Believe in our connection

Too much filth brought about by humans,
we look around but don’t feel what we see, don’t even see ourselves .
The whole world is gone wrong but
right now each of us can make a difference.
You are an essential fragment of the unified whole.
Another secret of life, to find that subtle link that connects us all,
to one another and to the Infinite Eternal.
It's not as tough as it sounds, nor a fantasy as it seems.
All we need to do is to find the angel in us, and let it grow.
Then we'll hear the cymbals and chimes, see the doves and the sunrises, smell the flowers in the meadows.

We've lost the world to ego and discrimination.
Universal Brotherhood marooned on the islands we dread to tread.
What do we feel, what could be more fearsome; bombs and missiles, tanks and wars.
We could all put a stop to this, if we just believe in our connection.
Devil's dance as angels shy, are we just going to watch as it all just goes by.
Don't recede from what could be, faith in our connection is the key.
Let our hollow bones and skin come alive.
We could all believe in our connection, one as all and all as one...

Let's lower our walls, its empty homes we defend right now.
Let's lower our drawbridge, castles of dungeons and dragons that we fight for.
Let's open up, hollow souls we'll cover up no more.

Let's bury our pasts in some corner of time,
it's an open world, let's till it before we plant the next seed.
We could make the angels want to smile down on us, we could live to see children playing carelessly.
We could start to believe in redemption, we could start to struggle for emancipation.
Oh we could...we could...We could change the world,
if only we could believe in our connection...
Oh! Believe in our connection...

Unsconscious Believers ?!?

When you look around and see all the chaos infecting us like a pestilence, don’t you wonder about the reasons that we present as ‘reasons’ for all the unreasonable things that we do…Why do people do the ugly things that they do?!... Is it like someone once told me that they do the things they do because they are scared? People doing things for no particular, logically sound reason but just for some unexplained repressed cause. Doesn’t make much sense, does it? But then again, if you are able to think along different lines, they do make so much sense! Something like children in a playground; if they do the pushing then they are not the one to be pushed. But reflecting on it, it’s immaterial whether you’re pushing or being pushed, because anyway you do feel the jerk.
Do children push because it makes them feel strong like adults..? Do adults ‘push’ because it makes them feel stronger than they are..? Is it all because humans have a subconscious complex of inferiority, an embedded sense of vulnerability… a sub-conscious acknowledgement of his own weakness? And is this sub-conscious acknowledgement of weakness due to the subconscious acknowledgement of some powerful entity… of the subconscious acceptance of a superior power… of God. Are we all, at the subconscious level, believers of God?!!!

Haunted Eyes

Little boy stares into the haunted eyes of the old man,
the one who taught him to laugh, and songs and tunes to clap.
But now he's silent waiting for the call of death,
waiting to see the light and the end of the tunnel.... with haunted eyes.

Little boy sings his songs, dances around and giggles,
trying to remind him of all he'd gathered and taught,
but the old man just looks at him... with haunted eyes.

"Rage rage...do not go gentle into the good night", sings the little boy,
but the old man just sighs and moans... with haunted eyes.

Haunted eyes, haunted eyes, haunted eyes...
Cruel haunted eyes, sad haunted eyes, confused haunted eyes,
lonely haunted eyes, troubled haunted eyes, blind haunted eyes.
Haunted eyes, haunted eyes... by haunted eyes haunted.

Little boy looks out of the window, spies little kids playing,
holding hands, dancing around in circles, and he wonders
if in the future they'll have haunted eyes.
He thinks of the people in the streets, in the offices and stores,
in the magazine stores and bus stops,
and wonders why they all have... haunted eyes.
Little boy thinks of the blind wise man, begging with a new hat on the street corner,
he thinks of the nice smelling rich lady at the movies,
and wonders why they all have... haunted eyes.

Haunted eyes, haunted eyes, haunted eyes...
Cruel haunted eyes, sad haunted eyes, confused haunted eyes,
lonely haunted eyes, troubled haunted eyes, blind haunted eyes.
Haunted eyes, haunted eyes... by haunted eyes haunted.

Little boy sings his goodbye, leaving the old man alone with his haunted eyes,
playfully prances down the carpeted hallway, to the end
of the passage where an ancient naked mirror hangs.
He looks into it only for a minute, and nervously steps out of the doorway,
into the streets outside, where he can try to forget
that he too... has haunted eyes.

When the night comes calling

Sometimes in the depth of these quiet nights, i hear a shrill echo from far. They say it's the echo of silence! Yes indeed, i've heard songs on it, read poems about it...heard the dumb and the wise commenting on it. But when i hear that silent cacophony, i feel elated. It's like a song that anyone can relate to, a truth that noone denies, like a love that never leaves a void, a youth that never felt lost, like a question that always has answers,like a messenger with only good news... yes, i believe it has things to say in it's own cryptic ways. If only we could interpret what this wisdom of the night signifies, i feel we could enrich the purpose of our existance. Does it say something about how we could make our relationships more soulful, does it speak of our psychological and spiritual pollution...does it tell us about how we could make our society worth living in, does it speak about transcendence and enlightment...does it comment on the mini Big Bang... does it tell me about how to write better lines of code...does it remind us of the lessons from our past or does it try to console us by letting us know that we are forgiven...
I really don't know what it actually says, but this i do believe that it says something... to you, to them, to us, to me...to all of us out here, doing our own little gig in a huge vacant auditorium where the stakes are not worth the games we play. Yes! when the night comes calling i do beieve that it brings an encrypted wisdom with her.

