Writing Is Exhaling

Loved by blogadda~ thanks!!

Writing to me is… Exhaling slowly!!

There is nature in excess
Splayed out in front of us;
 Dancing, pushing, disappearing—
Completely narcissistic and shameless!
I choose strangest of places; crouch there in silence
Trying to catch hold of a canvas--within
At a turn of every trail- there's
A panorama of beauty- seeking its way
Impulsively, it takes my mind in its grip
Oh me!
My heart starts thumping wildly…
I go out…
Start searching again....
Amused at my efforts
I hold my breath. And
Exhale…!! That's my initiation..
...a green blade of grass shivers
I accuse her of losing patience; turn around
Start peeling the landscape, tier over tier
Think of surrealism, metaphors, symbolism, art; and
 bring out my notebook; and start writing!!
Such grand exhibitions travel to me often
Writing seems, an eternal sojourn...
A relentless drip-drip of words,
refresh the parts of my brain that needs motivation
What a joy to see my notes---somewhere, sometime.
Art is certainly not independent of its surrounding!
But for the current moment, I am taking the time
to draw in a nice long breath--Inhale!!
I intend to exhale it slowly, next time :D


I love this quote.... " Reading is the inhale, writing is the exhale."--Justine Musk.
 Two separate things yet inexplicably linked....


This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.

Hanging Around

Thank you, blogadda!!

‘You wake up, go to the bathroom and look at the mirror’…

A child’s image with cleft lip and palate

Cowers in the edge; the slum boy's

mutated grin intrudes, shapes in form 
on your mute mirror-wall...  
medical care is beyond his paltry means; you nod
and hear your heart!

for once, you ruminate,’ how can you help him..?’

but then,  his eternal wants..... perpetual needs

cough up fire; and it throws you into an abyss

insists…  you lie dormant,......Silence seeps

You look into the mirror again;

 this time.....he ceases to smile. but

the weight on his eyelids cracks a light

and pushes you in the waning light… one more time!

you stand.....surreptitiously....disguising yourself
you start wiping the mirror to free the grime

 ...the stains.....disorders.... ...ennui....reflection

you know  well,  nothing can be reversed 

a slum life is putrid, and

almost unbreathable… the tunnels have no lights, no air

an impassable wave of guilt gathers and breaks  inside you

you mourn…winds roar on high outside

clouds come by camouflaging those gruesome stares

Like a shadow, the image slips out noiselessly        once again,

…and in a minute, you pull back           disappear! 



Poverty, hunger, disease stalk our world… and when I see beautiful children smiling in photographs or on films, it numbs my heart. Wonder, is  it a message of hope? Do I pity them? Have they just not yet learned to pity themselves? It's heartbreaking to say the least....

This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggersby BlogAdda

Disburden

This is dedicated to all those gorgeous dusky girls ...

‘You’re dark’, my mother told me several times

She was worried about my dusky skin

Many mumbled unkind things about my color

I stood in front of the mirror one day

Asking it secretly if I were really ugly…

The mirror laughed

An interminable conversation went on

Only to burn my skin more

Crumbling my mind to dust

Sobbing I rose, walked towards

The hedge of bougainvillea

The breeze wafted in, gave me a shove

Swabbed the hollows to calm me down

The wind became my shield and savior!

There was hope, always the hope of a miracle; so

Keeping my fingers crossed

I entered my teens…

My figure began to burgeon

With a softness here, a tenderness there

There was a gloss of novelty all over

I was ready to stride

On a world full of several colors

I celebrated my birth

But, my mother once again

Broke the stupor; she said….

‘You’re growing up, you've to be careful

Never come out in your petticoat

Not even when your father’s around’

I cringed; the facts were painful,

So the mist was gone once again

The innocence vanished

Naturally, instinctively and effortlessly...

I lost my sky to day-dream, to fly my kite

The sky, stars and fragments of me mourned

Growing up became something shameful

I held through my girlhood

Till one day I woke up in my white bed

With spots of blood; my mother said,

It only showed that I was ready to be a mother

I would bleed like this for years and years

I prayed…

 ‘God, let this not happen to me,

 let there be a miracle’

but there were no miracles,

it became a torture.

Keeping my fingers crossed

I blended in again, entered adolescent 

Gradually I grew, and

I became a woman

With a perfect curve of hips and

Slimness on my waist

I learnt to take in male stares

And one day I fell in love…

My admiration pleased him too

Faith moves mountains, so they say; I smiled

The color of the skin didn't matter

Love was kind, so the reality was so much better

My defenses innocently gave away

 My heart was livid now with a bornfire within

It turned my world around

People do make this world different and worthwhile

Love is not a deception, nor a lie

You—an enigmatic mirror!!