-six of their gang-members were waiting there making sure the whole act of hijacking me was not visible to anyone else. They joined us and formed a second layer of bodies around me. I could hardly see the turning and twisting lanes in front of me. Left, left, right, straight under a tin-shed and through some holes in a few broken walls and then as I tried to peep in front of me from above their heads, the man on my left punched me on the face. I do not remember what turns we took after that. The sudden blow had dazed me. I had never been hit that hard before, that too on the side of my head. My head was still ringing when they pushed me down on a rocky wooden chair and stood there staring at me. 

That was the time I realised how scared all of them were. They all looked younger than me; no more than eighteen, any one of them. One kid, who was unarmed, could not have been more than fifteen or sixteen years old. They were confused and constantly arguing amongst themselves whether to gag me or leave me as I was. Looking at my scared and timid demeanour, they decided to let me be and called someone through their cellphone. The man who made the phone call was wearing a red-sleeveless jacket with a hood over a white full sleeve shirt and pair of navy-blue denim. I was taking mental notes of their appearances and tried to look at their faces but the winter evenings had caused the sun to set too early; their facial features were hardly visible in the dark corridor where I was being held captive. The man ended the phone call after receiving further instructions, probably from his boss, and came running towards me and asked me to empty my pockets. I took out my iPhone, my wallet, my handkerchief and a packet of cigarettes which someone snatched away from my hand immediately. I knew I needed to be calm and cooperate with them in everything they asked me to do. The man who had made the phone call snatched my wallet and started emptying it. He took my phone and kept it in his back-pocket. One man who was standing behind me grabbed my shoulder and pushed me down on the chair again; and asked me for my wrist watch. I complied politely and immediately. 

The man with the red hooded jacket made another phone call and received further instructions about how to proceed. It was a long conversation and no matter how hard I tried to listen to it, nothing was comprehensible; he was standing too far and talking in a strange dialect. After he disconnected the call, he approached me again and took out my phone from his back-pocket and asked for my father’s mobile number. I spoke out the numbers with shivering and stammering voice. Every breath of air which was coming out of my mouth was an effort and my throat felt dry and itchy. The call connected and he handed over the phone to me. “Hello, papa!” I said as he snatched back the phone and turned around to talk to my father. 

“Your son is with us,” he said, “we mean no harm to come to him or your family. We only want a percent of profit that you are minting from working in our country.”

There was a long silence; at least it felt really long to me. I cannot be sure whether it was a pause of four seconds or four minutes. My mind was rushing back to the ICU ward of the hospital in which my father was admitted not more than a year back. He had suffered a mild heart-attack and was under special care for almost a week. This news could be fatal for his health. I was scared out of my wits. I just wanted to hear his voice. I wanted to tell him that I was not scared. I wanted to tell him not to be scared. Just to comply with all their demands and bring me back to the safety of his house. 

“We want a sum of 1 million before midnight and in return we guarantee the safety and wellbeing of your son. He will be delivered once we receive the cash. Call back on his number when the sum is ready.”

Again silence followed as my father was talking to him. I knew it was impossible to arrange that amount of sum in such little time; that too after the working hours had ended. The banks would already be closed for the day and we never kept any cash money above the sum of a few thousands at home. The hooded man disconnected the phone and kept it in his pocket again. He made another phone call, this time through his own cellphone and was describing what events had taken place to his boss. I looked around myself and saw how absorbed everyone was listening to the phone call.

That is when I realised, looking at them, that they were all high. All those kids around me had used drugs. Their eyes were bloodshot red, wide open and their lips were patched and dry. They were high on ‘Yaba’, the local drug which was ruining the country, the youth. Yaba, which is a mixture of meth and caffeine, makes you fearless and energetic for as long as the high lasts, which can be anything between four hours to twenty-four hours depending upon the dosage. This is when I really started to panic; I knew that their mind would not be functioning normally right now. A single wrong move from my side, or anything which ticked them off could be fatal for me. They wouldn’t even think twice before emptying the magazines of their semi-automatic pistols on me. They were young kids, so addicted to the drug that they had gone down to the limit of kidnapping someone to get money to buy some more of that life-threatening drug. 

My phone rang and the hooded man put the phone on loudspeaker for me to hear the conversation.

“Hello… Hello… Are you there?” my father shouted from the other side of the phone. His voice was full of panic and fear. 

“Is the money ready?” answered my kidnapper. “Do you want to look at your son again?”

“All the banks are already closed but I know the manager well. He has promised to help me. I have a cash-credit limit and he can arrange for some money in half an hour. But one million is not possible right now. Try and understand! It is not easy to arrange for such a large sum in such a short time. You have to consider my difficulty. Please take half a million now and release my son. I will pay you more later.” I could hear the trembling voice of my father and almost see the tears rolling down his cheeks. 

“We have to buy four guns. To buy four guns, we need one million. If you pay half a million, we will be able to buy only two.” the hooded man shouted back. He was visibly tensed. Even he knew that one million could not be arranged so fast, but he knew he could not say this to his boss. He shuffled around the dark lane, thinking and measuring his options, and finally said yes to my father’s counter offer of half a million. “OK. Pay me half now. Come near the construction site and call me.”

He disconnected the call and kept the phone back in his pocket. He was furious at himself for accepting the offer with such ease. He came rushing towards me and slammed his hands hard against my chest. It was so sudden and so strong a blow that my chair toppled and I stumbled on the floor, face-first. No one laughed, and neither did anyone try to pick me up when I did not stand up on my own. I thought it was better to keep lying on the floor than to stand up and face the brunt of his drug infused anger. My mind was almost numb after the sudden attack; so was everyone else’s around me. Only the hooded man seemed to be in control of his thoughts and actions. The rest were walking zombies who had no idea what they were doing. They were numb and expressionless. I guess this angered the hooded man all the more because he could not even ask for advice from any of them. After holding my direct stare for a few seconds he went around the corner into the darkness of the alley. 