Yet untitled

These few days have been kind of edgy out here. Strikes, protests and curfews for some pseudo-political purpose I fail to really comprehend. Sometimes i wonder, what is it that we are striving to achieve... a little fame, a little power, a little more wealth? All at the cost of the very reasons that we want to achieve these for! It all reminds me of the little kid who jumped across the stream to be able to jump back to where he was. Then when he crossed it and was about to jump back home, he realised that the water had risen and he was left stranded.
I just found something i had scribbled on a piece of tissue paper...i don't even remember where and when i had written it but here it is...

...From the ancient dry nights to
deeper echoing nights I've crawled.
Shelter me in my flights,
bury me and then uncover a greater me from these nights.
Hither i blossom where petals guard me,
prickly walls, into the fresh air I've crawled.

I'm a stranger, a story untold, a vision unrealised,
a clock unwinding, a picture unfolding...
Just a soul trying to find a perch,
fingers searching for a ledge,
just another ordinary boy, growing up...can you see me now?

The road head calls while bridges behind fall,
from these nights I now awaken with a hopeful yawn...

and oh yes! guess who that little kid was?..yupp l'il old me.

Sometimes i feel like...

…Sometimes I feel like a milestone, pointing out destinations but myself always ‘on the road’.
…sometimes I feel like a lamp post, shedding light for all but itself hidden in the convenient dark.
…sometimes I feel like a shooting star, the brighter it flares the quicker it recedes.
…sometimes I feel like the sun, holding the solar system together but itself all alone.

…Sometimes I feel like a desert night, screaming and screeching but no one hears a word.
…sometimes I feel like a song, people take me into their own context so that no one knows what I really say.
…sometimes I feel like a crying wolf, and the world thinks I’m just howling at a naked full moon.
…sometimes I feel like a war, millions die and millions cry but no one’s really sure why I came.
…sometimes I feel like an atom-bomb dropped loose, defending or destroying, I don’t really know.
…sometimes I feel like the questions of a child, naïve or wisdom, no one’s really thought.

…Sometimes I feel we’re all just candles, fighting to burn before we’re finally blown out.
…Sometimes I feel like the ancient me…

Drop a comment and share your "sometimes i feel like..." and i will append it to the original post with credits to you.

Echoes of the precious visitors who dropped a comment ( Thanks to all :-) }:
Sometimes I feel like a sand castle that can be easily washed away by a gentle wave... {Manik}
Sometimes I feel like a slave, waiting for my emancipation... { ibutabu}

A Midnight down

Did i feel that i heard the cymbals and the chimes of a beautiful world unfolding before me?
Did i feel that the long awaited eternal togetherness was waiting just around this solitary corner?
Did i feel that the rearrangement of my priorities was so worth it?
Did i feel that being alone doesn't mean being lonely... 'coz the beauty i dig, resides within me, for me?
Did i hear the echo of a happy song after so long?
Did i trace the curve of a long awaited, almost forgotten smile? Did I...

Did i feel the whiff of a blooming rose?
Did i feel the joy of a smiling baby?
Did i feel the brush of a loving caress?
Did i feel the peace from the burial of a dark 'yesterday'...and did i feel the joy from the resurrection of a softer 'today'?
Did i feel the reason for a new beginning?
Did i feel the presence of a strength to start all over again?
Did i feel in love being loved?
Did i feel i was someone's beautiful world?
Did i finally feel like who i am is what i want to be? Did I...

Did i just feel like all of these feelings were just acrobats of an illusion...
Did i just feel like the ancient me...

What matters ...Not.

Thoughts locked in some solitary late hours of the night, they ramble from one loose end to another of a tangled up existence. I look around me , and all I hear is the shrill echo of silence that darkness brings along with her, the silence that always provides too many answers for a question. Noise irritates and disturbs you… but silence? It confuses a ‘thinking ear’. There are always these voices in and around your head… just like these eyes that hound you, from within and thither…some comforting, some brimming with wet malice. You look right into them and they disappear… till you can look no more, and they disappear no more…
When its days of nourishment, metamorphosis inside your private cocoon, watching down from a private hill with time perpetually corroding and eroding everything around you. You feel everyone and everything around you , but it fails to stimulate any impact on you.
Its kinda tough to realize that no one and nothing at all is indispensable, not even yourself… but I think I get it now. It makes you feel less important, strips you of your fancy bows and airs, confuses and hurts you a little to realize that life goes on… you go on… even if the people you love become non-existent; that life goes on… all the people you love will go on… even if you become non-existent. It traumatizes you a little to swallow the realization that- all that matters, really matters not much if it didn’t matter anymore. I wish it could all have been some other softer way, but it seems this is the way the world revolves.
…and while the curtains on the window glow from the growing radiance of a new day outside, where the final echoes of the screeching night trail in the silence of deserted streets, I wonder about the eternal strangeness of life… and wonder how it’ll continue to awe us all..

I Choose to Live - II

... continuation to 'I Choose to Live - I'.

Aaah… I know, you might think that it’s just the rush of a young mind and that time and age will calm me down! But consider this, how ‘old’ is ‘young’ and how ‘young’ is ‘not old’? Everything is relative here. And if you relate your age to the universe, too old is not old enough. Time, as we know is infinite and a lifespan is just a mere moment. So live it. Don’t just plan to live, always planning for ‘that tomorrow’ when you get ‘this’ done and get ‘that’ accomplished….Be living it, love to live…for the truth of our existence is encapsulated in the entirety of life, not in a few fleeting marked moments. By planning up ahead too much, don’t push the Beginning closer to the End, for the End with all its doubtless realities is already close enough! Realise this but don’t despair, as that will only push the beginning closer to the end, and hence, relatively, you bring the End closer, and like I already said… the End with all its doubtless realities is already close enough.
Just loosen your collar, tip back your fancy hats and look around… observe, absorb life; don’t just speak wisdom, reach out; don’t just think, contemplate; don’t only hear, listen… its all out HERE, not THERE or SOMEWHERE, its EVERYWHERE. There’s a whole life waiting for you to live, trembling… the casket of life! The first reach is the scariest… but that’s how they all felt, before the first step on the moon, before the first ice-axe picked on the pinnacle of Everest, before the first neutron bombarded the atom, before the first wild cry for freedom, before the revelation of the first vision, before the crackle of the first fire… yes! That’s how they all felt before the first cry of victory.
Choose Life! Hah! You laugh, and I spit… and no matter if some of you or all of you choose otherwise, I choose to live life as long as I'm alive… so God help me!!!

