Resolution

The slate is wiped clean again,
Another festival, a new start,
A resolve-inspiring confrontation,
Resulting in a baptism within,
Absolving me of the guilt of past action (bygone),
Cleansing the conscience, turning a leaf,
Planting a mental seed of positivity,

Sometimes eyes must remain in one's self,
And not floating above, perceiving things objectively,
The pristineness they inspire to be dwelt upon,
Imbibed, relished and reveled in,
And while the soul soaks in it,
One welcomes change, embracing it wholly,
Stepping upon fleeting moments of joy,
To rise towards betterment,

They may laugh at my momentary resolve,
Ridicule my jump into action,
They know not but I do,
That I'll make it work this time.

A Battle Fought Alone

When facing unexpected bother,

Perhaps even anticipated fear,

When suffering in pain or sunk in sorrow,

Or when awaiting a never-to-come tomorrow,

When lost or facing the inevitable,

I give up on life,

Withdrawing from the burden of choice,

And the truth of consequence,

And when that happens not,

My world shrinks to naught,

I see myself trapped,

In my own being, caged.

In a cell made of my own spirit,

Struggling hard to get out,

Such is the agony of discomfort,

One that leaves not no matter what the effort.

Oh how can the indivisible soul escape itself?

Can one possibly outrun oneself?

Such thought clouds the exposed mind,

Forming a protective shield,

And as romance guards the fickle brain.

The soul fights a battle in vain,

Dying from the wounds of battle,

It resurrects to a wiser, freer one upon a higher mantle,

The ship of time carries the burden away,

While I gaze after it as it makes its way,

The hitherto claustrophobic soul rises,

Taking in fresh breaths,

Unclenching its vain fists in relief,

While I wipe away images of the grief,

Doors open as if they were closed before,

And a cool breeze seeps in like it was routine,

Some battles can only be fought alone, I sit back wondering,

Laden with vague memories and stark learnings.

If it'd been real or merely a dream,

For it had all happened too soon,

But perhaps it doesn't matter, if it was thought or fact,

What matters is that my soul is intact,

As I revere my experience with newfound respect,

I slip, slowly, back into comfort with myself.

Written at 1:08am on 27.10.2016 at Aero structures lab, IIT Bombay

A Writer's Little Stumble?

A recent discovery of mine is that when my mind doesn't have a grip, its creativity is at its best: it has nothing to do with me, the guy who takes any initiative: it is my mind, yes - a bundle of thoughts of which I am sure, I am the only witness, but my mind - it has a,well, a mind of its own. Perhaps its movement is controlled by some law of inner nature that is yet to be discovered by science. Creativity when under pressure seems to be a corollary of this fact. In recent times, half sleep states have churned out some pieces of writing that have surprised me. to the extent that I end up wondering if it was indeed I who wrote it. But thankfully I have been conscious at those times and possess the memory of writing every word - albeit on another plane, and that puts any doubt of whether I am possessed, at rest. The most noteworthy example would be "Come, visit me by my grave" - a piece I woke up thinking I had written in a dream. Specific details were new to me when I re-read the article - I supposed that this is what writing hangovers felt like.

At such times, I gladly hand over custody of my pen to my mind, letting it do as it pleases, giving it the authority to google synonyms for words as well (yes, I do that a lot). There are times when I go through what is written and then correct it, and those when I consider the words far too holy (forgive my impertinence) to be tampered with. I believe the state of my mind can be fathomed by those who read the work - at least the ones who know me well.

During one such unguarded moment yesterday, my unsteered heart took a turn that I had been consciously avoiding - one that had never forced itself upon me - a dare that I had sort of given myself but had chosen to not take up - I expended some ink on writing in Tamil. It wasn't a great piece, just a couple of cliched lines that are usually passed as dismissive statements in my mother tongue laden with philosophy but often never meant. I wasn't particularly proud after I wrote it - it had sounded better in my mind, but not great on pape- well, on the screen. I still thought I'd let it be.

