With Twilight Will Come Bliss...

Frozen dreams and a day that stays,
While days roll on and dreams still die,
Would you call me a dreamer still,
Just for my dream was not a lie?

One rainbow shines and another comes to life,
While my eyes still fail to rise up to the sky,
I can see what the clouds sweep,
But it’s in those oceans that life lies

Some moments are born to be made,
Some made to be reborn,
And then some are found in a place in time,
When life becomes a dream of a song

The picture may speak of a thousand dreams,
But could a dream be just a framed reality?
I closed my eyes and dreamed away the cage,
Did that make the real a fatality?

Awake, alive and with open eyes,
I dreamt me a life, for them denial,
A lie a dream could never tell,
When did that dream I befriend?

The stars may shine on,
But it’s the mind that’s alive,
For while the miles are real,
The distance is a lie...

Mid-Midnightmare

I doubt if there is anyone who would remember this, for I am sure that reading even one of my ramblings is generally more than most sane people can handle, but anyway, I once mentioned in a post of mine how I have the most amazing luck when it comes to mobile phones.

Anyway, I really should have known when August began that it was time…time for me to start looking at the new handsets on the market. I mean, it was 8 months since I had purchased the last one and quite frankly that’s about as long as most of my handsets last… This one was working alrite actually, barring a couple of keys that had decided to take a bit of a break from work, but that’s ok. I don’t particularly resent employees taking sick leave and this was not really impeding me on a basis that was regular enough for me to get unduly perturbed and issue show-cause notices or the like.

Being the Crab that I am though, I obviously forgot all about this and chose to look instead at the beauty of the fact that my phone was indeed still functioning. End result of course, is that I am in Bangalore now, while my handset is gallivanting around Singapore, having reached there in Business Class aboard a Lufthansa flight. OK, now don’t ask me how it happened and how I know this, but just accept it. It’s me! And it’s technology that we’re speaking of here. I can hardly be blamed if our relationship is slightly dysfunctional!

Well, I hope that this explanation mollifies all those that may be nursing a grudge against me for now calling back or anything… I don’t think there are that many people of that variety anyway, but still… I mean, I can’t really be expected to have had a backup of my contact list! I mean, I tried to have one, but it was too damned tedious jotting all the numbers down on paper…and technology scares me beyond reason, so expecting me to Sync with the Nokia PC Suite etc is something that I really can’t be expected to do. Sorry, but that’s the way it is :-).

Anyway, there are people who have asked me what I think of Bangalore and how I like it here. Well, here are a few snapshots of Bangalore…some that make me wonder, some that make me smile…and some that make me contemplate how bad it could be to be in the gas chamber after all!

- Auto drivers here don’t seem to want to go anywhere. You can ask them about any place in the city and the answer is a common, “No saar”. If you’re really, really, really lucky, it’s a “Saar, dubbal meter”.

- Real estate agents here don’t work on Sundays and work only half the day on Saturdays… Yes…that’s a fact.

- Shops here shut after working hours (7PM) and stay shut on Sundays…

- ToI has launched it’s ‘Refresh Bangalore’ Campaign… The tagline reads, “Put the ‘bang’ back in Bangalore”. Err…yes, this is true as well…

- Above one of the traffic signals here, there is a HUGE signboard that reads, “Red Means Stop”.

- There is no left, right or straight in this city. It’s leftaa, rightaa and (get this right) stry-taa”. Yep, the last one being pronounced as rightaa with an ‘st’ at the beginning.

On the positive side of course, since this isn’t home, there are no restrictions…then again, given the deadlines of this city, who needs parents? Oh and before I forget, I have also managed to coerce (for want aof a better word) my folks into promising me an N-series or something 30+ anyway, in return for buying a cheap handset this time :-).

Oh and just another point of similarity. That last post I mentioned at the start of this one, was made at a time that I had launched a pre-doomed attempt at quitting. Twas five days then. Over 3 weeks now...life's good...even better than the real thing...

Overadequate Inadequacy

There seem to be a thousand thoughts that encircle my mind at the moment, which of course is a massive departure from situation normal which normally is a huge void in that part of the body that is called the male brain. Anyway, this isn't a normal day perhaps, but be that as it may, I find myself unable to type anything remotely coherent given the fact that there seem to be no two sentences that I am able to string together that are not on quite different topics.

In a strange kind of way, that paragraph leads quite neatly onto one of the things that I was contemplating. Reading what I had written left me quite lost about what, if any, point I was trying to make and that is only reinforced the belief that was driven home last night by a question that I found myself faced with. Quite simply, words, for all their adequacy in certain situations, are so woefully inadequate when they are truly needed.

Could you define the expression on the face of a person who looks upon the endless sea and sees therein simply the concept of complete and absolute freedom? Could you describe in words the feelings of parents casting their eyes for the first time on their first-born? Could you describe in words what you mean by perfection and your emotions if you were perhaps to be confronted by it or him or her in your astonishingly short lifetime?

That of course, is another issue at hand, for what is it that deserves a superlative? Being, as I am, a follower of the school of thought that would have us believe that superlatives are best used sparingly, a subject I find worth contemplating is about what - if anything – constitutes a person, situation or happenstance that would warrant the use of one of those words that I am so disinclined to use.

And then what exactly is it that causes one to pause and look around and then feel like one in a dream looking about as Barrett so beautifully summed up “on the outside looking in”?

Then too, one wonders why a dream can’t be made to follow the direction one wishes it to take. Why for instance, does my noble steed always seem to end up either tripping over my shoelaces, that seem to start growing inordinately in my dreams, or rear up and neigh in fright at the sight of a hedgehog or some such? Why does it always happen that just as I find myself in a lovely place, there’s a truck that runs me over?

That of course is so different from the waking dreams one has that seem to follow the straight and narrow, so to speak, without any real conscious effort. In that drowsiness, somehow one is always smiling as the dream meanders down the path one would have wished it to…without one actually knowing what is happening. Even the silken touches seem more real at that time… Strange perhaps…and then again…

Talking of silken touches, has anyone ever quite understood the sheer joy of standing by the seaside and feeling the reality that is the mystery of everlasting and never-ending bliss? Just that one moment of connection, while gazing out at the setting Sun seems to last forever. The sea, afire and alive and yet so astonishingly silent as it roars out with the smashing of the waves on each other and on the walls of the sea-front…

However, while so woefully inadequate at times, words seem to possess a life of their own when woven by those who seem to create an interwoven mesh of pure magic. At times, a verse can scream out thoughts; thoughts that nobody could word or mouth, but which through that verse seem to take a life of their own. To be honest, I envy such persons and can only bow down and hail their extraordinary and blessed talent and wonder whether such a level could be attained by another who wasn't perhaps born with that magic touch.

It is not of vivid descriptions I speak here, but of abstract thoughts, worded in seemingly simple lines. Herein lies the true art, for the words by themselves are apparently masking nothing and stating but simple facts. As is quite obvious, I find myself unable to express just what I am thinking, yet not attempting to do so seems impossible. 'The essential dilemma of the reluctant ignorant' would perhaps be an apt statement of my state of mind on this one.

If dawn was all and dusk never fell,
Would the farewell last no more?
Would you still await the morn?
But then, there'd be no night at all...