The Uprising

Around 1,700,000 people of Kashmir marched to the streets with banners and slogans protesting against the atrocities in Kashmir by the Indian government and demanding independence. A memorandum stating the same was submitted to the UNO office here a few days ago. This is not a post reporting about the event. It's just an echo so that you become aware of this voice. Google "kashmir independence" to get updated on the event.

I Choose to Live -I

Well now… I’ve been running after the trails of shooting stars, and as one burned out, there was another that flared up in the sky. Beauty so haunting…frantic, frenzied, scary chases. Oh yes! They went speeding by, leaving behind a granular sparking trail, never in the same direction, inciting all the 'wandering wonderers' to follow enchanted. So we never got far, though it was always farther. Along twisted trails, we blazed footprints, lost to memory and time.

Yes, we might have lost some pieces of ourselves along the way, but then the gatherings too we brought back with us. I don’t judge them to find out, I just conclude on this. It all adds a spark to kindle us on our journey now. I know it does for me, at least.
If “being out there and making it back” didn’t rejuvenate us in some way, we would feel like the white ashes, maybe a little pure, but cold and lifeless, and we would feel so dead. But no! This thumping palpitation in me thrives on adrenalin, on the natural thrill of a pure life…to live… and how to live… but we’ll live to the end! Yes… I’ll live till the end… till the night whistles tunes unheard to the living dead… till the fickle minded stars keep switching their colours from hazy purple to mellow red. Alas, unnoticed to some, who only stare ahead and find no reason to gaze around…simply gaze, for the sheer unreasonable beauty of admiration, to absorb, to wonder in awe. And then, to realize the shrinking of your own ego, feeling the stupendous power of the vast cosmic expanse, and through this, finding in some subtle way the relation of the self to the universe…so delicate yet so strong, so implicit and yet so true!... my relation to the universe… the relation of my relativities to the Absolute!

...to be continued as 'I Choose to Live-II'

Nightly Evolution

-- Nights of Evolution

Naked in the auberge rated with a billion stars,
vulnerably exposed for the night with it's cruelties to char.
The Divine power, rearranging these galactic spectra just for me,
harbor me from harm, heal me with your chaste charms.

A shooting star, sailing silently across the night,
diminishing, receding, animating the cosmic carpet by it's flight.
No thunderous lightning proclaiming its majesty,
like innocence burning in the playground of hierarchies.

An enigmatic perception humming in the back of your conclusions,
you keep your questions at bay.
The carnival of life just enough for you, to ignore
the drainage and the yells of your soul.

The music yells through chords,
the night sleeping, groans and snores.
The blind tells by the echoes, the deaf through the shadows
the savior for the day, night is here, they say!

Neons decorate the night, putting up a fight,
midnight-musers shy from the light, stroll into the night,
comfort seekers hide in the realms of dreams.
Dusk, one in all, everybody's peace so it seems…

So shine, shine from your nights….grow, emerge from yourself.
An occasion for evolution be the night...
Dawn blossoms from the twilight,
from the dust orchards ripen, Mona Lisa smiles from the blues,
mountains tower from the sea, from the shore oceans spread free...
Don't paint the night red, start to heal...
Evolve beyond the human clay, grow…glow...
from purity, with purity, into purity…gush forth…
Let tonight be a ceremony of matrimony…
Let light peep into these ancient shadows of your haunted nights.

My Time Horizon

”Nobody knows where you are, how near or how far… Shine on you Crazy Diamond” hums Pink Floyd into my room through the speakers of my IBM Lenovo while some distant flashes of lightning shear the darkness of the midnight outside my half-opened windows…
I understand the TimeHorizon now, all so clearly. The relation between my existance in this dimension of space, time and possibility, and with that of the days of the Mayans, the Mesopotamians, the Vikings, the Ottomans, and the Greeks, the Neanderthals and the Dinosaurs... I see it all, like a hollow crystal, so clear and yet formless. I understand why this present is my present, and not theirs... and why their present is not mine. I understand the reason of my existance in the age when I can have the history of time in my palm. It’s all like the orbits of the revolving cosmic elements. Since time immemorial you’ve been going round and round in seemingly silly circles, never realising that your very listless wanderings were forming the centre. The moment you stop, the centre ceases to be apparent. Then its not about reflection of light, its about dispersion of vision. You see it all so clearly, and yet nothing is seen. But then you understand everything in a strange subtle way...an intuitive wisdom.
..Yes! ‘Closer’ or not, the world IS getting ‘smaller’, and humans are turning into giants, as gigantic as the human cast can let them be. Nothing more, nothing less. And it's time for me to try to grow too…
We do grown up fast, each of us with our own priorities and visions, perceptions and definitions, with our own ‘history’ and a silent dream that we carry with us. Time sure flies by… Seems like just yesterday that me and my friends used to finish our junior-school assignments, and with a small multi-coloured football rush to the nearby “Tundekhel” playing ground to spend the evenings after school. I remember those quiet, stilly early mornings when some of us would rush there during our winter vacations and the army would be exercising their horses... tall and strong, muscular with long bouncing manes...steaming nostrils... they seemed so proud and huge then! Due to the early morning frost our toes would feel stone-numb and we'd jump up and down in our Nike track suits and Adidas football boots to warm up before we kicked the ball.
… All of us, now scattered and evolved, each with our own thoughts, conscience and memories… so many little worlds within one world. Some grew up straight and strong, some broke down in our "meddles", some lost our ‘selves’, and some chosen ones found some elements more than they ever lost.
All I can say now is that I hope we all find our own pot of gold at the end of our own rainbows…

Caught the Homeward Wind

- from my "On the Road Again".

