it was a dark and soundless morning

days like today I indulge in static, in a comfort stationary, slowly sinking into silence. it may have been yesterday. the significance of everyday things oscillate wildly between pointless and all the difference between impoverishment and civilization. I wish again with a liquid desperation to realize a life neatly stacked on cubes of fact. the vision of myself as the focal pivot between progress and not, looms huge and constant, and I can hardly breathe or think to move. the ebb and flow of living, the rush of feelings and sunlight and cold, are enormous and ludicrous in a palate of continuous daily todos of constant temper and quality, like storms and wildfires scattering neatly arranged instructions for progression, the fact that there is music is filled with guilt and reluctance, terrible and incongruous. in the age of scientific reason, and exponentials of fractaloid machine logic, the real world is dulling steadily, systematically, I stumble around flat footed scattering the peace of a billion pixels. the deadly fear of water conquered by braving the elements to get toilet paper. in the hush of morning light and stale snow all around, I could be the only living human, there are no leaves left to fall, only cars with eerie light.

from the pensieve

her first was sky blue
we were four inside, plus one
in the middle of a bridge
stranded in the night
to continuous doppler honks
it wasnt any good
and there wasnt another
for the longest time
until she hung up the stirrups
and this one was gray
sealed and safe and untried
and it delivered, without
her at the wheel
and its now my turn
to not be any good
to not have been
for many many years
at what I loved doing
beyond reason, without filters
it does things

aging

has a theme song a wallpaper
wrapped on the vista
of golden possible
a paper pontoon sunk under a paper lantern
dissolving like shore from day to day
I try to untwist and speak
the doors that swung out into a freezing night
have already slammed a thousand times
faint and creaky, loud and clear
a blink of starry sky, and its evening again
light woollen gloves on aged hands
and im never quite certain
if I am
over or under a rainbow
plastic or tin can

3d orderings

in the life of pi
were the position of things
in the avalanche of things
but now I only see only have
the heart shaped rabbit medallion
and I dont know
how it fits in the living room
how long to wear it
where to put it
if I take it off again
with a certain exhaustion
of all the things
that are wrong with me
trickling through the sweat
of a hoary rationality

cold block

for I quite believed
an antigravity journey
that made it to target
and swirled around in many
circles of worry
builds a japanese door
into the soul and demands
continuous peek and pull
refactoring machine learning
between crises and flowers
is apparently also a thing
I quite believed I would see
the magic door
if I stared hard enough

moola sthanam

so wildly disparate
in the iot of things
multiplexed with rich media
and I sit on the grass
it feels real enough
with rapidly aging hands
with trauma and sunshine
with a child
it feels surreal enough
when everyone of the next age
are voices
when pathways to the next mind map
are links

deriving at top speed

freedom is an illusion

no its really not
within whatever structure
I currently live in
I must seek to change
life for the better
time for small and large
happinesses
I must seek to understand
then work around
the various chains of being
life and time have one direction
and the gatelets in our brain
orientation to circle
to progress
we have to choose direction
and meander around it
as humans know how
as do I, with a delightful
habit of emitting direction
no no no, thataway

carbon dating of hollywood heroines

im not sure whats up with the movie industry, but past year or so, I have become extremely reluctant to invest money to go and watch a movie. the oddest sort of non-stories are becoming 3 hour sagas. even the dick flicks are all getting overrun with crazy robot dramas.

the human interest stories are acquiring a certain satyajit ray-e quality - she walks into the room. thinks for a moment, then closes the door. screeeee. she turns around and leans on the door for a few minutes. she is upset. she feels her feelings. the fishtank in right changes color. a cellphone beeps. she slowly peels herself off the door and walks in a dejected sort of way to bathroom. opens the door. screeeee. she walks to the washbasin. opens tap. wastes some water as she stares at herself in mirror. splashes water on her face. stares some more. turns and pulls a bright orange towel off the rack. its mega hd so we can see all individual towel molecules. wipes her face in some detail. wipes her neck. places towel back. walks meditatively out of bathroom. screeeee.

and the darwin award nominees, my top 5 favorites

5. the gone girl chick - ok everyone who claims to have never entertained kind euthanasia for their loving spouse is lying. this chick kills random exes for her loving spouse, sure, of course, it could happen

4. the da vinci code chick - there is a severely biblical scene where tom hanks is carefully propelling her across a busy intersection. the lame leading the blind

3. the hunger games chick - barbie doll in chain mail who spends a lot of time in costume change, and uses bow and arrow in a melee battle

2. the fifty shades chick - who can never get anything done ever cause shes just tied up all the time. no no REALLY. clearly the first runner up

1. the vampire saga chick - sorry babe, you won't do, you're just too, i dont know, whats the word, too HUMAN. screeeee.

some other reason to be

a someday dream
for a stone staircase
marble for effect
wide and high
in pieces and together
with a garden surround
concave from the sky
something new to see
on every step
frequent reststops
for the weary
all the way to the top
where the view of the valley
is all of it
so those of us
with no point whatsoever
have pilgrimages to make

A casual google after writing this revealed this is already done to death - Dali, Escher, Inception, McCracken, true art with all the hopelessness

Clay

I was trapped in Swargam, the exotic spa. Mom was looking critically at me, her soft hair blowing delightfully across her features. She looked like a golden fairy tale princess of twenty five. She was forty two.

