melancholy....

i blackened my eyes till they looked as black.. oh black as the night ocean..
i blushed my cheeks till they burned their way through and ate me up...
i bled my lips till they dripped my whole heart out...
i draped myself in pale red...
knowing full well it was what you liked...
i ran to meet you...
fighting them who stood against...


only you never came...
only you never meant to come....

mai best frend...

Her naime is Koel. She s 19 yers old...tre yers yungr t me... but we ar best frends... she levs t saime boks as I do..ar favrit bok s 'totochan'... my moma yused t reed it fur mi.. ar musik taists difer tho... she levs rok! i haite it...

oooh... but she s reel fun... she kin maike u laf.. kry... just as it soots her... n i cant eva furgit t taimes wen she has bin ther fur mi..

loog taime bak, no won yused t tok t mi..everywon yused t say i wes mad... den she caime... she wes .. no.. is d best...

evun today sumbudy throo stons at mi.. they also tide things t my skirt .. n i maide loud souns wen i walkt.. they laf at mi.. i yused to kry.. a loot.. eerlier.. but nouw i m faine... i hav u .. so wot if they cant see yu.. so wat if they tink i am tokin t nobody.. so wat if they tink i m mad...

i don caire.. i hav yu.. mai best frend...

a girl...

i heard a big bang to my left... i jerked my head to see what it was... and then i saw her... a tiny, brown girl with matted hair and large eyes... a shopkeeper was shouting at her... she just looked on...

i went close to her, bent down and smiled... she had broken the vase kept outside while running behind a kitten... she looked at me with those large eyes... and then looked away...

i tried to hold her hand... she jerked it from me... i paid for the damage... she didnt react... just looked on...

i left... and then i felt a tug on my skirt... she was standing with her palm outstretched... asking me for money...

broken shells

I turned in my bed and tried counting sheep again. I have been doing this for the past three weeks. I need to see a doctor I guess... or this might very well turn into some complicated form of insomnia... that is, if it already hasn’t done that. I was always a light sleeper. Lights and noise were enough to keep me up for hours. But these days, the house is dark and quiet. It is the loudness of my thoughts that makes me an insomniac, or on the verge of becoming one.
Soon... I say to myself... soon...

__________________________________________________________________________________

I saw him for the first time in the railway station. And somehow, my eyes just lingered on him. It was not because of the ‘electricity in the air’. It was just because he was tall, very tall. And he hefted the big bag he had so easily... I am sure all the girls in the station were staring at him too. And my fervent prayers were answered the moment I sent it up. He sat in the coupe where I was. I glanced at him shyly... on and off... He was reading ‘Fountainhead’... my then favourite. And no, it was not fate. I certainly don’t believe that.
We started speaking somehow... I don’t remember how it started. All I know is that we ended up talking for hours, and I did feel a connection with him... we ‘vibed’ well together.

____________________________________________________________________________________

He had gotten down in the night to get me some water. The train started moving and he hadn’t noticed. I shouted... He ran behind the train, and was almost on the last step when he slipped.

___________________________________________________________________________________

I can’t live with myself anymore. Soon... I tell myself...soon. I’ll soon gain the courage to kill myself for killing him.

Broken shells

So thin the layer was, I shivered
So much that my teeth fell off
And I was turned into this old lady
I stared at myself in the mirror
Stared at this apparition
A shell of who I was once upon a time
I grew old
And saw the crack on the shell
All that I had left
Of this me... who was once more me than me...
The cracks frighten me...
But I am a realist
I have learnt to accept them
As mine own
As me... may be more me than I ever was...

fly like the eagle bird...

The swing was bright yellow in colour. She and her friends would take turns on it every day, trying to swing faster each time. It was she who came up with the idea. According to her, as the swing went high in the air, at the precise moment, in the precise position, if one jumped, one would fly... “just like that eagle bird Mama pointed out that day.” And of course everyone believed her. She was, after all, the one who made that ‘flying saucer thingie’.
She wanted to be the first to fly, so she mounted the swing. Feeling the familiar surge of energy (or adrenaline, as the grown-ups would say), which came every time she embarked on one of her adventures, she pushed off and kicked her legs to and fro with all her might. The swing rose high and for some reason, the image of her favourite chocolate truffle cake (“the one my Mama makes!”) came to her mind. She pumped her legs with as much energy as she could muster. The swing went faster and faster. She could hear her friends cheering, somewhere far below. At the precise moment, in the precise position, she let go. She flew for precisely 2.3 seconds before she crashed. She whispered to herself as her friends ran to her side, “Next time, I should jump after about five more seconds. Then I’ll fly like that eagle bi... Mama show...” And then, she lost consciousness...

the voice...

The whistle sounded. The people on the platform started moving to my right. They were all moving in the same way. Only I sat still... in the train. I looked at them pass by and I smiled.

I am 28 years old; I feel forty though. I have had a good life, neither too great, nor too bad... just like you. Yes, I am an ordinary woman, with curves and flats in the wrong places and lots of bad hair days too. I work in one of those nondescript schools: a nondescript teacher. I write occasionally, but my ‘art’ remains hidden in my diary. Soon, I’ll be the nondescript wife of a nondescript guy and be part of a nondescript family in a nondescript place. Life...

I took a book; flipped its pages. And my mind drifted...
***
It was a cloudy evening. The wind was strong, and I could get an occasional whiff of the salty air from the sea. I love such days. I was standing on my balcony, watching the trees dance. And that was when I saw the dog. He looked like a stray dog, but he had a black collar around his neck. Why I noticed him was because of the happiness he seemed to exude. He was happiness... from the top of his head to the tip of his short tail. And he was smiling... no, I am not exaggerating. I could even say he was laughing, the way his tongue was lolling out, and the way he was prancing. I heard a man’s voice. “Patch!” The dog ran to meet him, whoever he was...
And somehow I remember thinking of that voice... again and again...
***
Two days passed. It was raining heavily that day. I love watching the rain. I love listening to it too. I was gazing out of my window, when I saw the dog...again. It jumped out of a car and ran across the street. A truck came, rounded the corner... A tall man stepped out of the car, wearing a long coat. His face was covered by a muffler. He ran to where the dog lay...dead. I heard his voice. “Patch...” I cried that day... for the happy dog... and for that voice.
***
I saw the car several more times, but I never saw him for the longest time. Four months after the dog died, I was watering my plants when my mother’s old college mate knocked. She had come to invite us for her son’s marriage.
***
I wore blue silk for the wedding. It was the first time I was meeting the groom. I took one look at him, and I somehow felt... no, I knew... it was whom the voice belonged to. And then, when he spoke to me, I was sure of it. His wife was not too pretty, but she had a lovely smile.
***
“Falling in love is not a flash decision. It is something you do after a lot of thought,” I had heard myself say to my friends over and over again. But I fell in love with a voice, a voice which had uttered a single word, that too not to me... the voice of a man who had called out to a stray dog so lovingly..had made it laugh...

I move on... I'll never forget the voice though...
Life...