Whew! Finally got to Old Delhi…”The City Of Djinns” as Dalrymple baptizes her in his book. The city that never sleeps, never tires… always moving, hustle and bustle forever. I glanced at my watch and realised that I had less than 30 minutes to make it to the station before I missed my bus home. I got an auto-rickshaw to the Tourist Station at 30Hazare from the outskirts of Old Delhi. All along the way, I was thinking of a back-up plan if I missed the bus …it was that close!
When I got to the tourist station I sought out the driver, a rugged old man in a worn-out khaki suit, and inquired as to how much time we had before we roared off. “Paanch minute baetee”, he answered with the typical Delhi slur. Five minutes! All the while, I had been sweating like an ice-cream melting in the Sahara. I strolled into the backyard. “Toilet-Only Staff” it said. I looked around and quickly slipped inside and latched the door. I stripped in record time, took a shower, dried myself as much as I could with my handkerchief, aired my jockeys and then…out! All before you could say “Obaid! You desperately need a bath!!!” Since the last four days, I had been continuously travelling by rickshaws, auto-rickshaws, the Indian Railway, the Metro and now I was to board an inter-state tourist bus.
The air cools down a bit as if to soothe my morning rush as I light up ‘half a ciggy’ with a bottle of chilled ‘mountain dew’ and try to jot down some sleezy lines before the engine roars to life and off we go again like a projected cannon-ball. “Well darling! Love has caught the homeward wind now”…
…Watching the world unfolding as we head on, fading thoughts flash through my mind, milestones whizz by, the summer sun shines high as banyan trees bow over my blazing path sheltering whatever remains of me on my way home. Sometimes, I wonder…How far is ‘away’, and how near is ‘home’… which turn is ‘right’ and which not.
A map of life, a map of life,
Where can I get you for a dollar and a half...
These lines spring up in my mind. Hmmm… "Map of life", I try to push it into my long-term memory as the title for my next set of lyrics…
… A long road stretching out before me, an engine roaring to life beneath me, a sky that opens out above me as a doorway to the cosmos…a part of the world around me, a beautiful destination ‘open all’ just for me, a light in my eyes and the peace of the heart, some titbits... I guess it doesn’t take much to make me happy!

The Journey to ‘Ordinarity’

...The midnight-darkness trickles into these quiet streets where fancy frilly faces dance in the day time, and as softly as it seeps into my days, it passes as gently, without a trace, leaving behind a whispering twilight that escapes from me even more deftly.
... A little laughter, a few hidden tears, ... a few kicks, a few licks, a few thrills, a few drills... what more could one want from these crazy hours that slip by so easily. No scores to settle, no forced promises to keep, no dark secrets to hide, no reason to not-be-yourself... I lie mesmerized like a baby, too amazed at my own coordinations, entranced like "Alice in wonderland", at a world that unfolds so mysteriously; already too colorful to redo, already too beautiful to complain, already too crazy to try to put sense into... and the midnights never fail to come... so punctually, so dependable... bringing with it a pause that never fails to "enlighten" us a little bit more about the daylight that whisked by... a momentary pause to prepare for yet another daylight drill...
A strange struggle, to become an ordinary instance of existance with ordinary ways, an ordinary human with ordinary desires and chases...ordinary days with ordinary secrets, ordinary downs with ordinary highs, ordinary days with ordinary midnights, ordinary joys with ordinary battles, ordinary carelessness with ordinary fears, ordinary crowds with ordinary estrangement, ordinary charisma with ordinary ugliness, ordinary questions with ordinary searches, an ordinary direction with ordinary waywardness, .... And it took me a long time to get here.

The Rhythms Choose Us

..."Don't want your grip, don't want your greed..." screams Metallica into my ears through a pair of headphones that never fail to accompany me through these nights. One of my best friends that stuck through thick and thin. The next number to be streamed into my ears is the number called "One" by Metallica. With a thumping rhythm, a melody of its own, this has always been one of my anthems, drumming in my head through all my highs and lows. Sometimes I wonder if it’s we who identify with the music or the other way round, we are identified by the music..? Do we choose the rhythms or is it the rhythms that choose us...is it that we choose to live or life that chooses us..? This thought takes me far off to Valencia, Spain where a friend who I met during my travels, lives. I've never been to Spain but I've seen enough of beautiful Spain on tv, heard enough about beautiful Spain from people who've been there, or so as they said, listened to enough songs about beautiful Spain, enough to be able to imagine Spain in its famed splendor. My friend, the lead guitarist of "Eudemonia", a band that experiments with 'philosophical music', is a serious musician.
From one of our conversations, I started feeling that we cannot create music, but rather that the rhythms flow into the mind of the composer. Maybe a fragment of the ‘Universal Music’ that for some reason, or no reason at all, chooses one of the abundantly scattered subconscious minds from us out here, and seeps in note by note, until we have a rhythm in this dimension in a form that all of us can interpret...a song! What actually is the element that we call 'inspiration'? It definitely is not something resident in out minds, as we do not have inspirations throughout the day. Is the term 'an inspiring thought' even sensible? It's the 'inspiration' that brought about the 'thought' in the mind. Hence, the 'inspiration' and 'thought' are two different entities. So if the 'inspiration' is not another thought of the mind, then how can it be classified. Is the 'mind' even the seat of the inspiration at all......?