I often disconnect with my writing once I publish it on my blog (that'd explain the spelling mistakes in my old articles) but this one stayed on in my mind - not its content but the fact that I had written something in another language. Well, you can laugh, but you've got to understand this: it takes quite a bit of tuning to get into the mode of writing, especially when it is poetry. Language isn't natural but feelings are - it takes a lot of canals to force formless, shapeless emotions to form phrases that truly represent them, in a way that every reader, irrespective of the era, should be able to connect to exactly the same feeling. Such channeling takes a while to adapt to, be it in any language. Command over the language is secondary. You need to think in words. Yes, it's a sacrifice to be a writer. We don't do it only because we like it - I like to call it mental pregnancy - the experience needs to be delivered. And I've tuned my mind so well that it's one big slut - it gets impregnated by every silly sight these days (I'm probably the only happy guy to say that).

Tuning the mind is similar to tuning a radio - each language is a frequency and once you're tuned into - each commercial frequency value is a language, and once you want to tune out of a frequency, it takes a lot of effort to tune back into it. Tuning into a different language takes a lot of time too. People unable to express themselves are the ones who aren't able to hear anything other than noise on the radio - ultimately, it's all a question of right training and so anyone can become a writer. Anyway, so, this Tamil thinking that generated Tamil writing got me - um, thinking. I worried that English had deserted me. At least I wasn't guilty since I hadn't initiated this transformation.

Yeah, Tamil is my mother tongue - and for the record, I like it, but so what? Does that mean I should only do "Tamil" stuff (whatever that means)?

Did I disturb the membrane? Burst a bubble? Start a sequence of ripples? Ok, I think I'm blowing up a simple matter. I guess I'd rather not speculate, and instead, sit back and watch.

Written at my room on 20:57 on 25.7.2016

The Scientific Huntsman

He holds his pen in position and takes aim,
Targeting a phenomenon with his experimental viewfinder,
Loading his weapon with observation,
He fires his tests about,

Nature writhes, and struggles to hold on,

Putting up a fight before she gives her cub, phenomenon, up,
While the latter lies motionless but alive,
As the scientist-hunter picks her up,
Mercilessly locking her up,
In the cage of a Law,

Trapping phenomenon on paper,

The cub dwells in the zoo of publication,
Ogled at by other men of science,
Who click pictures, citing her in their zoos.

At times, the club's mother prowls by,
Clenching her paws in rage,
She flings disaster upon mankind, that heartless race,
Which took her child away.

Written on 23rd Oct, 2016 1:40pm at H13 mess, IIT Bombay

'Pon the Hill of Bliss

Perched upon the peak of peace,
A hillock I seldom wish to descend,
I look down upon my friends,
Who stand beside yet far below,

The cool breeze caresses me,
Sans hands yet reaching within,
Engulfing me in a warm embrace,
Cleansing my soul of the sins of yore,

Eyes closed, I look around,
A view beyond sight, yet possible to behold,
It is a nameless hue, yet one I know,
That fills the space around, and that within,

The mind-moon shines, radiating its coolness,
Its pale light enveloping all,
The night is young and so it shall be,
For now and for all time to come,

I dwell in it, my very own hill,

Filled with a wonder known only to me,

An infinite expanse of platonic bliss,

Endless, pure and everlasting.

Written between 2:47pm on 22.10.2016 and 1:35am on 23.10.2016

Falling Prey to Senses

Falling prey to his sensual rogues,
Caught in the delusion that it is a vogue,
Having lost his calm and cool,
He is but a hoodwinked fool.

A carcass in the jaws of the carnivore,
Choosing to be devoured,
His body burning in the flames of desire,
His mind turning ignited by the fire,

Ignoring counsel and words of wisdom,
Dismissing it as coming from a boring herd,
Like a zombie he lives life,
Oblivious to his miserable plight,

He lets his senses sway him about,
Lashing things left and right,
His mind losing its grip fast,
He stares, helpless, unaware, lost -

And today's society likes and cheers,
Like cynics afflicted with the same plague, his peers,
He follows as sheep, aimless and adrift,
Throwing empty words of fashion and logic,

He is but a moron, devoid of thought,
Misguided by his fellows who share his fate,
One day he will face a hurtful fall,
Knocking sense into his hardened skull,

It will fill him with compassion for young ones,
Who choose the path he'd once tread on,
But lo, his tongue is tied, for a herd he's joined,
One he'd named and mocked.

