The sculptor

A block of stone,
Unseen, unknown.
Kicked around,
Of no use,
To no one.

He takes it up,
He sees potential
He sees things,
You and I cannot,
He sees.

He takes a chisel,
He takes a hammer,
He chips some here,
He chips some there,
He chips what he can see.

He chips off the not needed,
Keeping what is needed,
Needed by whom?
The underlying form
In his head.

Slowly, from a block
An image arises,
An image in his head
Transferred by him,
By his tools.

He saw a goddess
Riding her tiger.
He saw her inside
The stone
You and I did.

How can he see,
Things we cannot?
Things we are blind to,
Are visible to him
To his eyes alone.

Are we blind,
Not to see beauty,
Lying beneath the surface
Are we oblivious
If it is not obvious?

26th December 2007

Against Nature

He drives fast
Faster
Than he wants,
Faster
Than he should.

The car speeds,
Over roads;
Tires squealing,
Protesting violently
At each turn.

The rain,
Pouring around him,
Blurring the sights
That surround,
That does not need blurring.

The world around
Parts from its way,
To let him through.
Lest it be a hurdle
In his path, it moves.

The rain
Climbs up the windshield,
Pushed by the air,
The air cut by the car
Rushing through.

The wipers try hard
To keep the water at bay
To ensure a clean vision,
Forward,
To ensure a vision.

The water spiders up
‘Ere the wiper cleans it up,
For them to climb again,
In tiny rivulets,
From the hood to the roof.

Moving against nature
Its nature.
Moved by a force,
External,
Moved.

It runs from the hood,
From the ocean,
It moves against nature,
To the roof,
To the mountain.

~26th December 2007

Fire, Ice and Stone

Carved in stone,
Sculpted in ice ,
The only sight of life
Is the fire in her eyes.

She stands there
In the pouring rain,
Nothing to lose, she has
Nothing to gain.

Standing in wait,
Her eyes, a frown,
Not noticing the water
Over her eyes, running down.

Who she is,
Whence she came,
For whom she waits,
Reasons, lame.

Fire, in those eyes
Ice, in her stare,
Stone of her heart,
Shielding from the glare.

Desire, to burn,
Desire burning,
Seen in her eyes,
Her heart is churning.

The face she shows,
Hides the fire inside.
The eyes, they betray,
A truth, unable to hide.

Her face, ice,
Tries to please
The burning eyes,
They cannot appease.

Fiery eyes,
To burn, they try,
Melt a heart,
Make it cry.

Heart of stone, immune,
To life, it is gone,
To things, they are past
To people, just flesh and bone.

She stands there,
Icy face, staring
Through eyes of fire, they hide
A Stone heart, no one sharing.

4th December 2007
~Aditya Rajaraman

Dasavatar

Did the ancient Indians know evolution and the concept of the movement of life form from the more simple to the more complex? If the Dasavatar is anything to go by, they may as well have known.

• Matsya - Fish: The basic life form to have developed in the seas. It is well known that the oceans of the world were the birth place of life. And the marine animals were the oldest life forms to have inhabited the world
• Koorma - Tortoise: The amphibian life form. This is the evolution of the marine form that has come to check the possibility of living on land.
• Varaha – Boar: A primitive land animal, which was can be likened to the first animals which began moving around the land.
• Narasimha: Half man, half lion: This would have to be the carnivorous reptiles that roamed the earth, the reason being the fierceness that has been depicted. However, the question that arises is the presence of half man. I would think that it is an allusion to the fact that they are planning to introduce the human, which prompted the change. After all evolution is the slow change of a simpler life to a more complex one
• Vamana – The pygmy: The pygmy, the man who was yet to develop from the monkey, the monkey that looked like a man, the chimpanzee, the orangutan
• Parasurama – The truly physical man, likened to the Neanderthal man who was truly the precursor to the modern human being
• Rama – Cro-Magnon Man. The reason that I call Rama as a Cro-Magnon man is the similarity between them in the use of bow and arrow. If I remember my anthropology right, Cro-Magnon man was the one who started the use of tools as a means of hunting. Thus the prowess of Rama as an archer seems to stem from that.
• Balarama – The farmer: This is like the well known transition of man from the nomadic hunter to the land based farmer. After all the implement that was carried by Balarama was a plough to signify the farming nature
• Krishna – The thinking man: Man transcended from being the manual labor that he was being an agriculturist to become one that used his head and began offering services. This is similar to Krishna in the fact that he was a master strategist and throughout the Mahabharata is shown to be offering services, be it a chariot driver, a messenger, a judge, etc. to the Pandavas and the Kauravas
• Kalki: This is the modern man, the one that brings about destruction of the world, the Kali Yug, where mans greed is punished with extinction. This seems to be the direction we are heading wherein we are destroying the natural resources that are important for our survival on this planet. When the resources run out, this is not a case of if they will, it is a case of when, and human race will be exterminated.

The only bone of contention is the fact that in all of these avatars, there is human form of some sort. There is contact of the avatars with either the gods in human form, or sages, or asuras who have the human form albeit with dark skin, or humans themselves as seen in the last few avatars (starting from Narasimha). The only thing that I can think of that makes some sense is the fact that to introduce a concept as revolutionary as evolution, they had to make some compromises and one of them was to show that man was present forever. Except this one glaring mistake, if discounted, the entire story of Dasavatar shows the process of evolution as scripted by Darwin eons after the Dasavatar was wide spread in the country.

All grown up

You know you have grown up when

• People start taking your opinion seriously
• Your father does not have a look of bewilderment when you say that you are taking the car out (he does not even roll over in his sleep, (yes he was asleep))
• You are not scared of being pulled over by the traffic police for driving (it does not matter, you have a license and you look like you are twice your age which is more than twenty)
• When you take the wheel of your car, feel the wind in your face, the empty roads ahead of you, your best friends in the seat next to you and behind you, and the music over the speaker and you know this does not get better
• When your parents are thinking of getting you married (who said that child marriage does not exist? :P)
• When you can go to the best restaurant in town, have a hearty meal, and not look order from the price list, or think how your father is going to react when you tell him the amount you spent and the fact that you need more money
• When your friend and you have a fight as to who is going to pay and not vice versa
• When you are sitting in a car, surrounded by mosquitoes, with the person you trust more than anyone else, talk about things that you never knew you both could talk about
• When you know that you have to go back to work, come Monday morning and it is work!
• When one of the people you went to school with is buying a house and he can actually pay for it himself
• When you start timing your purchases on the basis of the billing cycle of your credit card, rather than the timing of the need or the whim
• When you wait for the end of the month so that you can see the bank balance burgeon, so that you can start spending again
• When your father starts telling you on how important it is to save
• When you want to buy stuff for people, just because they hinted on it sometime ago, because you can
• When you do not get a peaceful nights sleep at night, things running through your head (not exams, not girls, just things)
• When people make a big deal out of you coming home and are willing to come to the station, in pouring rain, just to see the look on your face when you arrive
• When you refer to the word home and people ask, “Which one?”
• When you start smiling, a memory having just popped in your head
• When the you run out of fingers and toes and bodily parts before you run out friends you lost
• When you have no idea where the years till now have rolled
• When you have no idea what is going on and why, but are glad something is going on

I just realized, I may have just grown up and I hate (to be read as love) it!!!!