Theatre Of The Absurds

Dim streetlights shielded by the milky mist,
where lanterns in a timeless moment swing
for the wayward to home, their bundles of confusion bring.

Sometimes don’t you feel like we choose a mask everyday from our locker along with our shirts and flaunt it all through the day, finally taking it off before retiring to our solitude at night...a role through out the day and it is only when you are alone that you really are yourself with no mask and without a script to follow. Don’t you think it’s time to finally discover yourself for who you really are…

Rest a while, in the eden of oblivion…
Loosen yourself, in the gallery of your masks…
Introspect yourself, in the mirror of solitude…
Swallow a few tears, in the closets of your memory…
Resurrect once again, in the chamber of anonymity…
Arise, flaming…within the light of the smile of a beloved face.
Outstretch…reach into where you can yield to love and life.
Step down from the dais where life lives betrayed…
Step out, from the 'Theatre of the absurd'.

Credit card number, bank account number, social security number, license number, passport number enrolment number, telephone number,…number number! Sometimes don’t you feel like your identity is some combination of digits and alphabets! Don’t you feel like screaming out “I AM NOT A NUMBER!”

Stars, pretentious twinklers, peek into the milky splashes
over vacant hearts lost to numbers and cards.
The crescent growing, smiles in humor wise
over broken souls, defeated by pains and scars.
While I, in benumbing solitude try to figure
how, between souls, 'spaces' from 'distance' do differ…

We all need our ‘space’ but do you always realize when your cherished ‘space’ becomes a ‘distance’ and you become a castle with the drawbridge raised…and the ‘ivy starts to grows over your door’…

Figures huddled together around
the campfire that flings their lonely shadows afar…
Strange lights that illuminate the packets of void
amongst iron masks, cast with smiles…
Don't wait for the curtain to fall, only death the curtain boy's cue.
So let's step out…from the 'Theatre of the absurd'.
Let's listen to the serenade of Life…
And we may finally start to LIVE…

Meditate

-a journey through space, time, values and definitions.

Turn off the lights, close your eyes…lets form a circle and hold each other’s hands. Yes, let the music play in the backdrops of our minds. Now listen to me intently as I guide you through a short soft journey, and we may come back with the experience of evolution…

Midnight friendly to dreamers,
under the banners of peace.
Searched for the truth of reflections in the mirrors of illusions?
Now meditate with intent, to unify with the eternal cosmic affinity.
Hum a tune in harmony to the chants of the angelic bands,
Meditate with intent to unify with the essence of the truth…

“…there now…it’s working, isn’t it? The Heartbeats! You feel it, don’t you? Now we’re getting somewhere… carry on, I’m with you. The ripples through your back!...pay heed now. Sometimes, the Truth is best perceived through closed eyes.”

Pay heed! Pay heed now… Let’s depart…
Transcend this earthly plane, rise above the dimension
of doubts and queries, complexes, thoughts and inner dialogues.
With blinded eyes and open minds,
gaze into the abyss of your souls.

… if you can’t realize your soul, at least your mind… tell me what do you feel…Can it ever be told? Will it ever be told? Will it never be told…?

Let this be a moment of ceremonial matrimony between
traditional consciousness, your sub-conscious and your super-conscious selves.
Consummate yourself in this ceremony with celestial witnesses…

…aaah! And the music stretches and pulls you inner self…shivers! shivers!?

Awaken in a chamber, ancient and lost, in the ruins of a forgotten civilization.
Study the artifacts of your mind, uncover the tombs of your soul
for it is there that the answers lie buried under material debris.
In the silent echoes of nullity, hear the voices of your soul speak of wisdom.

How long will you toil for ends that only lead to other shallow beginnings.
Materialism has captivated our souls,
can’t you hear it screaming…”Wake up! Wake up, you degenerate!”…

Wake up now and embrace the seeds of your true identity.
Wake up now to find yourself .
Shed aside your fears and doubts, expectations and inhibitions, base self, foul society and conformity,
jump over the fence, for it is yonder that your soul waits for you.

Chanting in the background – “Thou art lost to the twilight zone,
a stranger greets the morning sun.
find yourself behind your social mask.”

In this moment, we sailed through space, time, values and definitions.
I invite you to my ‘Ceremony of Redefinition’.
Let’s redefine ourselves…
Uncovered your tombs? Shattered the mould?
Lucid, formless, rudderless… seeker of eternal peace.

Can’t embrace the light, and in darkness you can’t find delight?
Hither they cry and moan, thither they laugh too strong.
Caught in between, a misfit joker.
Don’t laugh, don’t moan,
draw the iron vest closer.
Rearrange yourself in the Gallery of the Lost and Found.
I invite you again to my ‘Ceremony of Redefinition’.