I stood back up after a few minutes and picked the chair to sit on it. There was restlessness in the air. They had not anticipated that it will take so long. They were getting impatient and most of them were walking around in circles trying to curb their anxiety. The hooded man came back shouting orders and grabbed the collar of my shirt and asked me to follow him out. After sitting there for so long, my knees were jammed. I stumbled when I was picked up all of a sudden and the hooded man kicked me at the back of the knee asking me to walk faster. They half-dragged, half-kicked me out of the maze of alleys and I was standing right outside the premises of our construction site. My father’s car was parked right behind my car. He got down from the backseat of the car with a bag. The driver also got down from the side of the driving wheel with a bag in his hand. Both of them approached us cautiously, my father never taking his eyes off me; scanning my body for any injury marks. The hooded man took one step ahead, grabbed the bag from my father and flung it to one of the boys. He took the other bag from the driver and walked past me, sneering at me with discontent. “Go!” he said, and disappeared in the alley we had all come from. 

I ran across to my father and hugged him tight. He kissed me on the forehead, on the cheek, on the chin and asked the driver to take me to the car. He then took out his cell phone and made a phone call. Within the next ten seconds, the place was abuzz with sirens and tyre-screeches. Some twenty-odd police vehicles surrounded the place and there were dozens of policemen sprinting inside the alleys. Two police officers approached my father and whispered something in his ears. He smiled a sad smile and looked over his shoulder to meet my gaze. 

Bang! Bang! Bang! I heard three shots which were followed by a long silence. A policeman came running from the alley with the two bags at his sides. My father took one bag and kept it inside the car and he gave the other bag to the police officers who were still standing beside him. All three men shook their hands and we bid goodbye.”

Big City Life

The child’s face was radiating with happiness. His cheerful eyes were wide open- scanning the world around him, trying to capture every minute detail, soaking in every colour and shape he was surrounded with. It was a rare opportunity for kids like him; kids from the small towns and villages, to come to a metropolitan city in such a young age. He knew that this voyage was not his alone, but of all those kids he had left behind in the village, who would be waiting eagerly with palms joined and ears erect to listen to all the stories and experiences he would bring back with him. They would feast upon his memories and share it with hundreds of people. He would no longer be addressed as “Hey, kid” in his hometown; everyone would know his name, from the village headman to the old temple priest; from the school headmaster to the old man who just sat in his courtyard smoking his tobacco pipe, looking at his mango trees. 

He had started this journey with his maternal uncle two days back as a kid, knowing well that he would return as a man, catching a bus which took him to the nearest railway station seventy-six kilometers away from his village; where they boarded the train and had to accommodate themselves on the floor for another thirty-seven hours. They did not have reserved tickets; neither did they need it to get to their destination. Only a bribe of fifty rupees per person was enough to see them through. He was to start working at the street-side restaurant as a serving-boy where his uncle worked as a cook. All the world’s riches could not have given him the happiness that this employment news had brought. 

His uncle grabbed his hand and started dragging him from the overcrowded platform towards the exit, to the bus stop. There was confusion and chaos all around him and he could not understand where so many people were going, all at the same time. Village life was different from this; people did their work in their own sweet time, leisurely. The city looked like a time bomb was about to go off and everyone was in a hurry to leave the vicinity. Incoming trains kept bringing hordes and hordes of men, women and cargo. When he was leaving his village, all his friends had come to see him off to the bus stop. Here, no one seemed to be interested in him or his uncle. Nobody gave them a second look. The welcome he received was far colder than the one he had anticipated. 

His uncle tucked at his shirt and asked him to stay close and board the bus. The kid took the last-row window-seat and as the bus rolled out of the railway complex, he was astounded to see the first glimpse of the big city-life. The wide, concrete roads; the beautiful, green dividers; the tall, reflective buildings; the shiny, bright cars; the descriptive, colourful hoardings; the pungent, dirty city air. It was all too overwhelming. He just looked at his uncle beside him and smiled a big, toothy smile. The bus wheezed past other vehicles, stopping only for a few seconds at every station and traffic signals. But then the bus screeched to a sudden halt. He could hear a commotion from ahead. Something was blocking the road and its traffic. He saw as the conductor jump out and walk ahead. 

There was a familiar smell in the air, the smell of evening meals and morning prayers. There was stillness all around, stiffness, a calmness which precedes a storm. And then there was thunder. While everyone was busy scouting the roads ahead, trying to clear the traffic. A mob carrying torches and axes, swords and lead pipes approached from behind. They were shouting something together, calling out someone’s name, asking for justice, accusing someone else. It was all so sudden. He could hardly understand what was happening. He saw a few men rush past his window, clearly ignoring the bus and its passengers. Everyone had crowded the left side of the bus, taking a peek from the window, trying to figure out what was happening. And then out of the blue, someone started washing the right side of the bus from outside. A group of people started throwing drums of water on the bus’s exterior. 

And then it was frenzy, the occupants of the bus started kicking and punching their way to the single-door opening. The rickety bus had no emergency exit and the windows were barred. His uncle asked him to grab his backpack and run out of the bus. He couldn’t understand the reason behind the sudden urgency. Then he saw a big man, clad in white from head to toe, throw a burning piece of wood on the bus and the bus enveloped in flames. “The people were not throwing water, uncle, it was kerosene!” he shouted at the top of his voice, the fear in his eyes no more than in his uncle’s. His skinny arms and tiny legs could hardly break the crowd. He could feel the heat on his back, getting hotter with every breath. Instantly, the bus became a furnace and black, thick smoke covered everything inside. Nothing was visible but the smoke. Nothing was audible but the sound of his own cough and the raging heartbeat. He started sobbing, crying, screaming, calling out for his mother, for his uncle and started throwing his arms all around to grab someone. And then the smoke started consuming his lungs, entering with every gasp, but not coming out. He fell unconscious on the floor of the burning bus!