"Put some more bleach on her cheeks, the layer is a little thin" her voice cut across my thoughts as I lay there invisible, choking in ammonia fumes. The spa attendant slapped more bleach on me. I concentrated hard on not letting the tears fall, they mixed with the bleach and made my skin streaky.

My hands shook, as the potter's wheel spun with a crazy piece of clay on it. In mom’s magic hands this would have been a masterpiece of containment, in mine, it was mangled and fast spinning out of control. The tears fell freely now blending with the clay. I looked down. Surprising that the grotesque pot didn't dissolve, but clung on grimly to some kind of form on the wheel.

In a perfect family, born of wealth looks and ability, I was the black sheep. Literally. I had neither my dad's tanned elegance, nor my mom's fair perfection, neither daring nor talent. I was dark as night, small and comfortably proportioned. Ordinary.

I loved pottery, the feel of dark clay sliding against my fingers, clay that matched the shade of my skin.

Have you tried Fair and Lovely dear? Yes I had.

I loved watching my mom's hand against the wheel, so fair against the clay, long and slender, deft and beautiful,

Just lose some weight and you will look like a dusky model

I loved contrasting my own hand with hers, blunt and camouflaged perfectly in clay. It was a form of pain that was always in my heart.

You have really pretty features, you know, despite being so dark

At the potter's wheel, my pain took form, and I could see it. I made pottery whenever I needed to see my pain, watch it mangle itself in my hands.

Are you adopted?

The clay in my hands finally caved in to utter shapelessness. I cursed and scraped it off the wheel.

Today I was going to be somebody. At a small art gallery, Handscapes, an exhibition including twelve of my paintings was to be held. My paintings, mine! It was like a frightening dream come true.

In a way, my first real painting that I called mine was of an orchard. Coconut and papaya trees arranged in perfectly symmetric lines. I saw it daily on my way to college. One day I just walked into it. I didn't think about trespassing or earthworms. It was beautiful and I wanted to stand in it for a while.

It was here that I discovered that I was a child of the sun. I had been taught to fear the sun since the age of seven, I was morbidly afraid of becoming darker that I already was. Today with the rebellion of youth, I stood there among the trees as swathes of penetrating sunrays hit my hair, and danced up my skin.

Inside me, a warmth grew, my skin glowed dark gold and I leant against a tree, upturning my face to the sun, drinking in its sliding warmth. From that day on I was no longer afraid of the sun. I worshipped it, and started painting its warmth into my pictures. And its shadows

It took me a month to paint the orchard. I brushed out the trees lovingly, dabbed on grass and leaves, then added sunlight and shadow to it. Something overwhelming came over me, and I started adding shadow everywhere. At odd angles, at complete contrast to the direction of sunlight, sharp, menacing shadows. The beautiful orchard wore a look of irreparable damage with shadows crisscrossing it, and I loved it.

I went back to all my landscapes and added shadows. A man in the crowd whose shadow had horns, a shop front that had teeth in its shadow, a giant with the shadow of a small mouse. I spent hours debating on each shadow for each innocuous part of my picture, walking an odd angle between symmetry, reality and complete chaos.


I stood in a corner at Handscapes. Meet the artist! Why didn’t I feel like it? The crowd flowed around me, mostly ignoring me. Life hadn’t changed, really. Some who knew I was the artist shook my hand and said the paintings were great. I couldn’t tell if they meant it, I was too nervous to probe.

I saw a young girl enter the gallery. About sixteen, dark and slender. She was clearly playing dress up, heavy makeup, and a low cut blouse that she fidgeted with constantly. Trying to pull it back up her throat. Looking pale as delicate death, with lots of white foundation for extra-fairness. I watched her, as she walked around modeling the inner me. Self-conscious, afraid and unhappy.

Surrounded by the dense caricatures of my pain, expensive perfumes, and the babble of art talk, I looked down at my hands of clay, and realized something. I smiled, first inside my stomach, and then brightly at the girl. She smiled back tentatively, blinking in shyness and shame
"Hi, I'm Nasha, the artist" I gestured at a wall quickly as if confessing to a sin. 

She smiled a genuine smile for the first time, radiant and wide, it took my breath away.

"Hi, I'm Kirti, my mom is your mom's college mate"

I nodded. I had already decided when I saw her face that I wouldn’t go to Swargam again, or inhale ammonia. It was so simple, I didn't belong in an exclusive club. No, God's place for me was more inclusive

"Hey Kirti, do you like my paintings?"

She nodded eagerly.