Emptiness vs. Hollowness

...The music plays her own chords and I feel like only just another note on the tablature...These midnights come in chilly and windy shades. Another new year rushed in as the last one slipped by. What do we have to put on the table... and those that we do have, do they pump some meaning into our existance?
We do the fancy gig, play the 'got ja answer' jig, walk the 'made man' walk, see the 'been there, done it, seen it' view...the 'experienced' soul....maybe some of us are, but somehow it makes one feel more like a juvenile. Is it as they say, 'confused are the wise'.
...what makes me feel strange is this that sometimes even when one is at peace, as peaceful as any man alive could be, without any exaggeration, we experience this inexplicable hollowness inside. Its not an emptiness...but a hollowness. Passing through my own phases of life, I have come to realise the difference between emptiness and hollowness of the ‘self’ now. If one were to put it into words as efficiently as he could, it would be something like this I guess...An 'emptiness' is the feeling of something missing, the realisation that something needs to be added so that you feel whole. A 'hollowness' is the feeling of a void. Contrary to the feeling of 'emptiness', it doesn't signify the need of something external to be added. All the parts are there on the tray, rather, its the failure to realise the significance of a particular element which incidentally already exists, a failure to realise the significance of a part in relation to the whole. And many of us feel this hollowness inside so deeply. Whether we do to interpret it as such or not is something else. Whether we are able to interpret it is also something else.
Every man is born innocent, meaning that he does not have the ability to delve into the complexities of such feelings. 'Innocent' is a graceful way of saying deaf, dumb and blind in a beautiful way. Then he jumps up to understand the definition of 'whole'...then he strays to loose this 'whole'...then he whimpers in solitude as the 'emptiness' gnaws at him so painfully...then he runs away to some distant land and there tries to gather the scattered pieces to fill this 'emptiness' in estrangement. Then if he is able to do it, he again jumps up as he forms the 'whole'. Then he realises the definition of 'whole'. This is the most beautiful phase that is experienced. He sings songs about it, preaches it, practices it...on the whole, a 'whole' man. Suddenly, he feels not as 'whole' as a ‘whole existance’ should feel. Then he jumps up to understand the definition of 'hollowness'... Very few ever reach to this level of realisation. But when and if ever this phase is crossed over, it is then that he has 'transcended' himself and it is the beginning of his journey to the horizon…
...and so, a hollow man I be for tonight...

Druid of the New World

..Stopping for refueling, and they say we are going to reach Manali around eight tomorrow morn. A toot of the horn and off we go again over and across the dry barren mountains of Northern India. Naked brown mountains rising and falling as far as the eye can see. Some love song from an old Bollywood movie being streamed into the bus. Me, over the shoulder of the driver, looking at the world through a dusty windscreen...a beautiful feeling. I disassociate myself from the objective and destination of my journey, and then I become just another backpacking traveller on the road again… like an arrow let loose, like a dolphin playing with the waves... like a baby's first walk. Alone, but it's cool, it always has been. And it’s also peaceful when you have a heart throbbing for you at the end of the road... someone you’re going to rush to when you get back..."A beautiful destination to a beautiful journey".
The nights of Sarchu breathe as softly as any night of any other place. Sarchu, a night halt here before I get back on the road again tomorrow.
Sometimes when I punch these lines with the lights switched off... a feel like a wizard from the Gothic Age trying to brew a potion in a cauldron to feed the king's army so that we could conquer the world, and I would become the ‘Druid of The New World’. Druid or not... it IS a new world that I’m going to sleep in tonight.. And it's going be a new world that I yawn in when I wake up. When you understand the reason of all the Chaos in the world and comprehend the purpose of it, the underlying harmony and beauty rise up before you... and you just cannot help snuggling inside your blankets with a half-smile... like a promise to welcome each light of the day and to get nourished through each screech of the midnight owl...and I feel that smile slowly spreading across my countenance...

Civil Retrogression

A chunk of rock which we affectionately call “mother earth”…instances of infinite possibilities which we lovingly call “relationships”…a word coined by warm hearts which we call “humanity”… Sometimes I am tempted to believe we all are really “nice and civil”. The Collective Conscience has such pretty definitions to lay on the table. I could believe that we could sing songs of peace and strew necklaces of small pretty white flowers while our children play in the cradle of carefree happiness. We all want to.. We could…so how does WAR fit in??? As if famines, earthquakes, tsunamis, draughts etc. were not enough to unite us in a common plight. What happened to “Universal Brotherhood”… Just another definition to stack on the table???

The bloody victory banner flaps high…
The fallen angel gazes down, an ominous grin breaking.
Scavengers with heads high, proudly awaiting ceremony.
Powerful warriors, allegiant to the amoral regime,
dutifully return after civil retrogression.

The Necrographer raises his gore-dripping quill…
While on the land of the mortals, its brother against brother,
an eye for an eye…
Feeble resistance of the panic-stricken,
in vain against the confident evil.
The prince of darkness tightens the shackles…
Moloch… victorious tonight.

Orange morn cracks the assembly,
soldiers tired, take a break.
Limping humans in pain, homeward bound,
while the painless dead, strain for the grim sound.
Survivors envy the other end,
the dead… pointless markers around the dark bend.

Where the bugles unheard, trail off…
Unconscious strives for towering while bases fall off.
Sweet love rots to paste, trampled barefoot by the very ones…
Fear of faith, faith on fear, darkness rules day,
skin looses feel, hearts freeze cold, chaos clouds judgment.
Treachery and treason hovers wide… its brother against brother…An eye for an eye,
…and Satan still waves wide…

