जादू करते रहना ज़रूरी है

सिर में हथोडे से कील ठोक लूँ
या कि बंदूक से गोली
इतना शोर बढ़ गया है अब
कि keyboard कि आवाज़ आने से पहले
सिर में घुसी आत्माओं कि आवाज़
मेरे ख्यालों,
मेरी कविताओं,
मेरी कहानियो को खा जाती है
वोह सब लोग जो अच्छे लगते थे
या बहुत ज़्यादा बुरे
वोह वक्त कि अलग अलग कब्रों से उठ कर
मेरे दिमाग के कोनों में
अपने drum , नगाडे , घंटे लेकर जमा हो गए हैं
एक बड़ा सा जलसा बनाके
वोह marchpast करते हैं
मेरे सारे गुनाह
जो उन्हें पहले पता नहीं थे
अब मेरे दिमाग कि काल कोठरी में घुसकर
बीन बीन कर निकाले हैं उन्होंने
हर बेयिमानी ,
हर चोरी,
हर धोका
जो मैंने छुप कर ख़ुद को,
दूसरों को दिया था
और जिसके दस्तावेज मैंने जला दिए थे अपने सिर में
बस सिर्फ़ उस आग से उठती हुई बू
मरे हुई कीड़ों कि बू कि तरह
नींद में बेचैन करती थी
वरना तो सब शांत ही था
इन घुसपैठ आत्माओं ने पता नहीं कैसे
दस्तावेजों कि राख से
सारे सबूत इकठे कर लिए
और बड़े बड़े banner, poster बना के
मेरे सिर कि दीवारों पे चिपका दिए हैं
मेरी कमजोर झूठी भावुकता
मेरे बनावटी दुःख
बेमतलब की हँसी
अजनबियों को दिखाए जाने वाले
बेहतरीन चहरे
सारे नए जुमले
और वोह सारी बेशर्मी
जो महसूस हुई थी
चहरे दिखाते समय
जुमले बोलते समय
यह सब उन banners पर टंगा है
मेरे दिमाग की दीवारों के सहारे
मेरे आम होने के गुनाह का सबूत
उनको नोचने कि भी कोशिश करता हूँ
तो दीवारों का कच्चा चूना उधड्ने लगता है
अब जब भी कुछ लिखने कि कोशिश करता हूँ
उन posters कि लिखावट
उन नगाडों का शोर
उन दस्तावेजों कि राख
मुझे गूंगा बना देती है
शरीर में बस एक बड़ा सा सिर
और एक छोटा सा कंकाल बचा है
बाकी सब अंग खाल के समेत
उन आवाजों को सुनते सुनते
जली राख को सूंघते सूंघते
गल गए हैं
अब हर आदमी जो मिलता है
सड़क पर, ट्रेन में , office में
लगता है मेरे दिमाग में चिपके पोस्टर पढ़ रहा है
और बहुत जल्दी इसकी आत्मा भी
इसके पसंद का बाजा उठा के
मेरे सिर में मेरी आंखो से होकर घुस जायेगी
अब में लोगों से नज़रे नहीं मिलाता
न बात करता हूँ, न दुआ सलाम
चुपचाप ऑफिस से घर और घर से ऑफिस
और ख़ास कर वोह लोग जो मुझे बचपन से जानते हैं
या उन दिनों से जब मैं ख़ुद
दूसरों के दिमाग में पोस्टर चिपकाता था
उनसे मैं बिल्कुल भी मुलाक़ात नहीं करता
डर लगता है कि मुझे देख कर हँसेंगे
खिल खिला के नहीं , बस धीरे से
कि "मुझे पता है, तुम्हारे अन्दर क्या हो रहा है "
पर फिर कभी कभी सिर्फ़ जांच करने के लिए
उनसे हात मिलाता हूँ, मुस्कुराता हूँ
यह जानने के लिए कि कहीँ यह सब मेरा भ्रम तो नहीं
और बाद में इस बात से डरता हूँ
कि शायद वोह समझ गए हैं कि मैं जांच कर रहा था
मुझे फ़ोन कि घंटी,
messenger कि आवाज़,
और gtalk कि green dot
इन सब से अब डर लगता है
मैं वापस उन दिनों मैं जाना चाहता हूँ
जब मैं जादू करता था , जादू दिखाता था
जादू करते रहना
आत्मा कि शांति के लिए बहुत ज़रूरी है
वरना जादू खत्म होते ही
यह सब अगड़म-बगड़्म लोग
दिमाग मैं घुस कर
धीरे धीरे उसे घोल के पी जाते हैं
और बस रह जाती है
तुम्हारे गुनाहों के जले दस्तावेजों कि राख
जल्दी ही किसी दिमाग मैं घुसना होगा
जल्दी ही किसी सिर में पोस्टर चिपकाने होंगे
या पहले जिसके सिर में चिपकाये थे उससे मिलना होगा
और सबसे ज़रूरी है
जल्दी ही जादू करना पड़ेगा
क्योंकि जादू करते रहने से
अन्दर भरी आत्माएं शांत रहती हैं
ढोल नगाडे सब बंद हो जाते हैं
और दीवारों पर कोई पोस्टर नहीं चिपकते
बल्कि सच तो यह है
जब यह टाईप किया मैंने
जादू हो गया
आत्मा शांत हो गई

SuicideR

He walked with his feet moving in different directions. Encountered 15 dogs who were barking as they usually do at 1 o’clock in the night. He asked them to shut up, to stop following him,. They agreed. They generally don’t but today they did. Perhaps because he was too sad today. So many stars were there on the sky. He knew it. But still he didn’t turn his head up to look at them. No he is not too tired for doing that, he was too full of himself to bother about so many stars. He would have looked up had there been less stars but he knew that the stars were many. So he could not bother. Kept walking. Walked past the tea shop, it’s usually closed after 8 in the evening. He knew that but still did the effort of turning his head to look if it was open. He found it closed. Felt happy, satisfied. Not much has changed. The ways of the world are more or less the same, except for the dogs. Dogs keep changing their ways a lot of times. He fails to understand why on some nights they ill treat him and on other nights they don’t care.

