Home

What is home? Do most of us have one? Do we ever stop trying to find a home? Did the young orphan try to find his home in other people or empty hotel rooms where his mistresses would come and go? Or in shadows of people he thought he knew? Or in people he met at drab restaurants? Did he ever quit finding a home? Do we ever stop? Does the tired traveler ever get to his home? Or does he keep changing train-stations? Did he lose himself in the air?

Migratory birds.

At the party, someone asked, “Have you ever found that one place which you can call home?”

Everyone had something to say. Mostly because they had been to places. Mostly because they were empty. Mostly because they had nothing to share. All of them had found homes in residues and filters of cigarettes and wines and liquor. All of them had found homes in slot machines and airports and seas and mountains. In people and love and sorrow.

What did I have to show for my home?

I do not think I am meant to be here. I have no home–so I am not meant to find it, to search for it. I had a home once–in my own self. Until I messed up and now I am not allowed back in. People never let me in–and when they did, I never felt like staying. I never had any force entries–people were always scared and intimidated and I loved it. And home is lost to me just like I am lost to home. I am not lost just not found yet. And when and if I ever am found–I will get away from the fire-escape. Because I have no shadow. Because I am a shadow of someone not supposed to be here. Because I am the tide–it comes and it goes. I had a home once–and there was silence there. Because home is a sickness. It has no cure.

The room grew quiet for a second. Then the silence faded and there was music. And I danced because I had to escape, like most people. And like most of them–I knew it all.

Ripples and Gold

So there were talking shadows on the silver edges
Of the cold blue pier
Where she sat and looked at her other self
Which talks of the misty air
Unfrozen birds and pink clouds
And lies–too much to bear
Would she rest her head on the rising tide
Or dance around without a care?
Ripples and gold, green skies and a pink canvas
Why did her smile disappear?
Sanctuaries of laughter,  disposable worlds and flash mobs of giddy people
Yet they all cried with blue tears
Ripples and gold–
She sat on the edge of the river, on a damp railing–at the pier.

Saya–Shadow

We often become overcome by sunlight which emanates from within our cold core and exhumes us and turns into an inextinguishable fire which then spreads out. There is no way around it. If we let it burn, it burns everything. If we embrace it, it overtakes us. If we let it go–it eventually becomes faint and fizzles out. It is like a forlorn shadow which follows us around.

Of this, like most people we meet in our lives–who are meant to stay and meant to leave, there is no tangible memory. They become ghosts which follow us and haunt us like shadows, sometimes to entangle with our bodies and often, just as parts outside of us–trying to fill us and make us whole. But they never will and they never can. Because they are shadows, incomplete.

And we–all of us, are defected. In that, we have one main defect; we are missing from ourselves. We are absent from ourselves. And every time we try to catch our own fleeting shadow–we fail.

And we often sit around in odd places where no one knows us–thinking to ourselves that maybe serendipity will come through and maybe we will see someone or something who can take a look at the turmoil that we are and see the nakedness of our being and appreciate it. But it never happens. And if it happens, we suddenly grab hold of ourselves and draw the curtains back–because no one actually wants to be seen. No one actually wants to be felt. No one actually wants to be touched.

And like shadows–we follow ourselves into the great mists of yesterday, today and tomorrow. And like shadows we sometimes fade mid-way. Just like the people who come and go from the busy trapdoors of our lives.

But the truth is, we cannot have shadows without ourselves. And whether they are elongated or shortened or dark or light or in front of us or behind us—they are there, unwilling to leave us, as we are, reluctant to let go of them.

We are all, in a very requited way, attached with our shadows!

It’s a Crack

The window from which you look outside-into the grey stillness of the fading away world, has a crack. A very small and subtle one. But it grows every minute and soon it will turn into a void. Do you see this crack? Does it remind you of yourself? Does it remind you of anyone else? Does it remind you of the tragedy that is the human world? The human world which has been taken over by the crowds of people. Banal. Does it remind you of the the rabid dog which goes around yelping into the bleak, dingy streets filled with darkness? Does it remind you of the transsexual romantic wandering looking for closure form the world? Does it remind you of anything? Anyone?

Because there is a crack in everything. And everything is in that crack.

Remember the time when the sparrow waded in the sky and looked down below and the only thought it had was about jumping down and killing itself…Only the tragedy was that it had wings and it could fly. You do not remember because you were not there. But next time you are, remember this. Maybe that is why the sparrow flies. To dive down so it can perish. Maybe it is not about the flight, the freedom–maybe it is chained because of its wings! You do not know–because you do not have any wings. And that is your tragedy.

Remember the time when an orphan boy roamed around in disarray, finding a home inside his house, bluffing with his own being. He adopted a stray dog, because he saw something familiar in it. Only, the dog got gunned down, shot once, shot twice, shot dead and cold. That is the tragedy of the orphan boy who now wanders the streets, finding a home outside his house. You do not remember, because you have a home–outside your home. And that is your tragedy.

