My experiments with touch

If I am exaggerating this while I narrate, read it the way it is, because as kids life as some point has been exaggerated and over magnified by all of us. We have all told stories of how we had beaten up the kid next door; or how a dragon had been the victim to our anger and then how virtuous we had been to pardon him when we’d see him weeping (then obviously concluding that it was a part of last night’s dream, when the whole thing had been dragged too long to be believed).
It was beneath the large mango tree that we first saw it, like all the other things around it was also green and that is how it was suppose to be. But there was something more that it was meant to do. And so to check it out all of us walked towards it. We were the regular visitors of this place but never had we been so careful about our footsteps and so vigilant about what was that we all stepped on. Before that day we had never seen the roots of that mango tree go in and out of the ground at intervals, as though been sewn into the fabric of this land. We had grown on the branches of this mango tree fighting on who was the one who that spotted the first ripe mango and then who would be the one to get it down. Running around to find every heavy but small round thing possible to bring down all that the tree had been bearing the brunt of through the year.
But today was not like the other days; today we were here on a mission to explore the unseen. To see how our touch could make the kind of difference that we were told of by our school master. We were a team of seven worthy men (boys would sound too armature) who were set out to change this world by their touch. Their were a lot many distractions that came our way, the other boys were up on the ground at this time, we could hear all our heartbeats rise and sink with every roar that struck our ear drum, some voices were loud and clear while some vague and unclear but none asked for any clarification from the other whether it was their team batsman that hit it over to the boundary line right now. We were all men who focussed on task and now that no worldly affair could hamper us from doing it.
After a lot of keen observation and finding from our side, one of us managed to lay our eyes upon that miraculous thing. His awe directed us to the thing that he assumed to be the object of our desire. Somehow this unsaid rule developed that no one does anything alone or by himself, the truth behind this was the fear of the unknown and also the fear of being mocked at if that was not the thing. Some one had to do it and I was stunned when all eyes stopped at me. Was I the one to take forward this mission and to complete it? To me it was more of a reward…but somehow the others knew that they were to follow the act and so it made no difference to them who goes first. Was this what I was thinking and was a myth or this is what it meant? (all this didn’t strike me then, it is only now when I write of it I think in this manner).
Before I noticed all the others were on their knees and then I felt someone pulling down my pajamas’ too, to me it was a clear indication to follow what was being done. We all crawled towards it and I bit more close. I brought my hand closer to it and got my fingers to touch it. I felt the blood rush into my fingers and as I brought them towards the leaves. I felt the space in between reduce and then as I neared very close to it I felt tingles in my fingers, I felt the space that separated us. If felt magical and magnetic, I felt it calling me or me calling it. And then I touched it, and it dropped, there was a silence and I could feel the happiness of having conquered, in that silence. It did not say ‘touch me not’ but we heard those words being said in definite syllable like the broken line of a nursery rhyme. I heard the drums and trumpets that rolled in our hearts. Then it was the time to see the touch of the ‘touch me not’ and we all dispersed to find our own touch me not’s. It was as though not we but they were touching us, and as they touched they sang to us -to…uch m…e not, to…uch m…e not.
That day taught me a lesson that takes a new face every time I think of it, it taught me that the small joys of life come coated with the silver foil of laughter that are born in our hearts and travel to our lips unknowingly. These laughs are not heard by our ears but give true happiness to us, and then the joys becomes larger than the objects that gave it.