He had the feeling of committing suicide, but then he knew he will not commit it. He has never committed suicide before. He is not the kind who commits suicide; he is the kind who just thinks of it. It often comes to the mind but the idea faints away the moment he starts thinking about the preparation required. Someday someone might put a gun on his face, and say, I will shoot you and he wont resist. He has thought that. One more reason why he is not committing suicide is that he wants to know how some important people in his life will react to it. In case he commits suicide successfully then he wont be able to know it. In case he fails then it will be painful or rather shameful to meet all those people whom he wanted to observe after he had died. Besides, the reaction of people will not be the same as it would be on a successful attempt of suicide. So this trap prevents him from even attempting it. The closest to suicide he can get is by not keeping in touch with most people who are important to him, by avoiding their company and by not giving any information about how he is doing. That is how he kills himself for them. And then after a long time he tells everything about himself to them to amuse himself. To see their stunned faces when they listen to his stories and experiences during his exile. That’s great entertainment to him, surprise that he gives to others. Yes even in a suicide-like life, he has some very involving experiences, experiences which stun his close ones. It makes them wonder, how less they know him, and that is what he enjoys. He enjoys that people don’t know him well.

The Son-of-a-Bitch charecters

One of my biggest kicks is to be a nice a guy who appears like a son of a bitch.I have always enjoyed watching such characters. The one played by amitabh sir in Bemisal, the one by shiny in Hazaron khwaishein aisi. Such characters have a enigma, a charm. The charm of nasty appearances camouflaging the virtues of a gentleman, of a proud lover. They make you curious; you want to know them better. But the problem is when I try and appear the son of a bitch; I end up making them believe that I am actually one. Nobody ever un-layers me to find the truth. I don’t know if it is my faulty skills of pretension or the lack of real virtues. I end up being a son of a bitch who pretends to have some virtues. Nevertheless, it’s a good role to play. If you choose to be this faking SOB, then your conscience gives you the license for doing nasty things. Deep beneath you know that this is not real. Besides very soon you will pull up a stunt to exhibit your jewel like heart, to create the paradox, the confusion in the mind of people you intend to charm. So here, nastiness is for the sake of goodness and goodness for the sake of nastiness. This is a perfect world. Your sweet little crimes, the hurts and torments you deliver are fake, though they hurt all the same but still you tell yourself "that’s not me". Your actions of nobility are compensatory for your own conscience besides creating the enigma for those who are charmed. And if they do get charmed, then you not only appear as a mystic person but also as some one with a heart that has been hurt ruthlessly by some unknown, un-talkable event which remains hidden in the secret corridors of your soul.

Time to write

when voices of people inside your head become louder than your own voice, its time to write.
when too many thoughts stop the action then its time to write.
when too many actions have confused your thoughts, its time to write.
when charecters you play are not the ones you have met, its time to write.
when your lies are better than the truths you seek, its time to write.
when music you listen stops emoting your feelings, its time to write.
when images you paint do not change the meaning of your existence , its time to write. when your wants are the bare minimum necessities, its time to write.
when you ask questions, answers to which you already know, its time to write.
when your answers have got nothing to do with the questions, its time to write.
when your gestures are to please strangers, its time to write.
when your loved ones become more important than yourself, its time to write.

THAT guy

Being THAT guy. When you are known , understood..at least partly, needed and finally ignored. You become just a THAT guy. Just a THAT guy, which is not even justified. You are talked about, discussed, mocked, used, given a bit of those things and then you are nailed into the coffin of THAT guy. Jutice delayed, and denied as well, both at the same time. It’s delayed till the time when it can be denied. And justice is not even in question if you think in retrospect. Who would justify you being that guy? You choose it to become a self sacrificing immortal. That’s the reason and that’s the trap too. No one is being a martyr here. It’s a long war that is to be fought silently to win. THAT guy in those days was there for them to need and demand all of that. One day all that comes to a point when that guy is giving all those guys, those snake charmers a run for all THAT. When I say snake charmers I am not calling her names. I love snakes and I even adore them. Haha ..poor joke but the fact remains that I wasn’t calling her names. They are snake charmers all the same but she is not the one who would dance on their tunes. About her being a snake, well I don’t think possessing venom alone can qualify a woman to be classified as a snake.
So finally it ends up being about the snake and THAT guy who we assume is not a snake charmer. Oh, you say he is the knight with the shining armor. May be that’s true, but it’s just that his armor doesn’t shine too much. Sorry I copied this line from LOOK BACK IN ANGER. I loved jimmy porter; he was the guy whose armor didn’t shine too much in that play. And he continued to be the THAT GUY till the end. Its sad but true, they all want to play jimmy porters , fanidhars and THAT GUYS role on stage. None of them have the guts to do it in real life. Yeah you can mock at me for calling it guts to play it in real life; you think its fool hardiness. No wonder you are the snake charmer with the piper who in spite of being so sure of his skill to charm the snake gets bitten by the darling. For all that humor and dance and entertainment and milk you shower on the snake, you end up realizing that there is no point repenting over the spilt milk. But still you repent and that is what your piper is. Your regrets and sorries over the bite by the snake becomes the piper which you blow up again and again to capture yet another one. And the milk I was talking about, it’s the white fluid you spend if you didn’t get it right. Most of it which sticks only around your own belly, and the rest..well I wont talk of this, it hurts me more than it will hurt you.