Inscrutable Love

(Read the prequel here: Candid Love)

I kept checking my watch every five minutes, believing somehow that the regular glances at the dial would, somehow, make the hands move faster and inch closer to Eight P.M.; when I was supposed to meet him at the street-corner delicatessen on the Capitoline Hill. I could hardly wait to see that handsome face again, look deep into those intense eyes, watch the fine lines which made his jaw move as he showered me with his magnificent stories and which always touched the right chord inside me; look at his ink-stained fingers drum the table restlessly; his hands dancing dramatically to the tunes of his own voice. Anyone would confuse him for an Italian, if they could just see him talk, not hear him. His hand movements, his broad shoulders, his ruffed-up hair, his immaculate dressing sense and his love-filled laughter; his eyes closed, his head falling back and his whole face lit up with the joy which made him laugh. There were no pretentions or checking of emotions. It was a laugh that only a man who has nothing to hide can laugh.

I took out my beige coloured, ankle-length frock and brown strapped sandals. I wanted to dress casually but elegantly. I chose a pair of pearl earrings and a white leather purse to go with it. I walked out to the balcony and instantly felt the hair on the back of my neck rising as the cold winds hit my naked arms and legs. It was a beautiful evening, winter was setting in, and the night was cloudless with the moon shining bright and the anticipation of love lingering in the air. I went back in, shivering, and decided to drape a stole as well. 

It was still seven-thirty and I looked in the mirror, blushing like a bride-to-be. I felt like a teenager, excited by the prospect of meeting her crush. I applied a sweet, fruity perfume at the base of my neck and wrists. I let my hair loose, keeping it to one side of my shoulder and decided to catch a cab to the deli. 

As I got down from the cab, I could feel the night air getting colder as I wrapped the stole a little tighter around my body, trying to shield myself from the penetrating gusts of wind. My eyes met his as he got up from the table to welcome me. He was dressed in a casual white shirt and blue denim. He was wearing a pair of dark red loafers and big black spectacles which made his face look even more intriguing. He greeted me with a bunch of flowers, saying “You look wonderful, tonight!” I resisted the urge to kiss him on the lips, then and there. I knew I had to progress cautiously if there was to be any future of our relationship. I needed to be sure if he felt the way I feel for him. I kept looking into his hazelnut eyes; at his black fuzzy beard; at his perfectly aligned teeth; and I had to bring myself back to the reality every time I sensed losing myself in him. 

Maybe I should have told him how I feel. Maybe I should have dropped a few hints. Maybe I should have brought up the topic of love and eternity. Maybe I should have said yes to his offer of dropping me home. I should have done at-least something before the night ended.


(Read the continuation here: Unfathomable Love)

Candid Love

(Read the prequel here: Enigmatic Love)

I lay staring at the table watch waiting for a minute to pass and the alarm to go off. It started to beep as soon as the red lines conjoined to show 4 AM. I utterly disliked red-eye flights and completely hated the early morning ones. But as fate would have it, I was stuck with one. I got up from my bed, absolutely sleep deprived and cranky. I have never quite understood how people do their business so early in the morning; I do not think the food even gets digested in such short period of time. Just a quick shower and I were already on my way to the airport, nibbling on a warm croissant and sipping a cup of very dark coffee. 

Flying executive class has its own privileges, needless to say. By the time I landed at my destination, my bowels were empty and my stomach wasn’t. I collected my luggage and rushed back home. I caught a couple of hours’ sleep, unpacked my bags, gift wrapped the pendant I had bought for her and went in for my bath. I picked out my best dinner jacket from the wardrobe, put on that musky cologne I knew she found irresistible and picked up my iPod so Eric Clapton could accompany us till the restaurant. I wanted this evening to be perfect, just like that evening at the street-corner delicatessen had been. And we had come a long way since then; we had become closer friends; we had found a confidante in each other; we had even started referring to our gluttony-evenings as dates. 

She had brought with her the stability I was looking for in my life. She made my life sensible, complete, fun, easy, and all of it unknowingly. I meant to tell her what she meant to me, tonight. I had made reservations at her favourite restaurant, asked specifically for her most preferred table which overlooked the city. I was wearing her favourite perfume, had put on my best clothes, had trimmed my ‘savage’ beard, and was picking her up from her condominium. I had put all the music tracks she adored on my iPod, starting from Eric Clapton’s romantic numbers right till Marilyn Manson’s suicidal rock. I meant to sway her from her feet this time, and in style.

The clock struck seven o’clock and I was tying my shoe laces, bang on time. I do not remember being so excited in the near history. I had beads of sweat forming on my forehead in spite of the air conditioner keeping the room’s temperature at a comfortable twenty two degrees centigrade. I picked up all the items I had arranged on the bed, took my car keys from the bowl by the door and dropped a text informing her that I was on my way to pick her up. She was already sitting in the waiting area of her lobby as I pulled my car up her driveway. She was looking captivating in a blue dress with her hair let loose; the bright lip colour which always made her dark black eyes seem all the more darker and deeper; her heels which she carried with such poise and elegance; and her long, slender fingers grasping on the little purse with utmost care and casualness at the same time. 

I opened the door for her as she touched my arm lightly and kissed me on the cheek. My ears were burning with anxiety and desires. “You look wonderful, tonight”, hummed Eric as we drove to the restaurant, she- lost in his voice, and I- in her presence. The table was ready when we reached and I gave her the present as soon as we settled down. She seemed very excited as she was un-wrapping the gift with one hand while clutching upon my hand with the other. She was dumb-struck for a moment when she saw the diamond pendant and figured out why I was gifting her such an expensive present. She immediately kept it back in its box and looked at me straight in the eye. I knew something had changed. Something had changed since I had gone for the month-long tour. Something had changed in her life during this time when I was inaccessible. 

I smiled a reassuring smile, although I was not sure who needed the reassurance at that moment. She took her glass of wine and downed it in one go. It was courage, she needed, not my reassurances. Courage to tell me that she had found someone for whom she felt the way I feel for her. I did not let the smile on my face vanish for a moment. I was still psyched to be with her. I held her hand and congratulated her. I told her how happy I was for her and that I wanted to meet the guy at the earliest. She smiled, as we finished the rest of our meal talking about that fortunate guy.