Head in the clouds

Disclaimer: This poem and the story to follow on this theme draws inspiration from the post on Nivethitha’s blog, Lost and Found and my recent journey through the clouds in an airplane. .

Sitting on an airplane,
Thousand feet above,
I look down on the squalor
Lying below me.
They call this a city,
They call this a life.
Houses shaped like matchboxes,
Ash, the color all around.

As I rise,
My head in to the clouds,
Bathed in ash, in white and grey,
I look out at a sight,
Shapeless shapes,
Peaceful,
Given form, given names
By me.

The blue above,
Pure,
Unencumbered,
No limits,
No scars,
No boundaries
Sense of relief,
Sense of life.

The ashen buildings I see,
The populated places I go to,
The varied people I meet,
All constrict,
All limit,
Boundaries they set
I am lost,
Lost am I.

The formless clouds,
The ashen sight,
The endless blue,
All free me,
In the boundless,
In the limitless,
I find myself, with my head,
In the limitless ashen blue.

~Aditya

Love and companionship

This had been an eventful few weeks. There have been many events that individually have caused me joy, which taken together never cease to bring a smile on to my face.

The main theme of these smile-bringing events is that a few of my friends have gone and gotten committed, committed in love. The net result is here I am, sitting on a moving train, with a test coming shortly, writing about something, which has never made sense to me.

I am not sure how I am going to start this piece. I am going to use a line that I heard in a song by Savage Garden. Even though I do not remember the song, the lines remain in my head. The line goes: “Love and other emotions are just chemical reactions in your brain. Feelings of aggression are the absence of the love drug in your veins.”

I have concluded that in the end of the day, love is nothing but that. Love has never been defined well. I am yet to come across a definition that has hung on. However, I can surely say what it is not. It is not the mush that we have come to identify with love. It is not the yearning, the desire to always be with the other person. That is something that has been inserted into our psyche by the movies and the television shows. That is just to increase the yearning in us, thereby increasing the revenues in the theatres and the cards and gift shops. This post is to be more of a thought provoking one, and may be a little thought giving one. It all boils down to what I have seen in people close to me.

The people I am referring to are cases by themselves.

• One has been committed for nearly eight years now, with his age being twenty three (you do the math)
• One is not sure if the girl he is with now is the same girl that he fell in love with (Is he in love, was he in love, don’t ask me)
• One who never believed in the word love, tells me that he/she is desperately in love with a girl/boy (He/she in fact sends me a picture asking, telling, “Ain’t she/he good-looking?”
• One is candid enough to tell me that he/she can never get past the physical looks of a person (this needs guts, to admit to someone that all you look for is the physical appearance and do not proceed beyond that)
• One is able to fall in love and out of it in a matter of a week, one has been in love with a girl/boy for ages, and now he/she has finally gotten over her/him and fallen in love with another girl/boy (I hope that this one stays)
• One is in love with a person for almost six years, gets over her/him (says he/she does) in a week, falls for another person, lets that person go in another week (All in a week's work)
  
• One believes that to get over someone, we have to hate them (does this mean that we love them once and then hate them, is this not equivocal?)
• One wants to be committed so he/she can refrain from having to take decisions (is he looking for a partner or a boss?)
• And finally, one who is not sure if he/she is in love with a person, or the idea of that person (Hysterical!!!)

The closest I have come to understanding it is this. It is a desire for comfort. It is a desire to be wanted. It is a desire to be needed. It is a desire to know that you are valued and you make someone’s life better. It is a desire to know that no matter what you do, someone is willing to be there for you, 24x7. Ultimately, it is the need for companionship.

If it were easily understood, I guess that there is no charm behind those three words. No one knows what they mean when they utter them. I can never forget the scene in Alaipayuthey when Madhavan’s character tells Shalini’s that he loves her and she retorts by asking what he means and if he would jump of a train for her.

I guess that at the end of the day, everyone comes to the table with a different agenda. The trick is to find someone who wants what we are willing to offer and is offering what we need. It is a barter system folks and let the exchanges begin.


~Aditya

Thank you

I thought
I was lost,
I am lost
Lost in thought
Lost in beliefs,
Lost in hopes,
Lost in prayers.

Thoughts,
Prayers,
Hopes
And beliefs,
Mine
Only mine.

I thought
I
Was with you
Because
I wanted to
Because
I wished to
Because of me
Only me.

I realized not
I was with you
As you
And as much as you
Were with me
As me.
It was not
I with you
And you with me,
It was
We with us
Not alone
Not separate
Together as one.

I
With you
Now, and before
Because I wanted
I hoped
I believed
Because
You wanted
You hoped
And you believed.

I am with you
Because I want
Because you want
Because we want.

~Aditya

Joy and Pain

Tearing my way,
Bursting the seams,
I ride out.
In a torrent of blood,
I ride out.

She cries in pain,
She cried with joy.
Tears, they are the same,
She gave me birth,
She gave me life.

He stands there,
Disbelief in his eyes,
He created life,
In pleasure,
He created me.

Born
Out of their pleasure,
Born to her pain,
I shall bring joy,
I shall bring pain.

Their lives,
Intertwined
With mine,
Their actions,
Based on my needs.

I caused her pain,
With my birth,
With my birth,
I caused them joy.
Was it them or was it me?

Do I still please
Or are they pleased,
To see my life
Lived
My way?

They gave me life,
They showed me life.
Even if I live it
Against wishes, theirs,
Happy they are, for me.

My joys,
Mine, do I share?
My pain,
They partake,
Don’t they care?

Their pain,
They share.
Their pain,
I am clueless,
Why do I not care?

Joy in my joy,
Pain in my pain.
Joy in their joy,
Pain, un-shown,
Unknown, unseen.

~Aditya
October 2nd 2007

Idea of a good time

These are the things of late which have given me a good time

1. Walking home alone in the rain
2. In a crowded train, my cell playing my favorite songs
3. A dinner, open skies, best buddy, good food, things to talk
4. Lemon juice, salt lemon soda, no words, lots being said
5. College, friendly professor, seemed avuncular
6. College fountain, thoughts of a time shared with a friend
7. Ride home on a bus, seeing stars after a loooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnng time
8. Realizing that things I meant to talk to with people important to me, can never be said
9. Driving my car. dad's rather, "New York Nagaram" at full blast
10. Finding old books, the smell from them
11. Betting on who among the three musketeers will get married first
12. Finding out the person who I thought will never get married, is engaged
13. College, juniors, talking to me like I am an Uncle

They are not in any order, this post is an indulgence!