The Simulated-You

She has gone numb, silent. She doesn’t talk, react to my murmurings. To all that I have to offer there is not a single nod or even a wink, not even indifference, just plain simple absence in totality. No more heard, No more seen there. Though she does exist, I know she does. She walks, she breathes, she sings, she gestures but not to me. Not when I want her to. She is becoming a master of her own will. She has always been free. But I have been a part of her free life. She had accepted it until I shared her with others. I don’t know when it happened. But from the time she came out of my thoughts in the form of words in front of others, she has stopped reacting to me. She was like a simulation within my mind made by all the details, facts, I have about her. All my experience with her, through her and without her has contributed to that active, reactive simulated image of hers which I carry like a companion in my mind.

So many years, I never discussed, never exhibited, never made her a part of my declarations. My silence about her preserved that simulation. I had gone through all that she made me go through without speaking of it, without exhibiting it. All that I achieved, all that I lost, all that I have gone through and the joy of having gone through so much pain, humiliation and unrecognized valor in so less time was kept hidden from the world around me. That secret existence of her in me was my power, my strength to stand it all alone. All those years of silence and perseverant belief that I will never need to break it, made that image so vulnerable that it talked to meat at my will. It was like a caged bird, fluttering her wings to break free, talking to her master, telling him tales, calling him names, singing the melodies, failing him in duels, the way only a free bird can. She did all that to me only as long as long as I was quiet about her. From the time I spoke about her, she became quiet within me. Now I feel so lonely. I have lost my closest, mot lovely companion’s voice. I can’t undo sharing you with others, what is done is done. But I want the simulated-you back to life, fluttering without pause.

So many times it happened that I fought ruthlessly and they all wondered at the way I was plundering. It was unlike me, they all said. Still it was me who was doing it. It was you who I made to do all that. The simulated-you in me picked up and fought all the battles for me. You knew how to insult, you knew how to shrug at insults, you knew how to mock, you knew how to laugh at mockery, you knew how to pin point mediocrity, and you knew your own too, as it was mine as well. You did all that to me. My face has not known all those contours which it later possessed after your simulation in my head was completed. The simulated-you made my eyes move, the lashes rise, the lips cut open and all those, miracles which you do all the time with perfect timing. It sounds as if I am possessed. Yes I was possessed by your spirit. So powerful, so undefeatable that even I can’t offend it for the pleasure of doing it even in my own mind. So many times when I wanted to revenge the hurts you have given me, I fought with the simulated-you or with your spirit within me and was left naked, broke in front of it just as I am left in front of your real self. I have humiliated myself more number of times than you have by trying to win over the simulated-you.

But that vengeance and that humiliation in my own mind gave me the courage. It made me immune to any other external hurt, insult or reproach. May be that is what has made me shameless, brutally honest. To have accepted you with the insults you gave has given me the ability to look people into their eyes when they have assumed that they are better men. No, I am not vindictive or bitter towards the world around me. I have been talking only about the hurt and insults, but that is not all that has made up the simulated-you. It’s just a very small part of it. I will talk about the other parts later in detail. Right now it’s just about the strength of the simulated-you. So many times I attempted for things which I wasn’t capable of doing but I knew, you were capable of them. I just went ahead. No, it was not plain, simple imitation of you. It was making you win it for me. I have lived through you by making you secretly live within me.

And that simulated-you has also made me predict you perfectly so many times. That was a personal game for me, a personal entertainment. I would put you into situations or rather simulated situations and predict your reactions. That’s how I used to see the designs of your life. No wonder I have always known with precision what will happen to you and to the world around you. You wondered, amazed an even fell in love with what you call “my uncanny ability to guess things about you.” It wasn’t guessing, it was just reading from a screen. It was that simple to me. You relation with the world was so clear to me that the simulated-you never-never fails me in predicting the ways of the world and your contribution to it. Is this what the saints do? Yes they see the designs!! But I am not a saint, I am the selfish, ruthless crook who is possessed by the spirit of a devil and I am ready to destroy the whole world to save that one thing of pleasure to me. But I am so stupid and so unnecessarily dumb that I myself ruined it by sharing with people. Can I be redeemed? Can I be forgiven?

All that I acquired and maintained through secrecy, I have let it to the winds. Perhaps just because of my foolish desire to showcase the wonders that I have within me. I really question it. Why did I share you with others? Will you please break the silence and speak to me? The simulated-you, I am talking to you!!

To sudha, with love: Ijazat

I wrote this peice imagining that rekha is the one who had an affair instead of naseer and even after marriage she is recieving letters from that fellow in naseers presence.
This is written by naseers charecter.

मेरी खातिर उसका ज़िक्र कभी खुल कर नहीं किया तुमने
जब भी उसका ख़त आया, चुप चाप पढा
और शायद मेरे पढने के लिए,
मेरी किताबों के पास रख दिया
फाड़ा नहीं, पर दोबारा पढा भी नहीं
मैंने बहुत कोशिश की
कि नज़र बचाके पढूं उसके ख़त
या तुमसे पूंछुं कि क्या लिखा था उसने
और कई बार तुम्हारे चहरे से
अंदाज़ा भी लगाना चाहा ख़त कि सूरत का
पर चहरे ने कभी कुछ कहा नहीं
ख़त पढने कि हिम्मत हुई नहीं
पर आज के ख़त में लगता है
आख़िरी ख़त होने कि बात लिखी है
क्यों कि चाय आज तुमने फींकी बनायीं
और दाल में कंकड़ भी काफी निकले