SMILE AT ME

Smile at me, I like it when you smile. Just curve your lips a bit, let your muscles loosen and your mouth relax. But remember, do it gently, don’t force it. If your eyes close a bit its fine, there is not much out here to actually look at, nothing worth compromising that smile. But its now that you don’t smile at me, you don’t even see me, because I do not exist to you.
I still remember the last time I saw you smile, if I recall rightly it was a loud laugh and not a small miser smile. I was growing wiry of standing in that corner and watching people pass by. Popcorn dropping, the bubbles off a cold drink can, counting people go by and some things I don’t recollect. Oh god! I never thought I would ever wait for someone for so long. “Wait, wait…Stop. Why are you doing this to yourself? If you’re doing this for me, please don’t do it? It hurts me more than what it did that time…please be careful, don’t step on it, it’ll hurt, it’ll bleed…hush…now lie down calmly”.
Nothing has changed here, the same old bed sheets, the uncovered pillows, and half eaten scrambled eggs on the pan. I could never figure out why you ate them directly from the pan. I didn’t think of these things then I didn’t notice them either, because I could only see your smile. And now I don’t see your smile and you don’t see me. I see the night lamp across the bed is lying down and pieces of glass scattered till a distance. I think it’s still warm and you must have broken it a little while ago as the filament is still glowing. I don’t touch it, anyways I can’t. There was a time when you quietly saw me sleep and I didn’t see you. And now I see you sleep lost in the dreamy land and you can’t see me. How antithetical…can you see me in your dreams at least…can you touch me. I once read that in dreams you are unable to touch people. Can you touch me? In dreams emotions are overwhelming so do you smile…now that you see me do you smile? Let me blow on your fore head and see if you feel my breath “see…look at him, I think he could feel it”. I guess he just turned a normal reaction to all the discomfort in the body and mind. “You turned your back to me… I don’t think that way, because you have stopped smiling”. I wish even I could sleep like you. But sleep and dreams are all lost for me now.
You get up today again not with the rising sun but the rising volume of your alarm. I am surprised how it can dare to raise its voice even after being beaten on its head each day.
That evening was so much the same as the others, the same long wait and the promise to me that the next time it would be different. And then I saw a sight I had seen a lot many times before. You and a bunch of fresh tulips, both smiling at me. Not much was said, and the promise I made to myself was left to be mulled upon for the next time. There was the movie and I saw me in the character, a few warm drops rolling down and the cheeks and the same old hand in hand thing.
This was of yesterday, and today is what was tomorrow to you then. I hear sirens, I see panic and I again smell the last smell that I distinctly remember of. I hear the impatient shuffling of whizzing feet as I see red all around. I think of tulips…but what a paradox the colour now troubles me so much that I want it out of my sight. I see you unable to find your own breath, barely holding on to it. I see your chest moving up and down but your expression is cold. Never did I see your face vacant of emotions; I saw the smile being replaced by anger, frustration and helplessness. “If only I could have sustained that smile of mine that day”, that’s what you say to yourself in the mirror…do you see my reflection in the mirror? Do you confess that to me? You knew it that very moment I would never come back, but a little trust in me would have made it better for you and for me too. At least you would have not been so skeptical about my undying love and unseen presence. If you had not seen me in the mirror you would have known that I am in your touch…something’s are difficult to explain rationally but then see what acceptance of the worldly rational things have made of you. You lost your smile and seem to shut your eyes to me…the day those tear drops cease to exist and your vivid vision becomes unclouded you would see me. I am their; just a bit veiled.
I still seek that smile, a lost but found one travelling from ear to ear. Unlike you I do not have regrets about that day. Being with you would have meant a lot to me, but it was to feel your presence and see your smile, and not hoping that things would have turned out differently for both of us. Your guilt is not only eating you up but is killing me again and again everyday. Do you know that we relive those moments everyday? ...You through your guilt and I seeing you consumed by it. I am here everyday, just as you are. I travel in pain everyday, just as you do. I am but an adaptation of you. The only barrier is of existence. Only you exist for me and for you other than me everything exists; but to you it does not seem so. I am not indifferent to you; it’s just that presence is a bit different.
You see, but never observe, hear, but never listen, exist, but never live and today you only proved your indifference to life. I wish I could touch those cold hands of yours and breathe my life into your mouth, but I feel for the first time since long the absence of life in me. And then I see that smile across your face, I see that I is for me. “Do you see me; I have been waiting for this smile of yours for long. Now that you hear me I tell you that even if you would have waited and kissed me good night things would not have been really different…do you listen”. Destiny has a game for all of us; it played it and is pressing the pain of losing it on you. If not that day then maybe yesterday or even today…it could have been me instead of you under those wheels. You cannot change the game that has been decided for you, what is in your hand is the belief that life and love do not die they replicate in some form or the other.”But wait…how can you see me…stay away…don’t touch me. How can you feel me…how can I feel you. Life can’t get off you this easily”. If I need to compromise your smile for your life I would do. “Please don’t see me…please stay in your world”. You are a part of me that breathes the air of morning, feels the heat of noon sun, tires and relaxes in the dusk and sleeps the calmness of the night. Feel me now and remember it as a part of you that perpetuates alongside you.
Lie in that bed of yours and feel life, relish the taste of being alive and the freshness of a new life that you grabbed last night. And above all, smile…yes, I see it again. In the mirror when you see I know that smile is given to me. To me that smile is an acknowledgment, a sign, an indication, a gesture, an assurance that I am real to you. A consolation that makes me feel not alone, and that neither are you. So smile.

The Concept of Freedom

Are we free? What is freedom to you, to me and to all of us? Is it the absence of control or the lack of direction; a search, a path to be followed or just an urge to break open. Or is it just an adamancy to be able to have control and be the maker or the beaker. Well for all of these freedom is all about oneself, about aloneness and oneness. But is freedom a concept of the mind or an existing reality that is achievable for those who crave for it. The five elements of nature: - earth, water, air, fire and aether all are simultaneously in our being, for a living creature is not born bit by bit. The moon beams that seem to dance on still waters are the ones that cause the white horses to run on the ocean floor. The forest spread finds anchorage in the flattened earth and as it grows the roots go only deeper. The apple’s so called ‘free’ fall is also a myth, it is a slave to gravity serving its notice period on the branch before being put down by his master. The blowing winds are only a company to this terrestrial sphere that’s meant to circle a wandering star. The sun cannot stop burning, do you think if would have been free it would be blazing. The essence of us is so interwoven that freeing them would be like questioning your own existence. How complex it is to describe freedom, possibly for every action or inaction it has a new meaning all together. If one says he is free to choose his way of leading a life he probably is manipulating, because in life one action leads to the other and so nothing is independent. Every action taken by you is a by product of certain thoughts given to you by someone through some means. And that is the reason it is said that life works out in the process of life itself. In these entangled lives and decisions your action is only a speckle and the idea of have taken it independently is only a fantasy to savor your mind. So this concept of freedom is something that has been used very loosely by all of us. I call it as a concept as the idea of a free will or mind is an intellectual illusion that we create to have the satisfaction of atleast ruling something in this world, be it as inherent as your self