Blame

As most of my posts, this one too derives itself from a conversation with one of those few souls whom I ask questions. The funniest part of that conversation is that I ask the question knowing fully well, what the reply is going to be. However, the question is still asked and the reply is acknowledged with an “I know”.

What is blame? What makes us blame someone? I guess the adage “If at first you do not succeed, blame someone” captures what I want to say entirely.

The act of passing the blame can be due to many reasons. I am not bothered with that. What I am bothered is that when certain decisions of ours go wrong, we are immediate to point the finger at someone else saying that they were the person who instigated us to do such a thing. More often than not, they would have expressed an opinion and we would have accepted that whole-heartedly without a second thought.

In such a circumstance, how can we blame the other person? Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinions. The constitution gives them the freedom of speech, thereby allowing them to express that opinion. In case, you are the target of that expression, then the onus falls on to you. What is the onus? It is to think what they say, why they are saying what they are saying and if that thing is applicable to you.

Assuming that you did or did not do all this and implemented that opinion, does this mean that you have a right to blame them if it goes wrong? In addition, in the same breath will you give them praise if it works out?

The second is more of a rhetoric question that I do not plan to answer.

When you decide something driven by forces external to you, maybe because it was said by someone important to you, maybe it came from someone you respect immensely, do you have the right to blame them?

The answer is no. The reason is very intuitive and is simple. Even when you do something on other people’s advice, at the end of the day, it is still your decision. When it is your decision, it is your prerogative to think through that decision. Just as you cannot be sorry for something that you do (refers my previous post Sorry) you cannot blame anyone but yourself.

You may come back with the question that it was their idea. Can you not see that it was your decision to implement their idea? Can you not see that you decided that person was so important to you that you decided to follow them blindly? Can you not see that that person means so much to you that you did not question their opinion?

When someone means so much to you, then how can you blame him or her? When someone is so important to you that you follow him or her, how can you demean that meaning and that importance by blaming him or her for what is essentially your decision?

The only person who is liable to blame is the only person who made the mistake, me. The mistake is that either I valued someone too much not to think through what he or she said and did what he or she said, or I did not think it out fully. The mistake is either in the value system or in the thought process, both of which are mine. In the end, it comes down to me and only me.

When I decide,
The decision is mine.
Root, in your head,
Root in mine,
Matters not,
Decision mine.
Blame,
You, I cannot,
Blame you,
I shall not.
Fault,
Lies in me,
For valuing
You,
For listening to
You,
Mind shut,
Ears open,
Should cause
Mouth shut.

Only for me

Walking along
On a crowded pavement,
Faces rushing past
No one to meet.
The first drop
Lands on my face,
The drop of rain,
The drop of joy.
People, they run,
Helter skelter,
Seeking shelter,
Under something else.
As the skies open
All around me,
I walk on
With
A million drops
Of joy
Splashing
On me.
All alone,
All drenched,
In the rain,
On the pavement,
I watch the rain
Falling on me,
Falling for me,
Only me.

~Aditya

Rainbow

Standing
On the edge
Of sunshine
And rain.
I look heavenwards
Searching for her.
She looks down
Upon me
From her perch
High
In the clouds.
Wearing her robe
Seven colored
Each for a mood,
A mood of mine.

Why is she sad
Frowning at me,
Reflecting an emotion
I feel no more?
Her frown
Fills the skies
From cloud to cloud
From earth to heaven
From heaven to earth.

Is she sad
At a world
That is straight,
Or is she smiling
With the world
Upturned;
Topsy turvy,
Turvy topsy,
Right side up,
Wrong side down,
Frowning at me,
Smiling at heavens
For me?

~Aditya

Dedicated to a want

My hundredth post.

What is want?

When I desire something so much that the very thought of that thing causes pain, not because it is painful, but because I do not even want to think of a life without that one thing, I guess I have a want.


When every second of every minute of every day, all the thoughts lead back to that one thing, I guess that I have a want.

When every word I hear, brings back that one thing, I guess that I have a need.

When I know that I may not get that one thing, yet I soldier along, not caring for the obstacles, I guess that I have a want.

When I know, I have a want.
I know I want.

Comparison

Disclaimer: I have used “he” as a general term to refer to both men and women. Ideally, it should be either he/she or they. However, for some arcane reason, we use “he” while referring to humanity as a whole. I do not want that error to detract us from the main theme of the post.


A statement I have heard many times over, and one I have come to detest (the feeling is beyond hate) is “I do not want to compare, but have you seen what x or y or z is doing?”

What is it that makes people compare? Why is something others do so important in our lives? What makes them capable of being the standard against which we measure our achievements?

Our marks were always compared to those of our close friends. This comparison was along the lines of “How come he/she has scored so much and you have not?”

As we grew up and left marks behind, it was then the performance at the workplace. Our team leader at appraisals will tell us that we do not deserve the bonus because someone somewhere did something more than us.

As we get married and start a family, what we bring to the table in the family is again set off against that done by others. I am reminded of the famous (not so famous if you are not a Tamilian) song from Yethir Neechal (Swimming against the current). It is called Aduthathu Ambujatha Paathela. During the course of the song, a wife compares what her husband brings home, what she has to the take home of the neighbors.

The best part of death is that it only then when our actions are taken in the absolute sense. There is no comparison; just what we did and whether they were good or bad.

Now that I have laid out the constancy of comparison in our lives, I would like to question the rationale behind it.

Any person, and therefore his actions are based, hopefully, on some reason. (Please do not make this post another battleground over whether there is reason behind every action or not)

Since we are working with this assumption, two people we are going to compare have reasons for the way that they are. This is to say that they have a certain premises based on which they act and live. There is no chance that their two premises will be the same. This is because of the uniqueness of the person.

When the two people to be compared are viewed by us, we are doing so based on our own premises. This is to say that we look at them from a third party position and try to compare what they are.

To me, this is not a valid comparison. How can one, based on their perspectives compare two things that are based on different perspectives? It is possible to compare the perspectives. This is to say that I can compare the reasons that the persons are what they are. I cannot compare what they are.

You see yourself,
In your own mirror.
He sees himself,
In his.
I compare
You and him,
In my mirror?
I compare
Not you and him,
I compare
The mirror
You both see

Holding on

On the edge,
With fingertips,
I hang.
Abyss below,
A sky above,
Me in between,
I hang.
Strength ebbing,
Will failing,
Memories flooding,
Life lived,
I hang.

An illusion,
A dream,
A hope,
A fear,
I hold on.
Scared
To let go,
Scared
Not to,
I hold on.