इजाज़त देखने के बाद, रेखा के लिए

कितनी बार तुम्हें मना किया
माया को मत आने दो इस घर में
पर शायद माया से यह तुम्हारा बदला था
घर बुलाकर उसे परायेपन का एहसास कराना
फिर कभी-कभी लगता था
मुझे समझने के लिए,
माया को समझना ज़रूरी है तुम्हारे लिए
उसे अपनाकर तुम,खुद अपनाया जाना चाहती थीं
एक रोज़ auto में
बहुत देर मेरे चुप रहने पर
तुमने दबे होंठों से मेरे मुस्कुराने के लिए कहा था
"मुझे भी bike चलाना सीखना hai"
और फिर ऐसे हँसी थीं जैसे
बच्चे को खेल में जिताके माँ हँसती है
ऐसा लगा था कि तुमने मुझसे कहा हो
"देखो तुम्हारी माया थोड़ी बहुत मुझ में भी है कहीं "
तुम्हें ज़ोर से गले लगाया था, प्यार किया था
फिर तुमने हँसी भरी आवाज़ में पूंछा था
" यह मेरे लिए है, या माया के लिए "
मैंने बिना सोचे बोला "माया के लिए "
"बडे कमीने हो तुम " , हँस कर मेरे कंधे पर से कहा था तुमने
आज लगता है वोह मज़ाक नहीं, सच में गाली थी तुम्हारी ।

तीखा वार

फ़ोन पर लड़आई ताखिये से कि तुमसे
बिल्कुल बच्चों कि तरह
न चोट हुई
न जीत कि कोशिश
बस डर था कि बगल के बूथ में
कोई यह नादानी सुनकर, हंसी करेगा
फिर पता नहीं क्यों
मैंने एक तीखा वार किया
"अब से तुम्हारी सब चिठियाँ बिन पढ़े फाढ़ दूंगा "
तुम्हारे जवाबी वार का दर्द
अभी भी तुम्हारी चिठियाँ पढने पे होता है
सब कुछ जान के भी
बड़ी नादाँ बनती थीं तुम
तुमने कहा था
"फाढ़ दो, तुम्हारी मरज़ी, तकलीफ तुम्हीं को होगी "

Non-man meets Non-woman part-1

I am a man of interesting stories and strange experiences। Someone who fits in well for well spent evenings but not for well spent lives. Across the dining tables and over coffee mugs, I have often seen them giggling, smiling with joy in my company. Amused they were, with my histrionics and mockery of my foolish self, clumsy and nonchivalrous ways and unconcerned ways of living. But that amusement is not to be bought for a lifetime. Only a few evenings can be spared for it. What do I choose now, the evenings, the lifetimes or my foolish ways. I guess none. I don’t want to choose, I want to be chosen on one such evening when the amusement I offer will be sold for a lifetime.

The woman who will choose such an amusement for a life time will be a person with an extremely sad life, a life lived unloved. Not hated, but unloved. She will be a beautiful woman who doesn’t know how beautiful she is. Perhaps because her sister was more beautiful than her, at least that was what all her relatives felt and eventually she agreed to it or rather made it appear true. She will be a wonderful singer but she would never sing for any body. She would dance like a mad man perfectly beat on beat but only at times when no one is watching or at times when she couldn’t care for gazing eyes. Her present will have no events of great consequence and her past will be a perturbed childhood.
Such nun like loneliness would accept my unmanly ways for a lifetime. Only a NON-WOMAN will accept the NON-MAN that I am. Sadness of a loner will be the breeding ground for a relationship with a sad man, a man or rather a non-man who is sad for not having met a sad non-woman. She won’t be amused with me like others who are not non-woman. She will be amused to see what she always saw in herself, her doubts, weaknesses, insecurities, pains, inabilities. And now she will know and understand that most of them were self assumed. She assumed herself to be a non-woman and kept hiding from a world of men and women. This one evening of amusement with me will make that non woman feel complete; make her know that she was always a woman, it was just that she couldn’t realize it. Men and women are very different. But Non-men and Non-women are not.

रिक्शे से मंदिर तक

रिक्शे पर मंदिर के सामने
तुम्हारे हाथ छुढाने से नाराज़ होकर
जब क़मर पकड़ ली थी मैंने
कितने घूँसे सीने पे मारे थे तुमने
फिर चुपचाप बैठ गयी थी मुस्कुरा कर
जैसे मेरे हाथ से कोई परहेज़ ना हो
रिक्शेवाले ने भी मुसकुराकर रिक्शा धीमे किया था
तुम्हें gate पर goodnight बोलकर
उसे पांच रूपये ज्यादा दिए थे
आज सालों बाद जब तुम्हारे शहर में रिक्शे से मंदिर गया
तो दिल बहुत भारी भारी था
सीने में तेज़ दर्द उठा
उस रोज़ घूँसे बहुत ज़ोर से मारे थे शायद तुमने

Honorable Dramatist

Is it arrogance that is making me wait? Arrogance, that I can’t accept anything lesser than you. Or is it the innocence of a strong headed child who sees nothing except for what he has liked once. Words, I thought would make it look small, stupid, disrespectful. Touch was an expression which cannot be replaced by words. May be you understood, may be you didn’t. May be the pretence of ignorance is important for your dignity, honor. Honor! What a trap is that. The honor of not confessing the need to be loved. The honor of not giving in to the desires which make you what you are. Make you the one who is to be loved by none other than me. Yes I know this is arrogance. To Love you for only I can love you. To love you to make you good enough for my love. To love you for you to realize that you are nothing without it. That is what my love does to you. That’s why you are so scared of it. My brutal honesty prevents you from believing what you want to believe for your pleasure. I show you your own face so clearly that you dislike it. Why cant you accept that, that is what is your beauty? Well, yes that is what I call beautiful.
Our definitions are so different!