(Read the continuation here: Inscrutable Love)

The Kid

The moonless night-sky spread like a blanket of darkness. Not even a few stars in sight to break the monotony of the blackness all around. It was just one of the many gloomy nights in the life of the kid who was squatting on the balcony floor of the one-storeyed orphanage in the suburbs of a metropolitan city. The kid, who had a name, but who did not care for it; neither did the love-deprived society he was a part of. A suburb to a metropolitan meant having a neighborhood of some five million people; and still the kid was truly alone. This night was pretty much like any other night for him, just a little darker; just a little more suffocative; just a little more depressing. 

The kid sat listening to the growls of an empty stomach, of his empty stomach. Staring at the vast stretch of nothingness, trying to make out what the aroma lingering in the air was of. It smelt of destruction and chaos. It smelt of helplessness and despair. It smelt of fear and horror. It smelt of the night his village was on fire. It smelt of the night his home had become a furnace. It smelt of the night he had almost lost his life. It smelt of the night he became an orphan.

The kid was gripped in fear; a chill ran down his spine every time he tried to close his eyes. He had goose-bumps all over his arms and legs. And then he saw a sudden flash of light in the distant sky and a few moments later heard an explosion from the same spot. The terrified kid ran for his life. The kid ran to the only place he felt safe, to the only place which was now his home. He ran inside the building, to his room in the ground floor and covered himself with one half of a blanket torn into two and started to weep. His wailings increased as he heard a few more explosions outside. All the memories of that damned night flooded back to him. The kid could see his baba running in the front yard trying to extinguish the fire feasting upon his arched back and lanky legs. All the images he had tried to erase came back to haunt him. The night, that had started with festivities and had ended with mourning. Just a year had passed since that horrific night, but the pain of solitude felt as old as the universe.

The kid’s inconsolable cry finally died down when he heard a clamour of cars and saw a few people walk inside the orphanage with big packets and even bigger cartons. The kid peeked from his room to see kaki maa welcoming the guests inside. One of the guests caught a glimpse of the terrified kid and signaled him to come outside. The kid took calculated steps towards him as he buried his hands deep inside one of the packets and took out a bundle of clothes. The well-dressed man took a packet from his companion and took out toys from it. He handed over the clothes and the toys to the kid and said something the kid could not fully understand. The man repeated “Happy Deepawali, beta!”

Venizia

Venice is not a city, because a city stands on stones and bricks. Venice is a dream; a Sunday morning dream which you watch half awake, groggily praying for sleep to come back to your arms and carry you to that beautiful world of impossibilities. 

Venice- with its innumerous bridges arching over the turning and twisting canals seems more like a fantasy than a reality. Its beauty is surpassed only by that feeling of intense joy you get when you are sitting in your apartment room, with the windows wide open, and the cool wind blowing the curtains and bringing along the aroma of the sea water. The smell of the sea which you always long for in your city office; which always reminds you of the beach trips you took as a kid. When you are sitting by that window sill, smoking your cigarette absent-mindedly, watching the smoke swirl and rise in the humid air; while a gondolier is maneuvering his way through the narrow lanes, singing a song of love and hope. A couple sitting with their arms intertwined, lost in the melody of the song and in each other’s company. The song which you cannot comprehend, but you know, is being sung for the love of one’s life. It speaks of the undying love, of the sparks of the first kiss, of the promises of staying together till eternity. 

Travelers can capture the physical beauty of Venice in their photographs, but its magic stays only in your heart. You can visit all the monuments in and around Venice, pray in all of its churches and cathedrals, and sip a steaming cup of cappuccino at every café, but you still might not feel that you have seen all that Venice has to offer. Oh Venice, by coming to you, I have truly become yours. 

"A realist, in Venice, would become a romantic by mere faithfulness to what he saw before him." ~Arthur Symons

Enigmatic love

My feet hurt as I continued walking briskly up the dark, steep alley. The choice of footwear had gone extremely wrong considering that the footpath was laid with cobblestones. I should have been wearing a pair of running shoes, and instead I chose the leather loafers which hardly gave any padding to the sole of my feet. The sudden gusts of cold wind filled me with joy as I shivered in my own embrace. I was checking my watch every thirty seconds; I did not want to be late. I stopped for a moment to regain my breath as I reached the top of the alley. I could see the turn of the corner where I was to meet her; a local delicatessen with chairs set up under the night sky. I checked my watch, Seven Forty-Six; I had enough time to buy flowers for her from that little window-shop off the next intersection. I was cursing myself for not falling in love earlier, because being in love felt absolutely delightful. I could hardly name five flowers if someone asked me to, but still I knew exactly which ones she adored. 

These were the things which made her who she was for me. I did not know the name of her parents, or how many siblings she had. I did not know her friends. I was not even sure what her subject of graduation had been. But I knew who she was as a person. I knew about her ideals, her thoughts, her favourite morning tune, her most preferred brand of coffee, her political views, her love for bright colours, her obsession with that particular whiff of cologne; I knew her the way only someone very close to her would, and to think that we had met only twice and spent less than half-a-year exchanging letters.

I tucked my shirt reassuringly and laid the flowers on the table in front of me. I checked my watch again; still three minutes to our scheduled meeting time. I settled down, keeping my eyes glued at the road where she would have to walk down from. I was neither nervous, nor relaxed. I was happily anxious to be meeting her again. And then I saw her getting down from the car. Her feet so delicately wrapped with leather straps which formed her sandals. Her dress just ending near her ankles and clinching on to her legs because of the persistent wind. Her arms wrapped around by a thin stole and her hair lying so carelessly to one side of her shoulder. She gave me one of the most enchanting smiles as I handed her the flowers and we hugged warmly. We spent the next few hours talking about no specific subject in particular, sipping iced cappuccinos, watching the evening pass away casually; and all the while, I kept trying to convince myself to tell her how I felt for her. Maybe, she was waiting for me to say it as well. Maybe, I will muster up the courage the next time we meet. Or maybe, it should simply go on the way it is going, because it is beautiful!