Do you recall the time when the old woman forgot herself? She sat in a wooden chair looking at the window with the crack and simply forgot who she was. She could not remember her happiness or her sorrows or her longing or her empty shell. She forgot to smile. She forgot to cry. She only remembered that she has forgotten herself. That is her tragedy. Oh so you do recall! That is your tragedy.

Remember the poetry of the vagrant? How they talked about the happy worlds and the giddy dreams? And the tumult in those cryptic words? Silence in the dead language? Remember how the vagrant passed it on to no one–and was lost! That was his tragedy. You can not remember because it made no sense to you. And so the poetry of the world was lost once more–and that is your tragedy.

I have no more stories for you–except I do. But like a subtly cracked window–I will pretend I have nothing. Except I have an abyss. And your tragedy is that I see, I feel and I hear. But you cannot see me watching you, listening to you, feeling you. Because you do not perceive me–you cannot hear me, you cannot feel me. That, perhaps is the tragedy of those around me. And my tragedy is that I know it and understand it.

And the window has a crack. But it is just a crack. And it is a defiant one. And like all defiant things–it too shall break. And that is perhaps the biggest tragedies of all. The tragedy of all tragedies.

Chrome

Dusk dispatched messages for those who liked to linger in the wild calamitous shores of the Night every time it reached a transition point. And though there were only few–they never opened those messages. For they knew already what Dusk would have to say, they feared what Dusk had to say–and they were tormented.

Sometimes they stayed back and did not cross over to the night. They became ghosts. Sometimes they climbed the broken walls and would glance at the Night. They could not decipher its mysteries and its depth. But neither could Night decipher their longing for the Dusk. So sometimes they would hang back and stay over, within the Dusk–the silent stillness which marred it with its pink, orange and lavender skies and the dead clouds which were as formless as ever. It was then that they would become free.

Dusk would leave messages for those who liked to stay back. But they would not open or read  them–they felt betrayed. How could they not! For they could stare at the Dusk for hours and become immersed within it, becoming one with its slits, with its dismal glory, with its sorrow, its longing and its clouds which were as formless as ever–and Dusk would not stare back.

For it was Dusk–the cross over, the transition, the orifice of the day and night–it could not stay forever. For it was an episode in the grand theater–and it wasn’t final and it wasn’t anything. For it could not linger on around the empty shores of the people and it could not stare at the hollow, slowly turning pages of them–it could not stay back and listen to the silent music of their souls. Dusk was not free. Dusk was not a ghost.

And so–it would dispatch letters and messages which no one would read. And one time during a moment of transition–a passing wind blew one of the messages towards the Man who would stay back every time–staring at the immensity of the coming night, shuddering–with his eyes fixated towards the Sky which was asking questions he did not have the answers to. And the spell was broken momentarily, and he glanced at the letter and a lament of pain escaped him. And that was the last he was seen–on the shores, for he crept silently into the dark abyss of Night, never to be seen again–leaving the Sky broken and alone–as it suddenly took the shape of a question never to change back into the blue vastness.

Bird in my Head

I sit in a dark room thinking about darkness
I have a glass of blood in my hands
And a bird flies quietly in my head
I do not know why
I will sit here. For hours to come. And minutes and seconds
Thinking about darkness
All the light that I lost
And I cannot look around me
There is a bear which plays the flute
And I do not understand why
There is darkness around me
And I am the light.
And soon I’ll burn myself out
As I burnt my candle turning it into the wildfires
The ghosts play the piano
And I can not dance
But I do not know why
I can hear laughter and people talking
But it must be all in my head
Yet I do not know why

It’s like the days are not even days any more.
Night isn’t night anymore.
I am not even who I was anymore.
The sky has turned into ash, it isn’t blue anymore
The moon is a black dot, it isn’t the moon anymore
The sea has turned into soot, it isn’t it anymore
The tree upon which I gazed outside
It is not standing there anymore…perhaps it travelled north or towards a dusty gloom
I don’t know anymore
There is so much dark now, I don’t want the light anymore
I loved someone once
I don’t love anymore

Hollow

I was haunted by the hollow of my hand
What is in it. Why
I was disfigured by the death in my eyes
Who died. Why
I was shattered by the quivering of my soul
How did it happen. Why
I was looking at the curve of my lips
Which way did they go. Why
I sat with myself once
I danced with myself once
I dreamed within myself once
Who was I supposed to be. Why

Wisp

Sometimes I walk among the living dead
And I die a thousand lives
And when I come back to life
I talk to them and I laugh with them
And I love them and I fall in love with them
And when I turn back to see
I see all these faces
Of people that I do not know
And I don’t know their stories
Yet they have told me everything
And I heard
But I do not know them
They are strangers
And then there is myself
The strangest of them all
For they have seen me
And never loved me
And never fallen in love
And I am a wisp they all love
I am a stranger whom I do not know about