Written at Biosciences Lab, IIT Bombay 15th Oct, 2016 (7:20pm) - improvised on the morning of 16th Oct

On Music #2

Emerging from the abyss of nothingness,
Particularly bright in the darkness of closed eyes,
It beats the heart-drum, pursuing its strings,
Swaying my mood about,
Stealing my focus with ease,
Oh who discovered this marvel, music?
The key to joy in life

Life

A thing like the one beside it,
Yet different from it,
Composed of matter like the former,
Yet comprising of something else altogether,

One knows somehow that they are different,
For they live, breathe, feel and eat,
What distinguishes life from inert matter?
Is it stirring or some biological factor?

It is alive, be it a single cell or a large creature,
But because of cytoplasm or some physical feature?
One may detect life through these but what defines it?
Is the Unnamed Conscience described by a formula on a chit?

How can one define a phenomenon by its effect?
A feeling by an inanimate compound?
Would that not mean, that a beaker of a hormone,
Has feelings too?

Do you think that naming your subject,
Lets you know it all?
Our definitions are indicative and useful, yes,
But not even remotely wholesome,
Theories and hypotheses have come and gone,
With each one eventually brushed aside,

Life is subjective, not an objective entity,
Felt by oneself, not others -
Yes, empathy is that magical bridge,
That connects lives across this material dimension.

Perhaps we are to learn,
That objective may not be whole -
That Another exists,
In a manner unknown -
Another Nameless Being,
That understands it all...

A page from my diary

The past few months have been, well, different - starkly so, in terms of a lot of things, and, in particular, writing. The discovery that I could write poetry has certainly been emotionally rewarding, and has raised my literary confidence to levels that I never knew, existed. I feel truly free in the apparently two-dimensional but truly multidimensional world of words. Poems come to me at ease, flowing forth as a fluid would flow when there is a significant pressure difference.

However, poetic as this experience with poetry may be, it has taken a toll on my writing. There is now an urge to dramatize every little thing, and I spend my time involuntarily looking for metaphors to describe them, even worse, desperately trying to rhyme words. I find that while this poetry phase has brought out a couple of good (sorry) poems, what I've incurred substantial losses. Strong opinions have now almost completely been replaced by strong emotions that overwhelm me. I tear up more easily than ever, and even otherwise, have become quite sensitive. My vocabulary in speech has received a blow, and I find it difficult to frame full sentences, at least on paper. This post itself stands testimony.

I realize now, that I have tuned myself to write poetry, and why I stay in this frequency, it is extremely difficult to come up with prose. 60+ poems seems like a good number, and I am considering tuning myself back to the prose frequency - but I do not know what the repercussions will be. I'm slightly tired of putting commas after phrases and starting new lines with capital letters. My more recent poems have become soulless and stale, and this can definitely be counted as a sign. I miss writing long articles where I digress to point out something totally different and then connect it back with the big picture. I miss framing sentences that have poetic metaphors.

But then again, what if my natural current state is to compose poems and not articles? I did not choose poetry - in fact, I believed that I wasn't capable of it, and it came to me of its own accord. Am I disturbing that equilibrium by attempting to go against the flow? Will this result in me getting stuck in a no man's land where I'd be incapable of writing anything? I'm not sure if I can handle that - oh, I'm not talking about missing the appreciation - with all due respect to you folks, I have only a handful of readers, but you people appreciate me even without my writing. I'm worried about there coming a time when my heart is filled with content and my fingers refuse to budge.

This might sound silly, but it feels like a big step to me - perhaps I should write a few more poems? Perhaps touch a hundred? No, the quality is bad already. There are quite a few poems that I've written and kept to myself on a personal medium, for I find them far too sensitive to share - and  then there are half baked ones that I am incapable of completing. I feel inadequate to compose now - perhaps I should take a break. At least from poetry. And I must be ready to digest the fact that I might never be able to compose another poem - that doesn't hit me badly, I feel pretty satisfied with the poems I've written. I couldn't bring myself to write one as good as, say "The Admirer", or "On the Partition". My poems have become dull and repetitive. I'm not dejected or something - I don't need a pep talk now, I'm just weighing the options before making a choice - an obscure one at that. To you, it, I might seem melodramatic - why would there be the question of a choice between one form of writing and another? Well, there is. And I'm not looking for suggestions, I'm just thinking out loudly. And choosing to publish my thoughts. You may choose to ignore this post - in fact, I might tak it down some day, but as of now, I'm just letting it be.

And I don't have to tell you when I make my choice. You'll know.