Peace of the Collective Conscience –Part II

The present Collective Conscience has not had a really 'Dark Night'. And we all know, almost always, there is a dark night before the Awakening. The present Humanity, as a whole is quite inexperienced, naive. Quite unacquainted with the Dark Side of the Moon, we fail to comprehend and appreciate the Light. Maybe we are learning a bit with all the darkness we're experiencing globally these days. But then again, when we'll have just experienced enough to really motivate us to clean up our acts, humanity as a whole... we would be dead...death and birth would replace the earth with another set of inexperienced souls, and we would have a naive Collective Conscience again, and then they would make the same mistakes we made, as did our predecessors.
So what do we have...a cycle consisting of three parts- experiencing, realizing, refining. But just when the Collective Conscience passes the first two parts and gets to the third part, it dies off (literally), and we have a new set of humans that begin all over again from the initial point. The only positive thing that gets passed on, besides all the scars and frustration, is theoretical know-how’s... and if we were to speak theoretically, we are already at Peace- we have nuclear non-proliferation agreements, the G8 countries are working to have no "third world" on earth, every country is working to have a cent per cent educated population with clean drinking water, AIDS is the only disease that kills, poaching of endangered species has been made illegal, advertisements against drug-abuse has been made mandatory to be aired on all national channels...we could proudly go on and on...yes! Indeed if we were to speak theoretically, we as a Collective Conscience, are utterly at peace...no matter what one as an individual experiences...we say “we have learnt”, "we are at Peace!".
(The absence of war does not define ‘peace’)
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Peace of the Collective Conscience –Part I

Midnight almost here, the night-buzz with its echoes ring in my ear and all is quiet here, quiet around me, and within me. I wonder how most people do not feel it although the answers are smeared all over the cosmos. It’s been smooth lately, the riding I mean. Of course a few bumps have for to be there so that you don't get paranoid over the sound of your own wheels rolling too fast. But it’s cool. This state of me that I feel in these deep hours of the night makes me want to stay up just a little bit more. If only they could feel it, they would not be so hasty to put their kids to bed so early.
It maybe too early to say, but I think that the Collective Humanity has a lot to learn about true PEACE. Maybe then we would be not so hasty to add to the chaos that is so prevalent already. When the cup of Peace can be drunk, who would waste time on hate and anger. Though we've had so many wars and revolutions, famines and deaths, so many elements of the Dark Side, the people who really did experience them directly are long gone. Death and birth has replaced the entire population since they were experienced. In a way, the present Collective Conscience has had no such experience as those who were alive then, did so...like those alive at the First World War or the Second One, the Industrial Revolution, Napoleon and Hitler...etc.
(The absence of war does not define ‘peace’)
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Hello Darkness, My Old Friend…

“There is always a dark night before the awakening”. There can be no awakening without the dark night, for it is in the depth of that darkness, in the silence of that utter emptiness, in the solitude of that estrangement that one is nurtured to be able to embrace the Light. And those of us who have had the dark night and have awakened to the cosmic truth will never be able to totally forget that “dark night” of whatever period it was, for whatever significance it stood for, even if we tried… for it was during that phase that we felt the need to rise higher than we could have ever stood, stronger than we could have ever been, wiser than we have ever been. And we take an occasional stroll down memory lane to pay a tribute, of whatever hue it be, to our own private “dark night”….

Hello Darkness, my old friend,
I’ve come to say good-bye again.
In your cold arms I find comfort no more,
you deceive with shallow values, all so low.
I’ve found a purpose, pure and so true,
holds me close when I’m up or blue.
Yes! my friend, finally love is all there really is,
care and faith honest without any frills.
And just for a moment if you shed your darker side,
my old friend you’ll find there’s beauty even in the blinding light.
and when sometimes, your hollow self’s engulfed by emptiness,
keep the faith and don’t withdraw, my old friend.
It’s just a phase that’ll pass away before you know,
there’s lighter moments waiting around the next corner.
So just smile when you can and keep a happy face
and with a tint of hope and courage your ‘phases’ brace.
Days and nights pass with trailing hues,
gather joy from each morning dew.
And you’ll finally discover that life is worth,
and then finally my dear Darkness, my old friend…
it’ll all make sense, even death and birth.

Rhymes of the Jester

Playing with the colours within
trying to blend the real me.
Bridging the haunted gaps within.
An occasional shudder hints me that I've risen above the rest
but am banished to the valley of thoughtful strains by some ugly test.
And the boyish traces still in me,
feels foolish to another soul born in me
tonight under the starry roof, deep blue nourishing.

Glow… snowy carpets rolled over the hills
and deep purple be the hues of other ranges nearer still.
For the drums of the night do I hear
and slumber's warmth soaking in me.
Starry friend of mine, for tonight I leave you alone
to muse over the craziness among the chaos,
for you with stars adorned and the milky smears
seem unbothered by the strangeness flourishing down here.

Spread on…darkness, wrap you cloak around
for ignorance, your ally grows profound.
We rhyme to courts and jesters
fooled by time's greatest pranksters.
By illusionists mesmerized, a crowd
to cloaks and daggers lost.
In the crazy hall of mirrors,
just another reflection of distorted images…

The silence gains pitch and intensity, while
darkness hides any weak shadows in its depth....
my soul yells as another
strange dream seems to be inviting me....

Let us see the 'eternity' in 'transitory',
the 'lingering- momentous -permanence' in life's 'Temporary"....
This is Reality, the Stability between 'total-attachment' and 'total detachment' from life....
living in Life with Death in mind, both unignored....
to arise with a smile you have got to sleep with a smile.
Let today be such that tonight we can sleep with a smile…

A momentary lapse of peace

… "The End is Near" laments "Alter Bridge" into my ears through the headphones.
Another midnight comes sliding in slowly and you find yourself growing numb. Why is it that even when the riding is smooth, occasionally all of us feel down and out in some ways...in our own private ways... Is it that the occasional ‘down’ from the experience of a void in and around us, is a basic nature of man... or do we just love to be unhappy...It would indeed be an irony if it were so…

Down and out, with a void I merge to form
cryptic shapes that loom over me.
With emptiness my songs rhyme to build
a silence that engulfs me whole.
Nights follow days that make me feel
like yet another stranger to yet another me.
My estrangement I try to hide
behind sermons of underlying-harmony.