On
The edge,
I am
Holding
On.

~Aditya

Urge

So many questions,
So many answers.
I hold the urge
Of saying anything.

Unanswered
They remain,
Answered by silence,
Mine.

Sanctity I take,
In silence, yours.
Words unsaid,
Heard nevertheless.


Thoughts too many,
Understanding too few,
I hold the urge
To understand.

~Aditya Rajaraman

Butterfly

Each flower,
A new destination
An old abode.

Temporary,
I flutter by,
I, a butterfly.

Flitting
From flower
To flower.

Never stagnant,
Never stopping,
Never happy.

Permanent
My flight,
I flutter, butterfly.

Searching,
For nectar,
Better fly, butterfly.

Aditya Rajaraman

Greener Pastures

I stay on the edge,
Looking out at pastures,
Some greener
Some not.

You are on an edge
Looking for pastures
Greener
Than the one, you are one.

We are on the same side,
Looking deeper
Deeper in our side
Searching.

A search,
Further inside
Deeper inside,
Longing for more, longing.

Aditya Rajaraman

Write

I sit,
To write.
I sit,
To create.

Thoughts
Once haphazard,
Settle
With me.

A strange sense,
Of peace
Falls
All around me.

Sight,
Insight.
View
Purview.

Words, fall,
Lines flow,
I sit,
They create.

~Aditya

June 28, 2007

Living Dead

Summer leaves and autumn comes,
Bringing cold to replace the warm.
The warmth of summer, so bright,
Shall fade into the chill of autumn.
The trees, once green splendid and bright,
Lose their own kind, their luster,
Drop the leaves that promised life
In the hope of growing them again.
One by one, they fall to the earth
To signal the one coming grey,
Leaving, once vibrant, trees bare,
Stripped of all its life, living dead.
Harboring at the heart, a single hope,
To see off a winter, so cold,
So as to be in a warm, kind summer.
Falling leaves bring a sign of new,
Coming around to replace the dying old.
The old, dying, with the only hope
To be replaced by someone new.

2nd July 2002

The Absent Friend

The person who’ll always there,
The one who’d never leave the side,
Shall give a shoulder to cry on,
And support during the worst fear.

A compassionate human, he is,
Ready to dry the stream of tears cried.
He’d be kind, even when kindness is not needed,
And he’d come every time, he was called in the mind.

The words he’d say shall soothe the mind,
The look in his eyes shall give peace.
The touch of his hand upon the cheek of yours,
Shall leave warmth flowing to the heart.

The gift he has got within him,
He shall always make you wear a smile.
Even if the whole world seemed to be gloomy,
He’d bring a cheer to a darkened heart.

And times when you feel you’ve reached
The limit to which you could ever tread,
He’d gently nudge you, to carry on,
Showing you there is no end to your limit.

Those moments when you feel all alone,
Walking along, with your face at your feet,
He’d be there, immediately, feeling the pain,
That he’d ease with words you need to hear.

When he was there, beside you, holding,
You up gently, when you couldn’t walk on,
You took him for granted, that he’d be forever,
That you all will stay forever this way.

But others had different thoughts for him,
Taking him away to a place far from here,
To show him how the life’s got to be lived,
And how to be all that you want to be.

That friend shall now be forever absent,
He is not there anymore, or will ever be,
That absent friend who was always near,
A light in the darkness of life.

Watching on you from high up above,
Guiding you when you go awry,
Giving you more love that you need,
Providing solace to a lonely heart at sea.

More than his presence is his absence,
That can give more than his presence can.
Times that moved apart, and so have the people,
But that had no effect on minds and heart united.

21st September 2002

Pain Laughter

Laughter through pain-
A game we play;
A smile on our face,
So we see the smile on theirs

Are we so important,
That they can’t see us frown?
Are they so important,
That we can’t see them frown?

Pain through laughter
We bear
A pain in our laughter
Lest there be in theirs.

~Aditya

Dreamcatcher

Catch me a dream,
Make it unreal,
Make it surreal,
Make it real.

Roam far and wide,
Roam near and dear,
Roam everywhere,
Roam whilst I sleep.

Bring me a morning,
Dream catcher,
Far from here,
Here.

Catch me a reality;
Make it unreal,
Dream catcher,
Make it.

~Aditya

Wig

Empty,
Barren,
Shorn of weed,
It glows
With light,
Reflecting
Off the surface.

It shows
Age,
Wisdom
Experience.
Not
Shame
Disgrace.

I cover it,
With
Someone elses
Coiffure.
Is it a cover
For my head or me?
A wig.

Open and closed

I open the doors,
Once left closed.
Were they closed,
To keep the world out?
Or were they closed,
To keep me in?

Now
The doors are open,
Am I left open?
Things inside,
Are they shown
Outside?

Closed doors,
Closed to the world,
Open to me.
Open doors,
Open to the world,
Closed to me.

Far Deep Below

You left years ago,
Or was it me who left?
Times have moved
Between us,
Creating a chasm,
Where there was none.
This gorge that lies,
Insurmountable,
Yet invisible,
Now the voice
I hear,
Is that of a stranger,
Is that of an unknown.
Memories lie deep inside,
Too deep to arise,
Too far below
Below, on the surface.
They come streaming back,
Bringing memories,
Those that lie deep inside,
Too far below,
Too deep below
Not to arise.

Looking Back

A foreign place,
Faces unknown,
Places unseen.

Things to do,
Infinite,
People to meet,
Unbound.

Sitting in a corner,
Watching time fly by,
Harboring hopes,
Dreaming dreams,
Of times past.

Things done,
Once, twice, umpteen times.
People met,
Yearly, weekly, daily.

I sit alone, yet
I sit not alone
Looking back.

12th June 2007

~Aditya

Identity

This post is as a result of a series of exchanges between Suchitra and me. During the course of the conversation, we came upon a topic, which on her request I am reproducing here with some minor alterations.

The question that is being asked is what to do when we notice that people are destroying the image that they hold of themselves at the feet of someone else. Is there a way that one should react to the same?

In case there is something that needs to be held as dear as the self, is it then better not to have that precious thing at all, not to find it at all, let it sleep? Rather than have it, and struggle to safeguard it, would it not be better to go with a time-tested route, and not lose anything?

My take on this is simple.

There cannot be a reaction to such a situation. In case one wants to do something about it, the only thing is pre-emptive action. Actually, I really do not care if the self of others is destroyed. For me, if one is not able to safeguard what should be their most treasured commodity, then they do not have the right to have it in the first place.

The ultimate aim of any man is and has always been peace. There are two ways that a man can reach that peace. He can either understand what he is looking at thereby find peace. Or else, he can suspend that desire to understand and therefore not be bothered by it.