You mask yourself because you hate to believe that emotions have a mind of their own. They have!! And they should have! You think it’s not honorable to think about yourself when love is what is expected of you, this is a dogma from which you can’t break free. Your masks are to protect yourself from your own vulnerability. You can’t allow anybody to know his indispensability and that’s why you wear those cold eyes to refrain from expressing too much. That’s why so many desired hugs are suspended, so many wanted kisses rejected, so many tears are strangled to death even before they reach your cold eyes, so many soulful smiles are turned into laughter’s of mockery, so many could-have-been-evenings of joy had turned into sleepless long nights, so many letters are written but not sent, so many questions of insanity have been answered with ruthless practicality. Why can’t you expose your madness, your needs, and your hunger for more? Is the dogma of honor to be big to be risked? Or is the sustenance of your enigma more important than its achievements? You are either afraid of your own emotions or you are thrilled by the hope that all of it will be discovered by them without your expression. Or may be not expressing it all is a trick to create the enigma, to maintain the curiosity.

You want to be controlled, but in a particular way which you have decided. You have set the parameters, the equations, the values which will be allowed to be manipulated, governed, and controlled. Beyond that and apart from that you are not ready to share, to allow the control in other hands. But I am able to snatch it. That is what is your complain, your fear. I might control too much to be within your control. You control others by allowing them to control you to a certain extent. The amount of control I snatch from you is more than that limit. When you say, you don’t want to talk, I reply "As you wish" because I know you can’t answer my arrogance with your silence. When you question me whys, I answer you why not’s. When you answer me with indifference I answer you with mockery, mockery at your feigned bravery of attempting to stand it all alone. When you mock at me, I laugh in amusement at this old trick which fails to hurt me. When you pretend to be in love, I know you are guilty conscious. When you ask for favor, I know you are allowing me a chance to feel important. When you ask for my hand, I hold you with gratitude for helping me believe my strength. When you weep in despair, I know that it’s because you could not hurt them enough to feel satisfied. When you laugh in hysteria, I know that you are hiding the pain. When you speak too much, I know you won’t be able to bear even a moment of silence between us. I play the innocent child by not letting you know that I know it all. Though the truth is, that you know it all so well, and that is what makes you stay away from me. The reason why I love you is the reason why I am not allowed to!

I fail to put in words and you deny the expression of touch. The audacity to allow the touch challenges your chastity, the insufficiency of words challenges my intentions. Honor, dignity, respect, conventions are nothing but the devices to massacre, to kill emotions which are not made by human minds. But may be I am disillusioned. Who knows may be my emotions are nothing but age old dogmas. May be I am feeling what I think I am supposed to feel, what I have been taught to feel. I have tried to sustain all my questions by not answering them, if possible by not asking them in the first place. Brutal honesty is a curse. Am I cursed?? Ruthless truthfulness, I thought was a device to unmask you. To let you know that I know you too well to not to love you. Your smile is no more a deception to me. It’s an acceptance of you weaknesses. To me your anger is your rage against your inability to live up to your desires. You laugh among men to make them believe that they amuse you. I know you are amusing yourself by laughing amongst them, a cynic’s laughter, a laughter of a murderer who laughs outside the court when acquitted. I know if I tell you all that, you want shy. You will hold your head in pride for ruthlessly running down those who seek your beauty. They might accuse of playing with their hearts, minds, of making them believe what you wanted them to believe. But I know that they are victim of their hopes. Hopes of seeking strength, heroism from someone they thought considered them a hero. They were not heroes on their own .You created heroes amongst them for fulfillment of your desire to live amongst equals. And in moments of indulgence you at times believed your imagination; you believed them to be real heroes which they were not. They should thank you for giving them the moments of glory in which they will bask through out their life. But they don’t know it; they accuse you of betrayal, infidelity. Oh! The biggest weakness of a man is to not know his weaknesses.

But then again I doubt, am I also an imaginary hero bestowed with qualities which I actually don’t possess just for your amusement. My brutal honestly, ruthless truthfulness, insight is nothing but just a manifestation of your wishful thinking. May be I am just being or believing that I am what you want me to be. Even if this is true, then I thank you with all my heart to have chosen me for your amusement. I wish I was insane enough not to question the reality of my existence for you. Do I exist for you as I really do or your imagination makes me something for your pleasure? Oh! What a great artist you are! a dramatist who has a stage in mind where characters enter, exit wearing masks of your choice, in lights you choose them to be in, on a background score which fits into your feelings. I wish I could stand up to the dramatist you are. I wish I could act well enough, long enough in your mind to let the play go on. !! I beg of you, don’t assassinate the character I am playing. I will improve. I will become better; I will be clown enough, to make u laugh. I will be murderer enough to thrill you. I will be lover enough to gloom you; I will be hero enough to make you victorious. Just don’t put off the lights, let the background music play, let me have some more lines. If not lines, just give me a coffin in your mind to lie down. I will wear a mask on my face that will keep your eyes unmoved for a long time. When you are tired of looking at it, I will become a ghost, a raven, phantom, a messiah, a wish, a fairy, and a witch ....what all I can be after I am dead. Even if I don’t have lines to say, I will be actor enough to amuse you. Just don’t let the curtains fall on me. I don’t mind co actors. Let them do their part .Let them be heroes for your amusement. Those men of honor and courage, who have been bestowed with the crown in the play with in your head, will finally be murdered secretly. Yes, they will be murdered; this is how you write your plays. I know your trick, your plots. I have always known them. Then newer heroes will be born out of your imagination. I just want to be the character which is used as a device to build the subplot for the emergence of heroes and for their murder. That’s how I will live, even in a coffin, or even as a ghost. That’s how I demand my existence.