I got to confess...
Tonight I can’t see any reason to wake up anyday.
Tonight I can’t hear the cymbals and the chimes.
Tonight I can’t speak with that peaceful smile.
Tonight I have to force purpose into all the reasons.
Tonight I can’t be the one with the light in the eyes.
Tonight I can’t rhyme with the rhythm.

But tonight I could whisper a secret to you if you can open up enough to read in-between the lines..
On such a night, you could choose.
You could be my key, you could be my banner.
You don't have a clue who I could be for you....

My Link Roll

OzSoftLabs

Helium

The Doors of Consciousness

Sometimes don’t you feel so... jaded? Dream boats sail all around me while I lie back on the bed letting myself get sucked into the aura of the cosmos, engulfed within a deep silence. A pause... a pause with a depth that goes as deep as the soul, deep into the essence of my very existence. Everything inside me bares up and I get stripped down to my very deepest instincts. Sometimes I feel like I become just another instance of myself, unaware of even my own existence, silent and spongy-soaking, and the music... yes of course, the music!... always there in the backdrop of my scenes. Maybe we share a common rhythm that I cannot explain. Something common between our music and us. I can’t seem to be able to decipher that hidden relation though.
Yes, the 'scribblings' on my diary are getting scarce, I realize. I definitely should devote a little time to punch down some more of these lines. The human mind has a tendency to forget and I really would not like to forget the brushing of these days. Of course, life goes on, but when it leaves a trial of such beautiful colors it would indeed be a pity if I don’t splash some form with it to look back to from down the line…
The nights are quite these days, and the stirrings are in my heart, stirrings towards beauty, stirrings towards the realization of the Absolute Truth. “I” am, but some centers of consciousness. The composition of the essence of each of us is some centers of consciousness, and the thing that one can do is to strive to cleanse his/her Doors of Consciousness. Huxley chats in length about the “Doors of Perceptions”, and with all due respect, that itself is a mere ‘perception’ for ‘mental acrobatics’. What is, is the Doors of Consciousness….and it’s high time to awaken.

Aide to the wandering ship

The Night in silence…
The night in silence, sings her ancient songs..
Songs of laughter and songs of tears, songs of heroes and songs of traitors, songs of lovers and songs of mongers...songs that warm the senses, songs that questions your thoughts, songs that initiate the heart, songs that elevate the soul...songs that leave you wondering where you've heard it all before.
The night in silence, sings her ancient songs...

Breathing to the rhythm of the night,
these ancient sidewalks, scarred with the pains,
who's to know the losses from the strange gains…
Forget the stepping stones, what does it matter where you started from?
Ignore the milestones, destination lies unknown..

Isn’t it strange how, as we drift on, we string together so many hopes, hope for so many dreams to be realised, dream to be in so many places, do so many things, be so many people. And isn’t it strange how we continue believing in so many contradictory opinions. Yes indeed! We are in the Theatre of the Paradox, each one of us a paradox in himself/herself…

Paradoxical perceptions, attitude unattested,
hovering questions, gnawing confusion…
Figures arise from the chambers of memory,
episodes indelible, faces stare into the soul.
Somewhere far off, love in tears, droplets salty accusing.
Arms that held love, now cold and broken,
cling frantically around themselves.
In desperation onto pieces of broken promises clinging.
While here, guilty and guilt, drifted by the tides of time
swallows bitterness and away from another episode walks.

Fluttering sails, switching banners, changing winds,
deep waters, free waters, aide to the wandering ship.
A sign for the drop of the anchor,
a harbor for the gang-plank,
a coloured banner to hoist,
…long in wait….in love with the wait…

An Unsung Palestinian Song

Cruel nights of territorial nightmares
ancestral insomnia steers my gaze around.
All of my home that remains
smoky shambles grazed by cannons,
still meadows for their Apaches and Strategic tests.
Me, a barefooted youngster, with eyes of tears that dried to blood,
orphaned, homeless, ruthlessly molested
by devilish messengers of the 'Keepers of Peace'.

Silent forbearance intensifies their fury,
to peaceful words, a deaf ear they turn.
When to protest I walk, armored tanks they deploy to bury.
A stone I hurl to Falcons that rain bombs on me,
and a "Terrorist" they label me!
An effort to plead for my fundamental rights,
a "Fundamentalist" they call me!
By their torture and injustice, a lunatic I've become,
and a "Fanatic" they call me!

O people! What of brotherhood, what of humanity!
do the echoes of my anguished cries not ring in your hearts?
do my muffled sobs not haunt your nights?
My scorched flesh, scarred by atrocities
does it not make you uneasy in your Congregational robes?
My silent, hollow eyes, no questions in you raise!!!
O! unborn living, living dead…believing unbeliever, unbelieving believer…
do you have answers for the inevitable Divine Questions?
Today, you may turn around pretentiously unaware but
on the Day when I shall point to you
and the Eternal Judge puts you and them, all in one.
That Day I shall watch and you shall call and plead…

Do you know that just since September 29, 2000:
A minimum of 1,050 Palestinian children have been killed.
A minimum of 4,862 Palestinians have been killed.
A minimum of 32,744 Palestinians have been injured.
Israel has been targeted by at least 65 UN resolutions and the Palestinians have been targeted by none.
1 Israeli is being held prisoner in Palestine while 10,756 Palestinians are held by Israel. More than 650,000 Palestinians have been detained by Israel (which forms about 20 percent of the total population of Palestine in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Source: The Mandela Institute for Human Rights – Palestine).
Now read this post all over again.