To the sane mind, the second possibility should sound very insane. The reason I say this is because the ability to think is what makes us humans in the first place. If it were not employed, if that faculty was ignored, not made use of, is there anything that separates us from the dogs, cats and all the other animals and plants that coexist in the same world?

Moving from the concept of self for sometime, I will try to throw some light upon why does a man claim a thing as his own. By doing this, I shall try to show why are there different levels of possessiveness for things that a man claims his own.

There are two instances when a man claims something as his own. The first is when he has been given something. This can be a gift or an inheritance. It is when he did not have to do anything to get that. He has it because he is alive. In such a circumstance, the receiver will know heart of heart that he has done nothing to have possession of that. In such a circumstance, he will know that as it comes so will it go. This means that the amount of possessiveness, though present, will be less.

The other thing is something for which he has toiled. The very fact that he has toiled to get this means that he wanted it in the first place and then when he got it, it is so important to him that he will over possessive about it. This can be anything ranging from a book, to the all-important self.

The concept of the self is the latter. One develops a strong idea of the self only after having gone through tremendous amount of psychological trauma and having literally walked through fire. This means that the person will be so possessive of this that no one can come close.

The logical question is why does one have to toil for the concept of self? The answer is because no one is born with it and no can learn of it from others. The only way that one can understand the concept of self is either by realizing it or by losing it and then finding it out.

This comes to the question why it is this important. I shall ask one in retort. How long can one be someone they are not? How long can one live of the ego of others?

Everyone has some amount of self-importance, the feeling that he is someone in the whole jigsaw puzzle of life. Every time they acknowledge the fact that, they have taken someone else’s ego to make themselves feel better, they shall lose some of that self importance. It is but natural that after some time, that shall start telling them, “Enough is enough. It does not matter how difficult it is but start acknowledging the fact that you are as important as anyone else. Even if you are not as successful, even if you are not as beautiful, even if you are not as brilliant, you are you and that makes you unique.”

When this happens, it is natural for them to start developing their concept of “I”.

When one lets it sleep, they are putting themselves to mud. They are telling the world in not so many words that they are scum and that they do not deserve to live.

There is no time tested routine. There is no path that has been walked on previously. Even if someone has been on this, one will not know unless they are on that path themselves. That means that they have already made that choice before they know who else has either made the choice now or had made that choice in the past. Therefore it is not possible to let it sleep.

When you ask me this, if it is not better to let the self, sleep, think of what it means to let that precious thing sleep. It means that you yourself deny your right of being yourself. If you are not you, then who are you? What is your identity?

Think to live,
Understand to think,
Know to understand,
Search to know,
Yourself, search.

Lost

A thousand things I want to say,
A million things, to hear.
Sitting in silence,
Sitting in pandemonium,
I say all those words
I hear all those things.
Lost.

~Aditya

P.S. May the owner know, I stole, I used, I state.

Reason and Faith

A week down in Mumbai and here are my first words on a word file. This has to do with one of my own previous posts, Reason.

In the course of that argument, I tried to present the idea that reason was paramount and everything stemmed from that. Even though even now I hold that thought dear, I was shown that reason, though being paramount is not absolute. The reason being there is a limit up to which reason can go.

During the course of this present argument, I shall play the devil’s advocate, a role I do well. The defendant is one who thinks that reason is paramount, namely, me.

Devil’s Advocate (henceforth DA): Which is bigger faith or reason?

Poor Ol’ Me (henceforth POM) : Reason

DA: Why?

POM: Because faith arises when reason fails

DA: Elucidate

POM: Go and read my article called Reason, or something like that

DA: Have read that and that is the reason I come to you

POM: In spite of reading that, do you still have doubts? You must be one gigantic *!@%$#~^&*

DA: We’ll see who is that *!@%$#~^&*

POM: How will this go? Will you ask the question or will I have to? Aka Shivaji in Thiruvilaiyadal (Kaelvigalai nee kaekiraya, ala, naan kaekatuma?)

DA: Me will ask, I cannot answer, aka Nagesh (Nanne kaeakaren, ennaku kaeka than theriyum)

Curious Onlooker: Great, this is a good competition (Ballae, seriyana poetti )

POM: Ask on

DA: Why is reason greater than faith?

POM: Because when reason comes in faith disappears

DA: What is the base of reason?

POM: Reason does not have a base, reason is, therefore, reason is

DA: There you go again, with your lines that no one follow. Who decides reason and how to apply it?

POM: Each individual


DA: Does each person know everything?

POM: No

DA: Then how can his reason be perfect?

POM: I have no clue what you are trying to say

DA: I will ask a question. What is the world made up of?

POM: Matter

DA: What is matter made up of?

POM: Protons, neutrons and electrons

DA: What are they made of?

POM: Quarks and neutrinos

DA: Have you ever seen a quark?

POM: No

DA: Have you ever seen a neutrino?

POM: No

DA: Have you ever done any experiment to show that matter consists of those three particles, protons, neutrons, and electrons?

POM: No

DA: Then how can you argue with me that matter has that?

POM: I know this because I read it somewhere that someone did some experiment. The name of those people who did the experiment is not important, but the result is. The conclusion of that experiment is that matter has those particles.

DA: That means that you are taking it on the belief that person was faultless in the experiment, and so where the thousands who followed him and did the same thing.

POM: Yes

DA: That means that you are going by faith, faith on that person and his scientific abilities

POM: I think so

DA: Even that, my dear, you thinking so, is faith

POM: Cut the crap and tell me what it is you are trying to say

DA: Like, how in religion, faith departs when reason comes in, there will come a time when reason shall fail. This can be because the knowledge of man which he has to apply to arrive at the reason shall become null and void, or the cognitive ability, that which makes him think shall dry out, or the limits that are enforced on his activities by his environment will take a turn for the worse. When I say this, I mean that he will not be able to reason further than what he has so far. When such a state is arrived, reason fails. Any progress that man makes after this is based not on reason, but only faith. It is faith that makes me think that the universe is a result of a big bang, just as it is faith that tells you that there is a god.
Faith is not supreme, neither is reason. It is a loop. One cannot exist with the other, but then one cannot exist without the other as well. Faith, even though blind, needs to have a reason, a cause, and a justification. Reason, even though more objective, even though more cognitive, needs faith, faith on works done before and faith on us, for it is us who reason.

Faith in reason,
Reason in faith.
Both are alone,
Both are together.
Bring one,
The other dies.
Remove one,
The other is dead.

Disclaimer: I had this actual conversation with two people, one showed me that reason is faith, and the other showed me faith is reason. I guess that I shall be forever indebted to them for this post.

Hiatus

I leave
But to return
I part

~Aditya

The End II

This poem is an afterthought of my own story, The End. This started as a thought and now rests as a full fledged poem. One is incomplete without the other. Even though you can understand this as a stand alone piece, it is not meant to be one.