Politics of Love-part 2

It’s during these experiments you experience your creative faculties. You learn to create. You have gone through too much to keep it to your self. Your knowledge is too powerful, too magnanimous to be contained. That woman fails to be a human being for you from now on. She becomes a character for you .Just a mere character. That’s the ruthlessness of love, of knowledge. You are in love with not a being but with an interesting character now. With the experiences you had with it and the experiences she had with other men. All the men in her life become your protagonists, villains, narrators…characters. You are the writer-lover now. That’s how love becomes an act of selfishness. It empowers you with the capacity to see beyond the feelings, feelings which are nothing but age old dogmas. The confession box, you were who acquired the knowledge of her guilt, crimes, joys, and struggles, has now chosen to use it for his benefit, for his enjoyment. He becomes a story teller now. You have so many characters, the ones who loved her, the ones she loved, the ones she deceived, the ones she couldn’t, the ones she desired, the ones she acquired…oh so many of them…and above all there is SHE herself. The biggest pain is to see your self as a character in her life. You have to be brutal with your self, merciless like you have been with her. It hurts to be just a character; after all you loved her to conquer her, to be a hero. But now it’s time to grow up, to be more than a hero. The desire to be just a hero is killed, and knowledge is to be given a vent to create masterpieces. If you can do that you conquer your consciousness. And then again the politics of love comes into play. At no time she should know about this aspiration of yours. Your conspiracy to attain your creative heights should be hidden. The moment she knows that you are using her for self actualization, she will become deceptive, untrue in her narration to you. Doors to knowledge will be closed. That is where you have to play the trick. You are a story teller only while holding a pen and not her hand. The moment she sees the pleasure in your eyes when she is narrating to you her tragedy, she will start lying, hiding. She is the one who has inspired you to write, to create. She is the one who has empowered you with knowledge, with courage to see the truth beyond it is seen. She has given you the chance to plunder, explore and experience. And it is she from whom you have to hide it all. She is selfish just as you are, you are there for her only till you serve a purpose. The purpose of comforting, strengthening, and helping her believe what she wants to believe. You have been given a role of a guardian, a sympathizer, a listener not for your amusement but for her pleasure. You are not supposed to be amused by it that is the condition which is placed when she confides in you. Confidants are not supposed to be story tellers. But you commit the crime of being one, and you can sustain it only if you are a smart and ruthless criminal. Love is blind and love is ruthless too.

Beyond this I think GB Shaw should take over, for he understands it more than any body else. I am quoting a dialogue from his play "MAN AND SUPERMAN", delivered by the character TANNER

“The true artist will let his wife starve, his children go barefoot, his mother drudge for his living at seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art. To women he is half vivisector, half vampire. He gets into intimate relations with them to study them, to strip the mask of convention from them, to surprise their inmost secrets, knowing that they have the power to rouse his deepest creative energies, to rescue him from his cold reason, to make him see visions and dream dreams, to inspire him, as he calls it. He persuades women that they may do this for their own purpose whilst he really means them to do it for his. He steals the mother’s milk and blackens it to make printer’s ink to scoff at her and glorify ideal women with. He pretends to spare her the pangs of child-bearing so that he may have for himself the tenderness and fostering that belong of right to her children. Since marriage began, the great artist has been known as a bad husband. But he is worse: he is a child-robber, a blood-sucker, a hypocrite, and a cheat. Perish the race and wither a thousand women if only the sacrifice of them enable him to act Hamlet better, to paint a finer picture, to write a deeper poem, a greater play, a profounder philosophy! For mark you, Tavy, the artist’s work is to shew us ourselves as we really are. Our minds are nothing but this knowledge of ourselves; and he who adds a jot to such knowledge creates new mind as surely as any woman creates new men. In the rage of that creation he is as ruthless as the woman, as dangerous to her as she to him, and as horribly fascinating. Of all human struggles there is none so treacherous and remorseless as the struggle between the artist man and the mother woman. Which shall use up the other? that is the issue between them.”

The Politics of Love

Love is about the curiosity to understand the enigma initially. Then it’s about to live with the knowledge of your discovery. You start up with the exercise of solving the mystery, to know the hidden. To discover, to experiment, to try and to justify your own perception of life, love and god. In the process, your existing perceptions are broken and newer ones are formed. That adds to the beauty of love. That keeps the thrill. That insures sustenance of love and the desire for more. Its about the curiosity to know how she thinks, loves, hates, betrays, tricks, hurts, cribs, plays, selects, survives, fights, tries, loses, wins, assures, inspires... lives. That curiosity even goes to the extent of seeing her sleep with men. Yes it would hurt you but then that sight would tell you what a great choice you made!!
To hear the voice of her orgasmic pleasures with different bodies and attitudes. Sex is not only pleasure. It is the device to know, to hurt, to confess. Your turn would come and the orgasmic pleasures would be taken over by the pleasure of knowledge. Knowledge, that you know her so well, so completely. A slight twist here, an intentional mistake there, a mischief, a crime and she is pleading for more. She will hold your hand but her grip becomes firmer only when you firm your grip. When you know this before holding her hand, then you don’t enjoy the touch, you enjoy knowing it when the grip becomes firmer. That is the pleasure of curiosity, of love. Knowledge to me is the beginning of love. Once you know her whats, you have to move on to know her whys. You then know why she does what she does. She debates loudly because she had a sister who was more beautiful than she was. She fights so ruthlessly because she failed in pre-board exams in high school and then topped the boards. She hides so much because she wanted to love a computer geek but she could not. She betrays so much because she was accused of infidelity by a man whom she really loved. She seeks so much because she was 2 and a half years old when she fell in love with her cousin and lost him to the customs of the world. When you know it all, then she fails to hurt you, betray you. You will rationalize, explain, justify whatever she does. That knowledge is what makes you live with her for ever. Her betrayal becomes a part of your knowledge. Her ways of hurting, insulting become the part of her picture which was incomplete before she did that to you. The more complete the picture, the more beautiful it is. Besides that, you know why she is what she is. That makes it divine, unsurpassable.
And that amount of knowledge prevents you from loving someone else. You don’t have the capacity to love someone else, to know someone else so much. Yes you might still have the impulse to experiment, to try, to even discover, but not for the sake of loving but for the fun of using your knowledge, testing it as an exercise to hone your skills for loving the real women better. All other women become dummies, on which you experiment, test try, learn and prove your superiority by virtue of your knowledge. I don’t know if this is a crime, but this is the truth for sure. A man loves only one woman, the woman who gives her knowledge about herself, about love, about life, about god, and above all, about himself. Rest all women in his life are laboratories.

