Cower

It rained so hard.
We ran for cover.
We hid.
It found us.
It hurt us.
It bored holes-
In the sky
In the shades
In the walls
In us.

It ran on the ground
It didn't seep in;
It only ran out
Gushed out
Out of us.
It rained on us.
It rained around us.
It rained through us.
It rained without us.

We ran
We kept running;
We kept crying
Crying for help
Crying in pain;
Sighing in vain
Drenched in rain.

They saw us.
From their windows.
Under the lights
The mellow lights
The warm lights
That blazed like fire
With stifled ire
Ire we held
In our hearts
Ire that held
The lights on fire.

The rain went bad
The crowd went mad
We looked around
We looked within
We were drenched.
In red.
The rain was red.
Yes, blood it shed.
Our blood.
Then came a flood.
A flood of lies.
A flood of cries
The flood of blood.

They filled their cups
They raised their cups
They made a toast
They laughed
They chatted
They shopped
They stopped
They looked
Out their windows
Out of their world
They checked:
We were reduced
Reduced
As of yesterday
Reduced to sacks
Reduced to numbers
Reduced to ashes.

They resumed:
They fed
On our tears,
Tears we shed
As we bled
With the rain.
They were satiated.

Window Pain

There's a window.
Yes, a window.
Do you see it?
Don't you see it?

I know you.
Yes, I do.
Who are you?
Who am I?

There's a streak
Of purple
Or is it blue?
Is it the rainbow?
No, it's a bruise.

There's the rain.
Pattering on the window.
Do you see the drops?
Is it blood or tears?
Yours or mine?

They're colourless.
No, you are blind.
Or am I?

There's your heartbeat.
There's your voice.
It's my music.
It's the sirens?
Or is it the silence?

There's the light
The lovely sunshine
It's warm and bright.
Where's the sun?
There is no sun?
It's fire.

The fire of love.
The fire of trust.
The fire of hurt?
The fire or dust?

The Odds of the End

Death is painful - something we all know.

For some it's serene - an effortless transition from one content life to another; for others it's a matter of relief and for another lot, it's the most excruciating experience of their life and ironically death.

However, for those who stand by and watch, it's always painful. Always.
It doesn't matter how, when or why it happened, but only that it did. It doesn't matter if you were the cold-blooded murderer or the helpless onlooker whose arms became the final abode of the departing soul. It doesn't matter if the blood that stains your hands was a product of the gash you gave someone or it's there because you held the warm, living body that became cold and dead in a matter of moments. Either way, pain is a constant companion- irrespective of who feels it.

It brings us pain to know that we can't do anything to hold onto those breaths that are softly slipping away. Anguish grips us as we realize in essence how the fire of life is about to be extinguished and leave behind the cold, dry embers of a lost life, a lost soul, a lost world. And we stand and watch, crushed by that helplessness, waiting for the curtains to fall and the lights to explode into the creeping darkness that threatens to engulf us and all that's dear to us.We wait for the burns to heal with the light that can burn this pain. And we wait.

But more often than not, light chooses to travel into the distant depths of the universe, up, above and away from where we are. From the stars, to some other stars and infinity - where every soul travels - at some point in its life, or death. Yes, that's where we believe they are: somewhere within infinity, with that light that left us to reach them, help them, guide them, hold them. It is almost relieving to bear that pain, that suffocating embrace of the dark if we believe that the light leaves us and somehow helps the ones we love.

Up, above and away are all so distant and yet so close. They are so hard to touch but they touch our lives so easily. They define transcendence from our troubles, offer an escape, only a very impractical and untouchable one. But they offer something, even if it is another life - that after death.

My exams finished today and I'd thought I'd write a blog post overflowing with glee of some sort or at least something that reflected freedom. The moon was full tonight and oh so beautiful when I went out for a walk and I decided to write something related to that but then I had an encounter with death. Most of us might consider this encounter a very trivial one and it probably is but I just can't feel that way.

Walking back home, I saw a dead eagle on the road-side. My eyes bulged out for a moment when I realized what it was and I got terribly upset. I actually felt my heart getting heavy! I'm not exactly an animal rights activist (although I do believe that animals should be treated nicely because WE are humans), but grief did grip me for long enough to produce this morose piece.