We walked around the crowded gallery, and I explained to her what each picture meant to me, each drawn of pain, paint and imperfect clay. I finally found the courage to agree when she said, they are beautiful

fake id

if I had the compass along
I’d know which way to age
which times are open season
which scars are meant for reason
I would glide along
the expressway to being doing
what we like I have done
whole aisles of superstore
and a paved road under the sun
if I had the compass along
I’d know which way was north
if I could blend blindness with ignorance
I would have been someone

terra firma

I gave up the sky today, for myself, for those around me, to lean on terra firma. To turn with my feet in four directions, to sit and stand and walk as directed, I gave up control today. Not easy not, its fearful scary. But to live in the shadow of the valley is longer and more constant as an ache, as a regret, as a douser of energy. So with the wisdom of age, the mellow strings of Puccini playing in the background, and a faint sort of hope for progress, I pad flat footed across terra carpeta, holding distrust and disdain away with considerable force, teacup close with same. I tried simultaneously to switch off the powerhouse, but it cannot be quelled, so with the best of two hands, I moved it along the paths of progress, learning, understanding, sorting, channelling. With dubious world impact, but thats sky talking. To savor the passing moments, the connections, the music, the food and drink, to me, thats a fight to the death. But I get better, I remember more of today than I would have at the end of a day two years ago. After dealing with lifes shitstorms, which by the way I thought I was done with, but apparently not, the anger, the fear, paranoia, anxiety, they are all there. They travel yet with, but im able to choose now. The wisdom of earth is peaceful and freeing, im not really made for thousand foot journeys, a random wander hop with occasional lookback to paint the most convenient picture, thats about my speed

a parents pride

watching the tiny toddler
rush out naked from a warm bath
leap on his plastic table
and make a pee
then rush back into the bathroom
and shred the toilet paper
until he has a perfect rectangle
of 3, then gallop back
to place carefully on the pee
I can't help the pride
we made that from scratch
beat that, world

lambda expressions

this is now my fifth retreat
into the glass house
glass ceiling
the best view all around
in the middle of nowhere nothing
in this half life I think
its more cellophane than glass
and sadly, if it tore away
I would still quite enjoy it
each day as I wake to watch
orion cross from side to side
it gets a little harder
to understand why
I cannot submit to reckless decay
and just be
whats in it for me

unsetting a precedent

is a long slow thankless

arduation, with frequent setbacks

a gaggle of blank stares

in polite conversation

a storm of acrimony

in real engagement

a series of minuscule changes

when finally in motion

liable to halt constantly

and reference the inchtape

as a measurement of progress

I can spend forever

climbing out of the box

but my forever is already spent

and I steadily lose hope

of the box dissolving

in my lifetime

*pic is a sculpture at Doha airport

the longest rays

and I remember her
in her dull green skirt
that always fit better than mine
hair so heavy, I half expected
her to spin away
when she turned
she knew how to talk
how to stand, how to be
at a ridiculous age
today when I finally learned
what it is to stand like her
I would rather spin away
than find her again

bird by bird

Trying to start writing again regularly, here are some quotes I use for self-hypnosis, most by Anne Lamott

And the eternal why - Because I want to, because I'm good at it

Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life, and it is the main obstacle between you and a shitty first draft. I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping stone just right, you won't have to die

Regarding perfect people - I could resent the ocean if I tried

All you can give us is what life is about from your point of view. You are not going to be able to give us the plans to the submarine. Life is not a submarine. There are no plans

Dying people can teach us this most directly - The package is not who that person has really been all along. Without the package, another sort of beauty shines through, truer and more poignant

Think of those times when you've read prose or poetry that is presented in such a way that you have a fleeting sense of being startled by beauty or insight, by a glimpse into someone's soul

To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass - seeing things in such a narrow and darkly narcissistic way that it presents a colo-rectal theology, offering hope to no one

Writing is about hypnotizing yourself into believing in yourself, getting some work done, then unhypnotizing yourself and going over the material coldly

We're a crowd animal, a highly gregarious, communicative species, but the culture and the age, and all the fear that fills our days have put almost everyone into little boxes, each of us all alone

Adam was the only man who, when he said a good thing, knew that nobody had said it before. - Mark Twain

Being enough was going to have to be an inside job.

I secretly believe there’s a pie. I will go to my grave brandishing my fork.

We write to expose the unexposed. If there is one door in the castle you have been told not to go through, you must. The writer's job is to turn the unspeakable into words - not just into any words, but if we can, into rhythm and blues.

The road to enlightenment is long and difficult, and you should try not to forget snacks and magazines.

You can either practice being right or practice being kind.

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don't give up.

The function of freedom is to free someone else - Toni Morrison

the incomplete bridge - spoken word

Written a few years ago the incomplete bridge to try animate the exciting world of goal setting

Thanks Elissa for inviting me, and Prabha, for recording this

the constant debate

beside the shadow
of a few mountains
where light was insistent
on deaf tones
and water incited by rain
rushed in floods of bits
trickled through porous sand
wove back in earth quietly
so pebbles could have
their sky back awhile
and all things growing
were wrapped in memories
lived a few birds

The Dress

everyone has one
makes you feel confident
beautiful, brilliant, witty
transformative of the higher self
mine is purple pajamas, of course
and green shirt, with unguents
and ginger scents
a half hour mirrorside
with hardly any talkback from it
a primitive ritual
without human sacrifice
to shore up steel, to mark time
to register and remember
despite many subsequent cutenesses
that a few hours in tiny toddler worldview
with a couple of near death experiences
and post traumatic tantrums thrown in
is life altering