(Read the continuation here: Candid Love)

Where is the Poriborton?

A lot of things are wrong in this state we live in, but none worse than the governance we have had over the last couple of decades. I heard this from a government employee, whom I must not name for the sake of his life, “CPI(M) government made West Bengal a graveyard, and now the chairperson of the new ruling party is doing taandav on top of our buried bodies”. This made no sense to me back then, but the latest Jadavpur University case made me recall this incident and I laughed a very sad laugh. The poriborton-promising party is going on making the same mistakes their predecessors had committed. What is most appalling is the complete nonchalant attitude with which the case is being handled. 

Let us say, that the police officers who reached the university campus, were heckled, abused and flipped-off by a few students when they were attempting to escort the Vice-Chancellor out of his office building. Let us also say, that the students were being extremely uncooperative and were causing hindrance to the job which the police had come to perform. Now, the question which needs to be answered by the authorities is, was this enough provocation for the police officers to manhandle the peacefully-protesting, unarmed students (note, both male and female) and drag them out of the campus like they were some criminals, punching and kicking them throughout? Isn’t the police force trained to handle a bit of provocation which they might have received inside the campus? If your answer is no, why have I never seen the police force wielding their batons at the political rallies which turn violent? Why were some politically affiliated people (read: goons) accompanying the police officers inside a university campus? Is the police force being governed by the ruling party or are they still truly a public serving unbiased constitutional body?

Another thing which I find extremely essential to point out is that the students were protesting for a thorough investigation on an incident of molestation with one of the university’s students inside the campus. The fact that the students had to protest for this speaks about the university authority in itself. Such politically-inclined people are not fit to be appointed at any post in an educational institution where they can use the power to try and save the guilty of their crimes because of their political affiliations. 

Instead of making sure that the matter is probed unbiasedly, the state government is busy in mocking the protests being undertaken by students from all across the state. The state government is also taking out rallies of its own, comprising of so called intellectuals and scholars, to counter the student rally which took place over the weekend. Firstly, Miss Banerjee, what are you trying to prove by doing this; that by having a few educated people on your pay-roll makes all your actions justified and all your wrongdoings right? Secondly, you need to understand what the student rally was about. It was without any political colour and with an important agenda of non-politicisation of educational institutions; what did you find worth countering in it?

I hope that other political parties do not just see this as an opportunity to grab some limelight but actually raise this issue so that it is solved and investigated properly and see that the guilty are punished accordingly.

That Dreadful Day..

There are a few things in life which seem absolutely useless. No matter how much you try to involve them in your daily life, they are simply of no use. For example Rahul Gandhi, the presence of nipples on the body of a man, the warning signs on the packaging of cigarettes, law and order in Uttar Pradesh, the F7 key on your keyboard, garbage-bins on Indian pavements, a diet chart, self-help books, Uday Chopra and geckos. One can still argue that Rahul Gandhi was made to join politics so that one day he could ensure a strong government comes into power, his opposition! But how can you justify the presence of geckos in your house? They do not perform any activity which could not have been possible without their existence. 

An average house gecko lives for about 20 years, which it spends doing nothing but eating mosquitoes, other small insects and its own skin- which it sheds every 4 weeks. Between the sumptuous meals- it copulates, excretes in every corner of your room and makes noises weirder than the ones you hear at a Bengali wedding. Clearly, none of the above is something so distinct and important that this world has to witness its constant presence right from the Jurassic era. The mosquitoes can be taken care of by using mosquito repellents in our homes. For small insects, we can use various domestic insecticides. We can also definitely do without having to clean its poop every day. 

Also, ridding the geckos from this planet will ensure that these geckos never again enter our cars and sit quietly in a corner, away from the sight of every passenger; waiting for the car to start and for the passengers to lose themselves in the conversations that usually follows, stealthily coming out in the open, craning its neck above the edge of the rear-view mirror and staring at you with its glassy eyes. That moment, when you notice its eyes staring at you and assess the very high probability that it might jump from the rear-view mirror onto your lap any second, is enough to distract you to one of the ugliest motorcar-accidents of all times. But if you still manage to keep your wits and park the car safely to one side of the road, it vanishes by the time you start looking for it to shoo it away. Life’s most challenging task is to muster enough courage to enter back in that car, still unsure whether the gecko is hiding inside or did it jump out at the same instant you fled! Well, when it happened with me, I was clearly the superhero that day. 

Until and unless these geckos contain in themselves the cure of AIDS or cancer, I sincerely hope they cease to exist, at least in and around my home. Uday Chopra is more bearable then these slimy skinned creatures. God, are you listening?

Open Letter

To our parents, grandparents, guardians and well-wishers,

When we were born in this free country, we inherited certain rights; these rights were, at times, contradictory to the customs and beliefs which have been passed down from generation to generation. We have a right to live, a right to practice any religion, a right to make our own decisions and most importantly- right to equality. Through these rights, the law-makers did not mean to offend you, or create a legion of young rebels. They simply wanted to empower every single one of us; to give us the power to rise above the petty social and religious diktats which are enforced upon us. These people were the true foreseers of our country. 

These fundamental rights were taught to us not during or just-after birth, but in the educational institutions in which you enrolled us, spending your hard earned money; a premier establishment which promises to make a man out of your boy and a lady out of your girl. These preparatory organisations never distinguished between the young minds on the basis of man-made divisions like caste, creed, religion, social strata et cetera. We were always treated as one and the same, and were taught to treat everyone else as equals too. During those young days, our minds were not poisoned to differentiate, not even by you all. We had friends of all colour, caste, religion and of the other sex. And this was always encouraged. 

The hypocrisy started surfacing when we became matured enough and old enough to take our own decisions. We saw the dark side of the moon when we were standing on the crossroads of life where we had to choose a life-partner for ourselves. Suddenly, the legacy of choosing a spouse of the same caste, religion and creed became a thing of utmost importance; for the sake of the family name, for the sake of the social stigma which will be faced by the family and for the sake of the purity of the lineage which is to follow. The freedom which was allowed to us all our lives became the biggest point of emotional blackmail, “Clearly, if we knew this is what the freedom will cost us one day, we would have been sterner and stricter during your adolescent age!”