It was not the eagle or it's death that hurt so much, perhaps. It was the closeness of death, right beneath my eyes, the fine line between the two phases that is so easily lost to sight. Seeing the eagle's neck lolled to its left; its body that was previously vibrant with life, turned into a static wooden frame; the grey shutters on the eyes and the beak covered in dust made me want to kneel down and start weeping. It's been so long since I've felt that way and back then it used to be where humans were concerned. I've seen dead animals before but never have I felt quite so broken by the sight.

I guess it's just because I haven't paid attention to any deaths in the past two months. Also, it was the realization that this living body that soared to great heights of blue oblivion would have bolted to the ground and lost its life in a snap. The simplicity of transition between these two extremes of what lies up above and away against that which takes one beneath the ground is just so paradoxical and ironic. This battle between warm and cold, black and white, heights and depths is what maintains the continuity of life - by ending some.

It is an act of greatly low stature to end a life. It is a matter of great pain, patience and strength to watch an end. I can't imagine how great it would be to have the chance to save a life.

Laws of retardation:Theory Four -Taking over

World in order

I can proudly say that my plan to take over the world is now complete. It took me some 18 years to finally get here and I’m deeply grateful to the Venus-lings for all their motivation and support. All hail Venus!

On a lonely summer day, I realized I was becoming a vegetable because I could not frame coherent thoughts and my vocabulary seemed to be rotting away with a rather putrid stench. It was truly devastating and I set out to investigate the cause, which I was shell-shocked to find: It was part of the greater plan of the Venus-lings to mess with my head. They wanted to turn me into a vegetable so that I would become useless for the Earth and they could take me away to Venus and make me their queen. The question is, why did they choose ME of all people for this prestigious, yet immensely important role? The answer is as following:

1. I love Venus too much and they received these signals confirming that from my heart and brain and the apple-pie I’m going to use soon. They were baffled by those signals and couldn’t find any such signal from a single Venus-ling! I mean I had even written two poems on Venus! They were just overwhelmed by my mis-directed patriotism and totally ashamed that I wasn’t one of them so they decided I deserved to be their queen (there are no immigration facilities up there so being queen was kind of essential or the army would take me down).

2. They realized the Earth didn’t deserve me because it had become too sad for me to live in and my heart couldn't take it anymore, even the apple-pie would crumble away too soon. Nobody on earth except Subata Khalid understood what I said most of the time or not in full depth at least and most of them gave me a hard time about it, trying to put me off. The Venus-lings realized I needed an escape and the power to make things right. That would only happen if I was the queen of some other planet.

3. They were tired of watching the ill-health of the earth and decided it was time for change. I was the only one thinking of a revolution in my part of the world and people were being too mean to me about it so they decided I deserved a chance to lead the change. I also have a blog called ‘Floodgates’ for crying out loud! They just understood the ideology behind it and were too impressed.

4. They had to make me queen anyway so they decided to throw in the Earth complementary for good measure too. I mean what more damage could possibly occur to it?

Armor and artillery

First and foremost, whoever is willing to accompany me needs to have their heart replaced with an apple pie- that is the sole armor we require. We shall then order sets of cowboy boots, enabled with the most modern, efficient, and possibly high-tech spurs. This will be taken care of by Saba’s Babu and we are deeply grateful to both of them in advance.

I know I've mentioned cowboy boots and they have a more ruthless appeal to the barracuda senses but I prefer Jimmy Choos. They are just irresistible!

Mc Donald's has been especially helpful and provided us with  these fresh, juicy and very sweet apple pies at our special request (be grateful all you pie-lovers, Mc Donald's would never have had the idea if it weren't for me). I prefer these over my own because I don't have to work, they're portable and occupy very less space, also easily replaceable (all you have to do is open the window in your chest, pluck out the previous one and replace it with oven-fresh stuff).

There is a wide variety of spurs to choose from. Take your pick!

 

   

Then we need to cat-nap some caterpillars and pack them away in jars (with holes in the lids for Oxygen). Seems like I have learned to make a note of precautionary measures, courtesy of A level sciences. At least they have some courtesy. We shall feed these caterpillars with apple-pies so that they become venomous and then prepare for the major part of our plan.

The Climax

We elope to Venus and after basking in its enchanting atmosphere for a while, raid the world wearing our sparkling spur-enabled, cowboy boots. We grab a random person on earth and say “Take us to your leader, earth-ling!” This by the way needs to be accompanied by our signature action of pressing our temples with our fore-fingers and jerking the head from right to left, making a 180 degrees angle in a robotic manner. The earth-ling (we are superior Earth cum Venus-lings now) takes us to NASA. We unleash the inescapable wrath of our venomous caterpillars upon the NASA dudes, the caterpillars sting them and they die at the spot.