Love is a journey from knowing the WHATS to knowing the WHYS. If the answers to whats fail to keep your interest, it all evaporates. If answers to whys are not sufficient then it becomes confusing, disturbing, even hurting.





After you have known her so well, the enigma is gone. The divinity is gone, the magic is all so well explained. Now you have the desire to conquer, possess, plunder, play and make her suffer. Not only for your pleasure but also for her to feel complete. She knows that you know. You know that she knows that you know. That is the beginning of conversation without words. No relation is complete without the hurts. There is no relation which is just Love-love relation. It has to be a Love-hate relationship. She knows your weaknesses, and she knows that you know that she knows. But she never speaks of it. Though her eyes have spoken about it so many times. You know her deceits, her tricks and you know that she knows that you know. But you won’t mention it in words. You will mention it when you ram her down when she is layed. That’s the politics of love. She will cry not out of pain of the hurt but out of the knowledge that you have known it all and have forgiven it by knowing everything completely. Similarly you will grumble in frustration while you look at yourself in mirror for being inadequate, and you will love her for accepting you. That inspires you to be lover enough, man enough. You are not lover enough if you don’t try to win her completely. And no man is man enough to be loved by a woman without being hated at the same time. No woman is woman enough to be loved by a man without being punished. That’s the only cute-war known to mankind. Knowledge-love-justice. And the politics of it all.

All the pains, inspirations, crimes, punishments that you go through is what is the achievement of love. That is what love achieves for you. It makes you go through so much. It makes you a survivor. You love to survive. Though you can love without surviving. Its insanity to love and not to survive but insanity is also a kind of survival. Insanity, for some is inevitable, for some it is a defense mechanism and for some it is a device for creativity The experiment on dummies and in laboratories produces brilliant pieces of art work. The accidents with the real subject of love become experiments on dummies. Though the real subject of love is not spared of experiments. But fear of going wrong prevents the researcher or the artist from going to the limits. You write the most dangerous line in the message box of yahoo messenger and keep your finger on ENTER, that insanity of a lover makes him creative. In the moments before he presses the key or deletes what he has written, he giggles, enjoys and creates. The adventure of not knowing what will happen if he sends it. The pleasure of not knowing whether he will send it or not. On dummies, ENTER and on inspirations, its delete.

I will write more in the next part of the post but before that I will quote G.B.Shaw. have quoted this phrase of his so many times and I still keep quoting it because I don’t believe someone other than me has written it.
“The most treacherous and remorseless of all battles is the battle between the artist man and the mother woman”

No one is Sorry

He cried not out of pain but out of feeling of estrangement. He was hit hard, thrice across his face, for keeping the cooler on while it did not have water. The burning smell of the pump had woken her ailing mother to anger. Her mother could not take another loss to her credit, her operation had already broken the back bone of her husband. Rage of a middle class house wife mingled with illness over powered the mother of a innocent child. Her fingers and the marriage ring left a mark on Pranav's face. The insult of irresponsibility added to the injury of slaps. After a while he was silent, busy with his drawing copy, wax colors and torn out papers. This wasn’t the first time when he felt that nobody loves him.At 11, Pranav was too young to differentiate between anger and hatred.

His mother, Gayatri lay in the other room on a bed in front of a table fan, chanting her dead mother’s name. Her ovaries and uterus had been operated out with the 1 and a half kg tumor. She had been avoiding the operation since last 2 years, believing on her homeopathic medicine though she never took them regularly. An aspiring doctor, she had read her brothers BMS books to become a respected medical consultant in the family and colony. But certainly Homeopathy was not going to help her disease this time, she probably knew it too but kept avoiding the inevitable until the time she could no longer bleed, nor could she put up with the sexual frustration of her husband. The pain kept stabbing her belly and tumor kept swelling while her thighs went through the blood baths day after day, night after night. Finally money was no more a consideration, she nodded yes for the operation when doctor strongly recommended it. Her husband Sunil, was more than willing this time.

Gayatri, staring at the spider web on the dead ceiling fan, kept thinking about her mother's suffering who gave birth to 8 children. She died in the same hospital last year where Gayatri was operated two weeks back. Gayatri hadn’t recovered yet, her wrinkled face, white hairs and a pain filled angry temperament did not correspond to her age of 35. She was going back into sleep when a paper aero plane struck her nose. She opened her eyes and expected Pranav to come for it. He didn’t. she could feel his presence from across the table fan. Tears of remorse filled her eyes. Picking it up she saw on its wings a part of a drawing. On unfolding it a bit she saw a picture of a gun painted by wax colors with all possible meticulous details kept in mind. "He paints well", she thought."Pranav, come take it", she said softly, trying to compensate for the slaps and in an effort to be more friendly she sent the plane flying towards the table fan. While picking up the plane, he looked at his mother’s reflection on the rotating circular steel ball in the centre of the fan. Gayatri kept thinking, how could she undo it. Not just the slap, but all that was to be undone, the tumor, the operationa and the burnt pump. Then looking over she saw Pranav putting his fingers into the fan, touching the steel ball. She shouted uncontrollably "So many times I have told you not to play with fan when it’s on, But you never ever listen tome. That’s why you get beaten up!!". Pranav took his finger out and thought "That’s why, beaten up." He silently took the plane and resumed playing as if he heard nothing.