My brothers,
Unknown,
Took your life,
They took
What you held dear.

I do not know
What they did,
I do not know
Why they did
What they did.

Now you stand
In front of me,
Claiming revenge,
Claiming
An eye for an eye.

I did not kill,
I did not plunder,
I did not ravage,
I did not murder,
I did not destroy.

Why do you
Do that to me,
When I did
Nothing
Directly to you?

You can take,
Take my heart,
Take my soul,
Take my life,
If it, you, satisfies.

If
My blood,
Soothes your,
Drink my friend,
Drink till the end.

~Aditya

Truth

This post has its origins with a question that I was asked - is truth absolute, or is it relative.

Truth is supposed to be a fact verified. It is supposed to be conformity to reality, and a value near to a true value. This brings us to the question, whose reality, whose verification and who is the person who sets the true value.

The process of knowing the truth is simple, know the fact to be verified, have the prerequisite knowledge, and cross verify this fact against the knowledge. This means that of the three steps two are ours. The knowledge and the testing process are ours.

When there is two-thirds of the truth that is subjective, how can truth be objective? How can it be absolute?

The truth is always relative.

Let as assume that there is some fact, which has not been verified yet. As long as someone does not know of its existence, it is not truth. It has no bearing on anything and it does as good as not exist at all. The reason being until someone can acknowledge its presence there is not effect of its existence.

When the first person perceives it, he shall perceive it according to the set of rules that he has formed for himself. He shall perceive that fact according to his own knowledge and shall state it to be a truth for the first time. This is the first truth and it is relative.

As time passes, more and more people will perceive the same fact and shall test its authenticity based on the knowledge and rules that they possess. This is to say that each person shall take this relative truth relatively. When they too come to the same conclusion based on their own cognitive processes, the authenticity is established. More the people who are in accord, more is the strength of the truth. If there is not one dissenting voice among the crowd, the truth shall get to be absolute.

Regardless of whether the fact is absolute truth, perceived by many to be the same thing, or relative, the moment I see it and start applying my thought process to understand it, it becomes relative. If my conclusions agree with the majority, the authenticity is enhanced, if not I become a dissenting voice. In the case of the latter, one would need to go over the truth forming process one again to ensure that they have the knowledge required and have used the correct cognitive processes for coming to the conclusion about the fact.

Truth seen for the first time
Is relative,
It is mine, it is new.
You agree, so does he,
We make it absolute.
When I see it anew,
I see it with my senses
It becomes relative.
Truth to me,
Is never truth to you.

God and Man

This post is inspired by the comment on Suchitra's Nandi

Man of flesh
To god of stone
Hear with stony silence
Words of lament
Words of pain.
Give me what I need
Give me what I want
Do not let me go alone,
Stay beside,
Do not tell me you are there.

Man of flesh
To god of heart
Hear my heart
As it cries out to you.
I hold you inside
For outside I mistrust
I hold you inside
For inside
Mine is truth
Truth is mine.

Man of flesh
To god of flesh
You gave me form
Which I gave you
Hold on to me
I hold on to you
Look out for me
Look out at me
For I can’t
Look you out

1st May 2007
~Aditya

Reason

Why does man exist? What was the reason behind his birth? Is there a reason what he is, what he wants to be, and what he is to become? Is there a reason?

If there is one thing that I have seen in the last year, it is this. Reason is supreme. I can say this with an amount of certainty. I hope that by the end of this post, I shall be able to say why.

A strange thought occurred to me today. Which would I take if I were given the choice between honesty, truth, reason, knowledge, and emotion? Without a moment of thought, I knew the answer. It is reason.

I shall begin with what is reason. Reason is cause. Reason is effect. Reason is like the root of a tree hidden from sight. Reason is the leaves that we see.

The dictionary gave me the meanings when I asked. There are six of them:
• A rational motive for a belief or action
• An explanation for the cause of some phenomenon
• The capacity for rational thought or inference or discrimination
• The state of having good sense and sound judgment
• A justification for something existing or happening
• A fact that logically justifies some premise or conclusion

I will go back to truth, emotion, honesty, knowledge, and reason.

If asked to order the above in the increasing order of importance I would have emotion, honesty, truth, knowledge and then finally reason.

Emotion is the human reaction to any given situation. This act requires the least thought. It is based on previous experiences, desires, and needs. There is irrationality when it comes to emotion. I need not elaborate on this; everyone has been in acceptance for centuries that to act on emotion is foolishness.

Honesty is, well being honest. It is saying what one perceives to be the truth at all points in time, it is making sure that one does not defraud anyone; one does not commit a crime, is free from any thoughts of doing the above, and is without pretensions. How important is this? The reason that I do not rate this as important is because it is derived from others. It does not have any importance of its own. One knows that one commits a crime when one knows what the laws that he/she is governed by are. One knows that one is speaking the truth when one knows what true and false is. One knows what honesty is only by knowing what dishonesty is and taking care not to follow that. How can something that does not have any meaning of its own be important?

This brings us to truth. Truth is fact verified. It is conformity to reality and actuality. Logically, one would think how does one know what is real and what is not? How does one know what is reality and what is a mirage? How can one differentiate between what is actual and what is not? The answer is from three steps. Step one – know the fact. Step two – know the premise against which it has to be verified. Step three – know the process of verification. When all these three are applied together, we get what is truth and what is not. This means that truth itself is derived from something else. It is knowledge.

Knowledge is the result of three things, perception, learning, and reasoning. I am not born with knowledge. I gain it by asking questions. I gain it by experimenting and trying to find out what caused the result of that experiment. I know because I learn, I know because I perceive and I know because I reason. This makes reasoning above knowledge.

Learning and perception, I have not touched. The reason being learning is a direct result of reasoning. I learn when I reason why, how, when, where, and what. Perception is too vague and differs from person to person.

That leaves reason. Reason is the cause. When one thinks about why something happens, one shall always conclude, everything happens because of a reason. Everything happens for a reason. When one thinks about what happened, we are reasoning what happened.

Reason is the effect. When one does something, the result is the reason that someone did the thing in the first place. One likes to think that everything they do has a well thought reason behind it.

Reason is knowledge,
I ask, so I learn.
Reason is truth,
I know, I asked, I learnt.
Reason is honesty,
I check, I knew, I asked, I learnt.
Reason is emotion,
I feel, I know why, I asked how.
Reason is reason,
I am because I reason.

She

Her breathe on my chest
As she lay beside, asleep,
Blew as a cyclone, To the depth of my heart.

The words I read in her eyes,
Say much more than her speech can,
The radiance of a full moon raising,
In the black of her eyes.

Divine music flows out,
With every word she sings,
Music like never heard before,
Reaches my tormented soul, brings peace.