Why did you even spend so much on educating and freeing our minds if you were planning to cut off our wings with your own hands one day? Why did you read to us the stories of all the great men and women whom the world remembers for their acts of valor to go against all the social norms? Why did you liberate us to one day lock us in the same cell in which you were imprisoned years ago by your parents, grandparents or guardians?

The secret to a happy life is to be with people who make you happy, and I do not think being with a partner of the same caste and religion guarantees that happiness. Let us make our own mistakes and break the age-old tradition. 

Remember the time when toilets attached to the houses were considered impure? Ridding that age-old notion turned out to be very beneficial, did it not?

Yours Humbly,

Discover Yourself

I will be your muse,
Your friend, your holy grail
As you sit and draw me,
In all your poetic ways...
My eyes will be a mirror
Not haunting, but clear,
To help you see inside you
To drive you, to ignite you..
My voice will be your guide
Not a binder, but an ally,
A fellow-traveler when you need it
A distant mirage at other times..
My touch will be your tocsin
For when you’ve wandered far beyond
A familiar kiss of intrigue
To bring you back to now..
I will talk to you about men
About existence, about life,
About prophecies, philosophies,
Of the long forgotten times..
I will be more than all the things
You want me to be
As I help you discover
Yourself through me..!!

RIP Humanity !!

Humanity has faced many crises before this, and I might be wrong if I say that this is the last one we are facing. But there is no doubt, that there is a very strong possibility that we, as humans, are not able to come out of this crisis this time around. This might very well be the end of us all, as the Mayans had foreseen, with a slight calculative error about the timing. This can be the Third and final World War; a war which eventually ends humanity and society as we know it.

There is fighting all around us – The Kashmir border with India and Pakistan exchanging gunshots every day; Israel and Palestine firing rockets at each other over land and dominance; The Taliban killing people in Afghanistan and Pakistan over religion and laws; Ukraine and Russia fighting for a piece of land without sparing a moment of thought for the people living there; ISIS/ISIL killing people is Syria and Iraq to declare themselves as a separate state. 

All around us, people are massacring others just for power and the opportunity to rule over some people. They are killing people whom they eventually want to rule. And in return, there is retaliation, which some might say, is not wrong- but what good is it bringing along with it? Israelis claim that they are not wrong by bombing people who have been firing rockets at them for years; Palestinians argue they are not wrong by firing rockets at a state which has been flouting border agreements and following discrimination against their race for decades. I do not know who is right! All I know is that none of it justifies killing hundreds of innocent people who had nothing to do with the disputes in the first place. 

If cross border firing was not enough, now these terrorists have resorted to shooting at international flights and killing hundreds of people who did not even belong to that country/area/land of dispute. Flights are blown up at Pakistani airport, airport siege at Kabul, Malaysian Airlines blown up to pieces near Ukraine border- how many more incidents do we need to prove that humanity died a silent death long time ago. If Russian separatists had a role to play in the MH17 incident, why will the countries of the dead passengers and crew, not send out their own fighter jets to counter such terrorist organisations, first thing tomorrow morning? Who is to stop further fighting which will take place because of this incident? Whom do we need to kill for all of this to stop? 

Governments which supported such separatist groups when they were budding and growing are to be blamed. They did not realise that fire burns all, equally. If there is God above, who is looking at us, and feeling ashamed for creating us, pray to Him for wisdom, pray to Him for forgiveness, and most of all, pray to Him for an end to all this violence. Because if we do not stop now, I do not think we will get another opportunity of attaining peace!

“An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” ~ Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Relationships

There are two kinds of people in this world. One- those who can enter into a relationship with ease and comfort, like they were made to be in that particular relationship all their lives and were just searching for the right moment; and two- people like me. Entering into a relationship, for people like me, is like choosing a career after clearing your class 10th examinations. No matter how much you think about it, no matter how sure you think you are; you are bound to regret your decision and want to alter the choice you made after a few hours - or if you’re capable of handling a lot of mental pressure - after a few days.

Yes, I am like that when it comes to commitments – indecisive, fickle-minded and get easily bored. People have huge expectations when it comes to selecting their partners. They want their partners to be rich like Mark Zuckerberg, handsome like George Clooney, funny like George Carlin, romantic like Clark Gable or Shah Rukh Khan and philanthropic like Warren Buffet. Well, I am none of the above. I literally meet not a single of the above mentioned criteria. I do not possess any other special quality like singing, dancing, or playing a musical instrument either. All in all I am the creepy guy who women steer clear of on metros and in cafes.

Now, let us talk of what I look-for in a girl (weirdoes have the right to be selective as well). No, I will not go on about how she should be beautiful, or intelligent, or down-to-earth. I want to focus on the more important characteristics; I want her to be broken. ‘Broke-n’, not in the sense that she should be bankrupt, but broken (repaired or not) emotionally. I instantly connect with people who already have something wrong within them. Who have a scar, waiting to be healed; who have a deep dark pit inside their chest, and they fear falling into that darkness every now and then; who have a constant fear of attachment. I do not say that I can cure such people, but I can feel the pain they go through, and it calms my anxiety and eases my own throbbing pain, in return. 

I want a partner who has been through a heart-break; who knows how much to attach herself to the other person; who knows how much to give and how much to expect in return; who knows the importance of giving the other person their personal space. (I might sound weirder now, but then again, what is life without a few fancies)

But girls do not think this way. For them, relationships are not supposed to be backed by logic. It should be absolutely spontaneous, like a lightning. It should be magical, like a rainbow. The relationship should be fulfilling, like a mid-day monsoon downpour. 

This is all I had to say about this crazy thing which usually evolves into love, or germinates from love – a relationship.

The Night Club Culture

Night clubs are to Indians, what evolution was to Charles Darwin – survival of the fittest.

I will try and back what I said by describing a normal day for an average-Indian-night-club-enthusiast at a popular destination. 