The fruit

We then set out to give quick, painless deaths to most of the lowly beings walking this beautiful planet called Earth, making it a little more blood-stained and dirty by slashing their throats with the spurs! Simple, quick, painless, peaceful, revolutionary, innovative and modern. The world is mine (or maybe ours).

Image courtesy: Subata Khalid, Bisma Farukh, Saba Iqbal, Atiya Rafique and Google.

Queen of Hearts

I know some of you have read this but it's linked to something I'm going to talk about soon.


6th July, 2010, 4 a.m.

Ever thought what it would be like to be heartless? It’s a rather strange time to be wondering so but that’s not the juicy part. Apart from the obvious and mundane biological reasons related to survival, it would actually be thrilling. Let’s take a look at my list of advantages:
1. You wouldn’t get hurt
2. You wouldn’t care about hurting someone else
3. You possibly wouldn’t have to be branded as warm-blooded!

Wow! I am almost tempted to claw it out of my system at this very moment. But there’s just a small problem restraining me: I might feel a little hollow after losing one organ. The insides that are sadly clichéd as beautiful might lose that ‘beauty’ since the heart maintains the soft pulse, associated with the beauty of life and existence, and other not-so-interesting stuff. Although, I can’t imagine how slimy organs coated with blood, fat and blood vessels can be seen as beautiful. It is a disturbing thought, even for me!

Anyway, the bottom-line is the fear of being hollow. So my not-at-all-dear friends, I have come up with a brilliant solution, and it was not triggered by Starbucks or the likes, neither did I rip it off of Wal-Mart. How about we replace the heart with an apple-pie? That would be so cool, or maybe the antonym of cool, literally speaking. 
Advantages:
1. You’ll be able to say “I’m heartless!” Ah, the sense of freedom that comes with that phrase.
2. You wouldn’t get hurt.
3. You probably wouldn’t hurt someone because you’ll be all sweet on the inside (you couldn’t get cold enough for that).
4. You could maintain the warm-blooded façade.
5. You would be complimented by the following words: “You’re sweeter than apple pie!”- Just too much juice for the ego!
6. You don’t have a heart, yet you don’t feel hollow.
7. You’ll probably become immortal because apple pie is unlikely to get coronary disease or go under cardiac arrest or myocardial infarction and blah blah.
8. Since we are blessed with barracuda teeth, we could even devour people! (What effect could the extra fat diet have on the pie? NONE!!!)

However, there’s a small disadvantage. Unlike the heart, apple pies aren’t muscular; they aren’t supported by tough, fibrous pericardium, so they can easily crumble under pressure. I guess you’d have to keep clutching your heart anyway like the Victorian maidens, although they lived in constant fear that it would flutter away at the slightest advancement from a male. I really should have been there to show them the light!

If you feel the above replacement is too feminine or incompatible with your more barbaric taste and you’re looking for something more concrete, then you could probably go for a block of low-weight steel. I wouldn’t recommend stones because they will make ‘where your heart used to be’ heavy. Not a desirable feeling, even for parting with your beloved heart (my eyes waltzed and bled to death on that note). Let’s get back to steel then. It has all the afore-mentioned advantages and perhaps more but the disadvantage is pretty serious. It has a short life. Given the wet, salty and squishy internal environment of the body, steel can make you rust away, literally. Why go through all the time-consuming and tedious effort then? I mean if you belong to my shoal of obnoxious barracudas then you wouldn’t have so much time to spend on a block of steel!

Therefore, after some serious brain-storming and spells of reflective pondering (when I was not too busy thinking about other stuff related to myself, of course) I have come to the conclusion that apple-pies are the best replacements for the useless, grief-supplying hearts we carry. And since I have taken out enough time to be a little selfless and share this with you (I thought I should give my heart a small farewell gift), I expect you all to write sonnets for me as proofs that you did, in some century possess a heart (as you’ll be tasting immortality) and then obviously, part with your primitive way of life. Then we could probably raid some planet and form a pie republic, if you are obedient enough and I would of course rule upon you.

Conjure up some good luck wish from me, be grateful that I at least thought of it and prize that memory for eternity!