And as she lay beside me,
Sleeping unfazed by this world around,
A calmer face, you’d never see,
Radiant like the rising sun.

Waves on a windy morning,
As she danced all around you,
You see in her bouncing tresses.

The way that her cheeks puff to a smile,
When the clouds of pink arise,
Pink as seen in a new born rose.

The birds start to chirp,
On seeing her every morn,
Without any make up,
Purer than the nature around.

She’d never walk at all,
Seemed to dance wherever she went,
Taking you along, a new life to behold.

~Aditya

Insane and Sane

Insane or sane,
I do not know.
The feeling I feel,
I never felt before.
Insane, I hope not,
Sane, I think not.

Insane or sane,
I do not know.
A way seems lost,
A fear seems found.
Hope not insane,
Feel not sane.

~Aditya

The Bride

She stands there at the doorway,
Watching every approaching face,
Searching for the face, she last saw,
On the day she was in silk and lace.

That day is still vivid in her memory,
When she was taken into a man’s life,
The pride that made her heart swell,
When she became a soldier’s wife.

The very next day the war began,
A war fought for the sake of peace.
“A soldier first, a husband next”, he said,
“I have to go and fight till the guns cease.”

She gave a husband to fight a war
With persons whom she did not hate.
Now she waits for him to return,
Knowing that it is in the hands of fate.

Many a mother have given their sons,
To die for the motherland of everyone.
Sons, born to a fathers face, unknown,
Nor do they realize they shall not come.

As she waits for him to return home,
In person, either in life, or in death,
The post man becomes her daily friend,
Lest her husband sneak up to her in stealth.

17th October 2003

~Aditya

Absence of Light

Absence of light around one
Keeps everything in the darkness.
One shall not see the shadow,
Behind the man we see, hidden.

Put the man in lights, ablaze,
The shadow comes out in the open,
The man is now standing alone,
Gone away his shadow.

The light is coming from here,
With the man standing before it,
The shadow is pointing away from him,
Away from the direction of light.

Put your world into the light
To see what with you is good,
So that the bad shall shrink away,
Driven by the light you receive.

Unless you come into the light,
You shall be blind to all,
As absence of light around
Keeps everything in the dark.

~Aditya

War and Peace

The world’s at peace
Wars not fought.
My mind’s at war
With an enemy hidden
No face, no body
No figure for me to wound.
Wounding it is, me,
To the depth of my soul.
My soul’s bleeding
And the wound’s too deep.
The world’s at peace,
The war’s inside me.

~Aditya

Who is next?

The guns of battle sound all around me,
A thousand cannons and a million guns
Each more devastating than the one before.
Death is free and is running amok,
The faceless man on the other side,
A side not your, containing enemies,
One that you have never met before,
Nor shall you ever meet again.
Madness to kill a man, unknown
A reason to do you have none.
What sin did he commit my dear friend,
The only sin, that he is from the other side.
He shall never see the face of his child
Holding on to its mother frail hands,
As they sit up looking at the winding road
Waiting for the day their love shall return.
But due to a stray bullet from your gun,
Those lonely eyes that scan the horizon
Shall keep scanning for the rest of their lives,
Searching for a soul that shall never return,.
The blood that stains your hands now,
A deed committed in the name of patriotism,
A word for frenzied murderous fervor,
You shall never wash it off your soul.
I am no better than any of those murderers,
I too have taken lives, some died before
Others still living, wishing they were dead
Worthless lives they lead, waiting to die.
Now I sit here waiting for the night
To come and envelop my tortured life.
Give me respite from all the killing
A time to rest, to plan whom to kill tomorrow.


~Aditya

No Face

Walking through the gentle drizzle,
Falling softly, making spots on me,
Bringing back memories of times gone by.
Hand in hand, we went forth,
To conquer all that was ahead of us.
No job seemed too small, no hill too tall,
All the wars we fought, we never lost.
You gave me the strength I needed to fight
And I gave the thought that you did.
Together we were not two but one,
But come night, you fled,
Relieving me of my strength,
Forcing the vigor of my brain to stop.
You were always there behind me,
As we walked into the rising sun,
And lead me on the lonely path ahead,
As we trudged away from the setting one.
A promise you made, of being beside,
As long I stay in the light,
No matter who may come and who may go,
That you will lie beside.
But during the times, I’d need you the most,
The time of the day when sleep beckons,
When the fears, faced during the day haunt,
Denying the rest, I deserve from drudgery.
No light beside I stay in the dark,
Not knowing the road, I should take,
No one to turn to calm the fear.
As I call out your name aloud at night,
I hear only my thoughts echoing.
You cannot come, as you are not there,
A promise you made remains unbroken.
I eagerly await the coming of the dawn,
To clear the clouds of doubt hanging above,
So I can behold the warmth called love,
That only the all-powerful white orb can give.
As I turn back to see the night,
That I spent in hell all alone,
You stand beside, as if nothing happened,
Ready to accompany to the goals we have.
I cannot ask you why you never stay,
Nor can you tell me where you go at nights,
For I have never seen you laugh or cry,
Or the twinkles that I think your eyes have,
As the shadow of mine can have no face.

18th December 2002

~Aditya

Light in Darkness

The whole world seems dark
And light, not one shining.
A flame, of hope, inside,
Shows the way you need to see

9^th July 2002

~Aditya

The window

The world is nothing but a room,
And we are forced to be inside.
Surrounded by four walls, inside given,
A view so restricted, to abide.

The only lookout, a window, open,
Bringing along a breath of fresh air.
Air so fresh, and air so pure,
Showing our existence, so bare.

Break down the walls and fly,
Out to the open skies around,
To rules you make and views you see,
Make yours, the rules you abide.

7th November 2002

~Aditya

Dream

Dream they’d say
As far as you dare.
Dream they’d say
For all that you care.
Dream they’d say
For anything’s possible.
Dream they’d say
With a little effort.

Be wary, I’d say
As how you dream.
Be wary, I’d say
As how high you soar.
Be wary, I’d say
To see the ground below.
Be wary, I’d say
Of dreams failing you.

Care I’d say
For dreams impossible.
Care I’d say
Of hopes harbored.
Care I’d say
As pain’s around the corner.
Care I’d say
Of knives knifing you.

~Aditya

Keep him alive

Scorned by the parent unknown above,
Rudely he was thrown out to the world below.
Came riding the god of death,
With his first breath, he took his mother’s last.

A loving father he did have,
Sadly the father loved some other.
Thrown into the streets outside,
A symbol of ill luck, a symbol of death.

Have always thought of the fact,
As how life can become death.
As to how a tiny baby, new born,
Can be potent enough to kill.


Scorned by the parent he knew not,
He walked on into this harsh world.
Building the roads, he walked upon,
Making the beds, he slept in.