The entrance to any club is always through a door which is way more cramped than it should normally have been. I believe this is because the owners were trying to be modest while making the night-club. They never expected that the turnout each night would be so high. So, suddenly you enter a dimly-lit room full of screaming people, with music so loud that it can damage your auditory senses and a stench so strong that your appetite is lost instantly. You stand there, at the entrance, for a moment, giving your pupils time to dilate before someone pushes you from the behind in an attempt to join the frantic crowd inside. You cautiously find your way to an empty table and start assessing the high-on-adrenaline-and-alcohol people all around you. Since most of the clubs do not offer butler service, you are forced to visit the bar yourself to get drinks for your date (and for yourself). This is the part where Darwin jumps in like a party-crasher. You push your way through a solid phalanx of drunk, stinky, hairy, middle-aged men in order to reach the bar. Once you have successfully achieved that, you need to shout out your order to the bartender who clearly has more in his plate than he can handle. You just stand there waving money at him so he notices you and hands over your drinks to you. Then starts the long battle of finding your way back out of the mob; which always leads to the same conclusion – your clothes and shoes end up consuming half of your drinks as everybody is trying to reach for the bar, while you are trying to move against the flow. When you finally come out of the sea of effluvial arm-pits (as everyone has their cash-filled hands extended towards the bartender) and head for your table and finally take a sip of the drink (for which you burned roughly around 100-200 Kcal.), you realise that the drink is more water than whisky because the night club owners are a bunch of money-hungry-bastards who always try to save on the cost of drinks by resorting to adulteration. 

After all this wasted effort, you hear a song which you really like and you decide to head to the dance floor with your date (with whom you have hardly spent ten minutes). Again, you work your way through a swarm of sweaty, hairy, frantically-dancing people to reach to the nucleus of the dance floor. Half the song has already been played by that time and you start grooving to the beats. For a guy, it is of utmost importance that his date is not inappropriately touched by other drunken males all around her, and thus he dances less, and plays the role of a security guard more. 

If this satisfies you, you leave the club and head back home with a massive headache or else you start back from the top.

So, for everyone who keeps asking me why I do not like to visit night clubs, I hope I have been explicitly clear. Thank you and keep partying!

The Forbidden Fruit

Let me remind you about the story of Adam and Eve today. God created a paradise of a garden called Eden. There he created a man, Adam, and a woman, Eve. They were given the duty of protecting a large tree in the middle of the garden. The tree was special as its fruits bore the special knowledge of good and evil for the person who eats it. Adam and Eve were also strictly instructed not to eat any fruit of that tree. Both of them ate from every other tree in the garden but could only dream of the taste of the fruits which were hanging from the magical tree. The forbidden fruit with all its mysteries was the only thought that kept running in their minds. 

And hence, one day Eve decided to defy God’s order and plucked an apple from the tree of knowledge. She called out to Adam and shared the apple with him. And as they were chewing their way through the apple, they realized that it tastes the same as every other fruit in the garden. They were highly disappointed. The next day, they were thrown out of the garden by God for going against his authority. 

Now why I shared this story with you is because this happens in all of our lives. We are enticed towards the forbidden fruit. We break boundaries and ethics to achieve the forbidden fruit. We do it, consciously as well as unconsciously. We are attracted by the forbidden fruit and spend weeks and months, just dreaming about its taste, its texture, its smell. And once we achieve the forbidden fruit, we do not feel the desperate need to have it anymore. We are satiated in just one bite, because it is not forbidden anymore; the only reason why it was so appealing in the first place. 

This is what happens in most of the relationships. If the girl is playing hard to get, or just keeps away from guy since he is creepy. It creates this image of the girl as a forbidden fruit in the guy’s brain. Now he has a desperate need to court you and sweet talk you into getting into a relationship with him. He stops thinking rationally; whether the girl is really compatible with him; whether they have similar way of thinking; whether they will ever be able to give each other the required time and space. He just needs to be with that girl. His mind creates an illusion that this extreme obsession is actually love. The boy does everything to win the girl’s trust and convince her that he actually loves her. 

Then one day, the girl says yes, swept by the immense flow of love and affection between them. That is when she stops being a forbidden fruit for the guy. And now, the boy really opens his eyes and looks at the girl, not as a fruit, but as a human. He starts assessing her behaviour, her likes and dislikes, her ideologies, her small irritating habits et cetera. This is when the boy truly realises that he does not love this girl. And hence begins a long series of small and big fights, a few broken hearts, long nights of crying, a feeling of vacuum forming inside the chest and repulsion towards the other gender. 

So all we need to do is realise which attractions are towards a human, and which are towards a fruit, and we are good to go!

"There is a charm about the forbidden that makes it unspeakably desirable." ~Mark Twain

Intelligentsia

One of the greatest challenges which 21st century has in front of it is finding other colonies of living beings in this vast universe. There have been a few reasons, and theories, to believe that extra-terrestrial life is a possibility. But so far, the greatest of minds have dedicated their entire lives in this conquest, and still nothing worthwhile has been discovered. Humans and machines have scouted vast parts of the unknown space and have found nothing but flying pieces of debris. The scouted area might seem humongous to us, but from a larger perspective we haven’t even covered a spec of sand, in this huge desert of a universe. 

The reasons behind this failure to find another life source can be two:

1. We are the only lucky species to be occupying the only life-capable planet in this whole universe. 

2. We are still not that technically and mentally advanced which enables us to yield positive results from this search. 

I strongly believe that the latter possibility is the actual reason. 

I feel so because of the rising number of dumb people all around me. I am not saying that I am the most intelligent person to be alive in this era. But I am saying that I definitely have an abundance of people with below-average intellect around me. 

People on Social-Media like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube keep proving me right, time and again. 

I am tagged in pictures in which I am not present more often than on pictures in which I am actually there. I am tagged in pictures with ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ messages. I am tagged in pictures with beautiful scenery as a background and some random shit which is supposed to motivate me towards life scribbled all over it. I am even tagged in pictures which is a selfie of a friend whom I haven’t met in ages. Perhaps, a few of you people do not know why a picture is tagged. Tagging means showing people who are in the picture; not people to whom you want to show the picture. 