He had been hearing Gayatri’s moans while he was painting the gun but he chose not to bother about it, out of spite or may be out of revenge. That is perhaps the foetus of a growing up criminal at the age of 11. Today he peed on the bloodstains in the toilet, trying to wash them away. While peeing, an unconscious flash of thought crossed his mind. "She bleeds, but from where? Definitely God is making her pay for what she does to me." He then shrugged on the thought. A chill went through his spine on realising what had just crossed his mind. Realisation of self demise had begin to fill him with contempt for himself when he felt the drops of urine falling on his legs. He went to the bathroom to wash his legs when he heared the sound of a scooter approaching their house. "No this is not his. But he should have come by now. May be he has met an accident, that saves me from him for the the burnt pump."The scooter passed by the house before Pranav could strangle his hatred ridden thoughts to death.

Pranav always heard his dad's approaching Priya scooter long before her mother but today he was extremely conscious about it. He knew all the possible consequences, but he wanted to figure out today’s by looking at Sunil’s face. Sunil came today, not with his usual sound of scooter and horn but with the ring of the bell. He had left his scooter at the repair shop. Gayatri didn’t ask him the expenditure on the repair. she usually used to dig out things before her operation, but now she felt too guilty to ask such questions. Sunil asked, "what happened to the cooler?" Pranav heared it in the other room. He felt like a victim of a conspiracy. A conspiracy, where conspirators are themselves the police, the lawyers and the judge. But he didn’t think of preparing for his excuses. He knew it wont be of help, besides it doesn’t matter. Shamelessness had crept into his character sometime back. He then heard her mother say, "I forgot to switch it off and went to sleep. It didnt have water, the pump burnt". "Good, very good. I will earn and people in this house will spill", said Sunil. Pranav thought, "Why is she doing this to me now, is she trying to prove that she loves me or has she silently signalled to him that I am the culprit and she is playing a good mother to me?" He had developed this habit of referring to his parents as HE and SHE in his mind. That was a child’s silent revenge. Once or twice he gathered the courage to think of them as "Saala", without feeling guilty.

Sunil didn't try to wash away the blood stains by peeing at them. He just stared at them in disgust while peeing. It had been months since he had sex with his wife. "It would take another month for her to get ready, for her stitches to be firmer", he thought. Image of Kiran wearing sleave less blouse caught his imagination, "I could have given her lift today, had it not been for my motherfucking scooter." But then, expenditure on the scooter crossed his mind and Kiran's arms could not hold her thought. Drops of urine fell on his legs. While washing his legs in the bathroom, he could hear his wife cooking in the kitchen. It reminded him of the operation day, the tension, the uncertainity and the loan he had taken. "Lost my bloody fixed deposit, just to keep a ailing cook alive ." Before he could think further, Gayatri called him for dinner.

Power cut happened just when Sunil had put the first bite of roti and daal in his mouth. "Motherfuckers, it’s an every day drama", he complained in anger. Realizing that Gayatri’s frail body was too tired after cooking , he signaled her to rest and went to the other room searching for the candle and matchbox. Pranav had already found them and was about to light the candle when he heared Sunil's order, "You leave it, otherwise you will put the whole house on fire." Pranav now knew that he guessed it right, SHE had silently told HIM that he burnt the cooler. He ignored the command, and lighted the candle. This time it was the ego of a hungry middle class man with a broken down scooter which over powered the father of a child. A hard hit across the face and Pranav had the courage to say "saala" loudly in his mind, before he burst into tears. Candle fell on the torn papers of the drawing copy, with half finished paintings of comic characters, mostly villains. Without caring for the slap and the cry he picked up the candle. "You all dont care for the amount of blood I burn. All these pages could have been steppled to make your rough notebooks. You all keep sucking my blood", he accused without considering the age of the accused. Gayatri called Pranav to the room where she lay infront of the table fan, knowing that its nobody’s fault. If at all it was, it was her's. Pranav moved to the other room, not to seek comfort from her mother but to avoid the chance of blurting out what he had always said only in his mind.

Sunil had been avoiding the sight of those loose papers ever since he entered the room. But now disgust had taken over hunger. He lighted the candle again, put it on the table, picked all the papers, stacked them together according to the size, took out the stapler from where he always kept it, stapled the papers and then neatly placed them on the table. He cared for the meticulous details at work and so did his son while painting. He now observed the paintings and thought how much money must have been wasted in the comics which gayatri allows Pranav to buy every month. He then realized that Pranav had just cried and was qiet now. "Bring the candle here and have your dinner", Gayatri called up from inside the dark room. He picked up the candle and just then power came in. He blew the flame off but before he could put it in the right place, he heared Pranav’s terrifying scream. Then Gayatri’ too. He rushed to that room, to see blood spilled on the wall. Pranav’s finger got stuck in the steel frame of the table fan; he had been moving its wings with his fingers during the power cut. The finger was now chopped off. Sunil switched the fan off, and snatched Pranav’s hand off the fan. Gayatri moved as fast as she could for the bandage, murmuring her mother's name. Sunil picked up his helmet to rush to the doctor, but no, how could he? Bang! Went the helmet on to the table fan. And in all the violence, Pranav kept screaming with flooded eyes as if accusing his parents for his lost finger. The words "Thats why, beaten up" kept hammering on his mind continously.