Not a soul seemed to care,
No one asked if he had a meal,
No loving hand to soothe the pain,
Remnant of a haunting nightmare.

He never did once lose hope
Of getting back at this world.
More than the desire for revenge,
Was that to be accepted as a man.

Someday the scars began to heal.
That day when he found a friend,
Who saw him for what he was,
Not for what he had been or shall be.

That hand seemed to ease the way,
And the pain that came along.
The words gave him courage,
To live a life that lacked value.

What the world could not give,
What the parent would not provide,
When the going seemed to drag him down,
From where did that smile come along?

In a life filled with scornful faces,
Why is there that one with a smile?
In a world that dubbed him worthless,
How do those words kindle the use in him?

In a world filled with hate,
Why did that heart give him love?
Dear friend, in a world he’d rather be dead in,
Why does that hand keep him alive?

3rd September 2003

~Aditya

Dark day bright night

The dark of the day scares me,
Faces of terror encompass my soul.
The light of the night blinds me,
Unable to see the things I should know.

The hunger of those who are rich
Wanting still more bewilders me.
The contentment of those poor
In having their need puzzles me.

Peace I found in hell soothed me,
People atoned for the sins they committed.
Bedlam I found in heaven troubled me,
Regret for pardon of crimes forgotten.

Greed I found in god stunned me,
A greed for the good of the world,
Generosity of man shocked me,
Generous only if he were to gain.

I cannot comprehend the emotion of the mind,
Giving more importance to thought.
Nor do I understand the thought of the heart,
Putting emotion before the right.

The hatred of a mother amazes me
Of those who think ill of her child,
The love of an enemy on the other side
To kill those on this side baffles me.

The power that hate wields amazes me ,
To destroy what was created with love and care,
The weakness of love calms my nerves,
Never to destroy, creating beauty and joy.

The thievery of a saint impresses me,
Theft from the power of the hidden soul.
The piety of a thief seems strange,
Thievery to feed his loves ones, saintly.

The stupidity of education irritates me,
Minds filled with useless information.
The knowledge of ignorance pleases my mind,
Ways to live and wisdom to find.

The frown on a face of a friend captivates me,
Anger as I have strayed in my path.
The smile on the face of the foe of mine
A smile due to my waywardness, surprises me.

Dark of the day scares me,
Light of the night blinds me,
Things I have known and seen today
Shall make me a better man tomorrow.

5th March 2003

~Aditya

Hope

A walk along a rock-laden beach
Brings a parallel to the life we lead.
The wave crashes on the rocky beach,
All the energy gone in froth.
The wave, destroyed recedes,
To come back again, if only to crash.
Life too is similar, my dear,
The hopes we have are the waves,
The harsh reality, the rocky beach.
Every time the hope seems to break
Because the life was not ready
To fulfill that one harbored hope,
Never fret away your life.
Come back with renewed energy,
Because even with all seeming lost,
The only reason once can ever have
To try again, all over though once lost,
Is hope, even if it were to crash on rocks.

18th July 2002

~Aditya

Eyes of a child

Look at the world through the eyes of a child,
You shall see hope rising above despair.
Look at the world through the eyes of a child
You shall see the light that blinds the dark.

Smile at the world through the lips of a child,
You shall know the tenderness of all.
Smile at the world through the lips of a child,
You shall see the cause is love at heart.

Hear the world through the ears of a child,
You shall notice jealousy does not exist.
Hear the world through the ears of a child,
You shall know, as a result, rises trust.

Feel the world through the hands of a child,
You shall see the tenderness of a touch.
Feel the world through the hands of a child,
You shall feel the good of being so tender.

Live life like it were of a child,
You shall find the new future is there.
Live life like it were of a child,
You shall reach the distant new horizon.

26th September 2002

~Aditya

Natural Romeo

Blow, oh North Eastern wind,
All the way from here to where I don't belong.
See If thy can blow away the air, sinned,
That repels me away from there,
Asking me away from where I am pinned.

Burn with all thy might,
Oh, thou warmth giving sun, burn away the disease
That stops that heart from seeing the light
Of a new day having dawned,
To replace the dark we were in of a night.

Rise, after the departure of the orb, so hot,
Shine down with a cooling face, Oh moon,
See if thy can stop the war fought,
And bring peace back to the mind,
Peace that we deserve a lot.

Blaze away, Oh fuel eating flame,
Fed by images of love and passion.
All left behind reasons so lame,
See if thy can burn them to ashes
And make thee worth thy name.

Pour down, thee all quenching rain,
Bringing relief to the parched heart.
See if thy can create for them who refrain
Gardens of truth and hope,
For both the heart and the brain.

Open for me, earth under my feet,
Swallow the fear they possess,
Of times which they are scared to meet.
Give them the strength thy store,
To laugh with me at danger and it to greet.

Flow, Oh rampant raging river,
Flow to the heart that does not feel,
The hopes I harbor even as they sliver,
Meander along, if thou can't force,
To show them I am a forgiver.

Erupt now, Oh volcano inside,
Pour out the burning lava from deep inside.
Reach out and thaw that ice of a heart that died,
Or burn the stone that may lie there,
That caused a death over which no one wept.

Oh, thou sentries of the world so new,
One to which I don't belong to now,
Put together an act, known to few,
Go and do what I could not do,
Woo for me a girl, looking like morning dew.

22nd December 2002
~Aditya

Sin

I stood by myself,
Then her, I saw.
Companionship, I craved,
Up sprang lust.
Through flames I walked,
To clear myself of sin,
Sin, of being human,
Sin of being alive.

Not a morsel,
Had I taken in days.
Pangs of hunger,
They ran wild.
I look at food, not to partake,
To clean up a sin,
Sin of being human,
Sin of being alive.

Day and night,
I toil.
The rewards,
Justly mine, of my toil,
I cannot desire,
I cannot have.
A sin, sin of working,
Sin of greed, for my work.

My wants, limited,
My desires, limited.
My work,
Aimed at this, limited.
I have to work more,
To repent a sin,
Sin of sloth,
Sin of simplicity.

Injustice, prevalent,
Reaction none.
My temper fails.
Dismember, to rejoin, to dismember,
My body in hell.
To pay for a sin,
Sin of having emotions,
Sin of being human.

I see you,
Better than I am.
I see me, I can be better.
Envy
Raises its green-eyed head.
I sew my eyes shut,
Purging a sin,
Sin of desire to excel.

I performed, I excelled.
I showed myself,
What I am worth.
Pride I felt,
In being me.
With bowed head, I walk,
Whipped, to be humble in sin,
Sin of being myself.

Lust, desire,
Gluttony, hunger,
Greed, want,
Sloth, satisfaction,
Anger, wrath,
Envy, motivation,
Pride, excellence,
All sins, all human.

~Aditya

(To read more on this refer Seven Deadly Sins from Wikipedia)