Newly married couples keep posting lovey-dovey messages on each other’s walls on Facebook. Mostly, it is done while using your personal Laptop or iPad or Smartphone, while lying right beside your spouse in your bed, in an awkward silence. Today people prefer conveying their love through a public forum on the internet on a website to a person who is sitting eight inches far from you. 

Today, social welfare has gained an all new meaning. Social activism is ‘Liking’ a picture on Facebook which has a caption “1 Like=100 Prayers”. Social work is ‘retweeting’ a message which says “#1RT=100 #Prayers”. Today, before helping a crash victim, taking a video and uploading it on YouTube is more important; because it will bring ‘views’ from people on YouTube. 

People lie to their family members about where they are going and then ‘Check-In’ themselves at places, so the entire unknown world might get to know about it. People are less concerned about the taste of their food compared to its presentation, because they want the pictures of their food on Instagram to look good. 

If this does not prove that our world is becoming dumber with every new generation, I do not know what will convince you about it. We still have time, let us take a space-ship and roam in this universe, to find a smarter race. Or we wait aimlessly, hoping they do not run away after seeing our explicit display of stupidity, if (and when) they find us!

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." ~Albert Einstein

Acceptance

Who defines social norms? Who sets the protocols- which need to be followed in order to be called normal? What is normal?

Our society drives pleasure from others’ misery. The people, who are the happiest, are generally also the most critical. They might not be perfect individuals, but they do the job of evaluating the shortcomings of others perfectly. 

The kind of life which I choose to live seems wayward, meaningless and rebellious to most people I know! The people who are in a position to judge what kind of a life you lead; the people who might/ might not have achieved anything substantial in their lives to evaluate whether you are leading your life in the right direction. But society does not choose such people on the basis of how they have fared in their own lives, but on the basis of how long they have lived and how much they have criticized. Everybody has a right to their opinions, and I have every right to feel offended by their opinions about me. 

The dense beard seems wrong to them. The body-art makes me an outcast in their eyes. The outright questions I put forward to all their social diktats make them feel I am rebellious towards their authority. And these negative vibes which I get from them drives me. I feel empowered by their disapproving stares. I become headstrong by their inaudible whispers behind my back. 

But in the end all I want them to know is I want to be how God made me. I want to live the way I feel right. I want to do things I am passionate about without the fear of “What will the society think about it?” running continuously in my mind. I want to have a fulfilling life; and a sense of fulfillment comes neither from money, nor from love, nor from power - it comes from being happy. I cannot find a way to be happy, if I am not being allowed to be myself. I crave for acceptance of certain people, of people whom I do not want to lose, of people whom I love and look up to. But I cannot alter myself in order to be accepted by them. Because then I am not being true to myself. I want to live my life as it seems fit to me. And I want to make my own set of mistakes while I am at it.

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” ~George Bernard Shaw

Baarish ki raat..

कुछ बारिश में भीगते सपनें ,
कुछ हवा के झोंकों में झूमती परछाइयाँ ,
कुछ बिजलियों की चमक से काँपते रूह  ,
कुछ पेड़ की छाँव में हसीन गुस्ताखियाँ ।। 

कुछ मौसम का था प्यारा असर ,
कुछ गीली मट्टी की खुशबू का भी था नशा बड़ा ,
कुछ उनकी गहरी आँखें भी कुसूरवार थी ,
कुछ हमपर भी था चाहत का सुरूर चढ़ा ।। 

कुछ लफ्ज़ उन्होंने भी कहे नही ,
कुछ बोलने की चाह हमें भी ना थी ,
कुछ कहे बिना एक-दुसरे को समझ लिया ,
कुछ उन बादलों की गरज में खामोशी ना थी ।।  

कुछ उनकी गीली ज़ुल्फ़ें थी हसीन ,
कुछ रात की हवा में भी ठंडक थी ,
कुछ जज़्बात काबू से बाहर हो रहे थे ,
कुछ उनके गीले होंठों में नर्मी थी ।। 


~ सौरव गोयल 

Passionate Desires

Late in the night,
With only stars in the sky,
A cool breeze in the air,
Every breath becoming a sigh..

A touch which burns the skin,
Soft whispers burning the desire,
Heartbeats raging like a war-drum,
With every blink it's getting higher..

The smell of her hair and skin,
Lingering so close to me,
Her nails digging in my arms,
Every moment seems an eternity..

The soft kiss upon the lips,
Sudden urge to freeze the time,
Her body arching in my embrace,
Every passing second she becomes mine...


~Saurav Goyal

Who am I?

Who am I??

This one question, which I keep asking myself, has become the source of both my aenoian misery and perpetual drive to self-discovery. Am I the same person who I see in the pictures adorning the walls of my home or am I the person whose silhouette I see on the reflecting surfaces around me? Am I the person whose stories of distant past, my mother-father, uncles-aunts and brothers-sisters, keep narrating of or am I the person who the poems on the pages of my old hardcover-diary portray? 

When did that chubby, toothless, bald kid in the postcard-pictures of my father’s old family albums grow up to become this cynical, arrogant, narcissist man? I am sure that if you look at those pictures and then look at me, you might not find much resemblance. When did destiny shape my body and my mind to who I am today? Why are there no materialistic evidences of the thought processes and changes that I was going through as a developing child? 

I have no answer to the looming question in my mind. I only know who I was because of the small living proofs all around me. There is no evidence to correlate my present existence to my past actuality. People who claim to know me, only know the person who I was in the past. I change, just like every other living thing on this planet. And it is not always possible to keep in touch with a variable all the time. 

Self-assessment has never been kind to anyone, seldom to people who take themselves in high regard. But my mind does not seem to like the idea of lengthy happiness periods. It keeps asking me the same question of my perpetuity. So, till the time I find the truth behind myself, why don’t you ask yourself the same question. When did you become, you? What moulded you to your present self? 

Who are you? ~ Saurav Goyal