Musings of an Iconoclast

Somehow I have always missed the trees for the forest. Never paid attention to the smaller things composing the big picture, and that’s when even the big picture gets screwed up. It’s the subtleties of life that perhaps are the most important...the passion…the enthusiasm to do everything which everyone else does…but in a dead way. So many dead faces surrounding you and when you spot one, just one, you want to cling to it, never let it go, seek undying eternal passion from it.

In pursuit to be different, you have made yourself an alien, looked at the world as if standing on the moon, sneering at common people. Considered yourself the greatest individual despite doing nothing different from a commoner...just because you refused to mentally kowtow to the fundamental, immanent principles of the world. But are you? Escapism is never the route to reality. It’s about enjoying the fruits of life fully, to live life as it is meant to be lived, and as millions of others are doing it. Trust me, it’s not about seeking happiness in every dying second of life…it’s about filling that second with passion and making it live again.

Devote yourself. Meditate. Introspect and retrospect and make yourself better. Make yourself common. You are a part of the dead society but don’t make yourself dead, ever. Learn new art. Seek knowledge. Remember you are going to be old one day. It’s a verity. How do you want to look at the gone decades of your life? Confused creature, running away from every happiness and commonality seeking higher truth but never realizing how low this high lies. Or do you want to live, love, forgive, share, learn, teach and be some one’s ideal, fulfill every dream however small it is…however common it is?

Mirage of fleeting time

I was there, sitting at the corner of the seat in the sleeper class compartment—barely paying attention to the ruthless slaps of cold wind and rushing scenes. A kind of random question comes into my mind—why isn’t anything registering? Why does it seem like I am a third person, watching my life pass by me? How long it has been since I have paid attention to the journey rather than the destination? My memories veered to the journey to Kharagpur. For the 1st time, I was to be away from my family, friends and city. That journey...

"The super-congested train gave the impression of inferno, as 15 of us—the Delhites sharing the same destiny—sneeringly entered our compartments. We had made a choice and though it seemed like a dream, deep within I knew its going to change our lives indelibly—forever. As dusk evolved from reddish-blue to hazy dark, the journey began. Everything seemed rushing behind, as if I was transgressing to a new life. Nearby me, were sitting some friends I had barely met twice, but now seemed as if we had known each other from aeons. Eating, chatting, watching movie on laptop, listening to songs—time fleeted like mirage."

...and that is when i noticed it first. The mirage of fleeting time.

The tunnels, flocks of sheep, V-shape of birds in the sky, rocks, colour of soil, dance of electricity wires and railway line—is it déjà-vu? Childhood memories surfeit and nostalgia sinks in my heart. I remember these scenes from my past travels, when i was a small kid, travelling with the family...has anything really changed? My family loved travelling and so did I. I got a chance to visit remote places like Tripura and tourist spots from all over India when i was very young. I loved watching outside the train window, to all the scenes passing by, and it all was like taped in my memory.

How fast am i moving? Why do i remember the 1st 14 years of my life much more vividly than the later ones? When you run mindlessly, all the pleasure is gone. The mirage of success is that it is the door way to another race. It’s an endless loop. “The most despicable man is man without a purpose”, Ayn Rand wrote. What purpose does having a purpose serve? All are ways of passing your life. Don’t do it and nothing would change. If it is satisfaction or pleasure or recognition one so desperately seek, then its all in the mind. You can be happy and satisfied without being known by anyone. Then what is your purpose?

Rat race is a necessary evil. Its just like a game. You win a point, you get happy, you lose, you try harder, but the game continues. You continue it because you enjoy playing it. May be you get tired of it sometimes, but have got so addicted that you can’t stay away from it much long. You take a rest, and come back again. You always feel in the end that you could have played it better. That is the fun of it...

Zombies

Have you ever felt moving in a world replete of zombies? Hordes of people running daily— to schools, colleges, offices and fields. Skipping breakfasts. Missing sleep. Paradox is this is called ‘living’. Everyone’s robotic life moves so systematically. A child is born and is spanked on the ass to breath, milk feeded till its old enough and then taught how to walk, talk, eat and shit. Till here, even animals and birds have the same life. Poor kid is then impelled to go to school—the hording continues. They study their asses out and for what? Well to get their asses furthur spanked in the job. Then get hassled and jostled in the marriage and create ‘responsibilities’ called kids. It is then considered a long term liability to raise them and parents say they can’t depart from this world before fulfilling their worldly responsibilities. If it weren’t so tragic, it would have been extremely funny. Dude you wouldn’t have had any responsibility if you hadn’t decided to screw your wife without prophylactics—so you could have departed at the age of 26!

The odyssey doesn’t cease here. People, as they had lost their childhood dreams during childhood itself, make their children’s dream their dream. They jump at their child’s success and spank them at their failures. Paradox number two. Dude what is your life for? Have you forgotten that. Your life is your own. To fulfill your dreams. To chase your ambitions. But you chose what? To create responsibilities that didn’t even exist in the first place and devoted your time to them! Effectively, what you have done in life is void.

Then comes expectation part. Parents expect from their ‘responsibilities’ to do what they want. Why dude? Have you created some machine or a robot? Paradox number three is when they say their children have gone out of hand! They went out once—when you pulled them out from the uterus, once and for all. But no. It doesn’t happen. What is fed into kid’s minds is crap called moral responsibility. Since you have been raised by such hard labour by your parents, it is your responsibility (read contract) to support them. Why dude? Is the value to a new child is equal to a future contract?

And what is this shit called moral responsibility? Why is it considered so fancy to do social service or to help others? Everybody does just the same. Tell me how many people live for themselves. Children study beacause they are sent to school, some do work to fulfill their parents dreams, most work so that their children can be raised effectively—so when have you worked for you? Where has your life lost in this maze of responsibilities most of which you needlessly created. You are convincing yourself that your life has some purpose—even if it is fulfilling some responsibilty you need not have created in the first place.

The problem is that the system doesn’t let you think all this. You are the slave of this system. You follow it because there all other roads seem blurred. Babies are turned into children, children to mindless slaves. Where is the freedom—the virtue considered most important?

This system works because of fear. People are discouraged to take risks and carve their own road. What sailers did when they set their ships to face unknown oceans, what adventureres did when they pushed to extremes to reach south pole, what scientists did when they set foot on moon, what hackers did when they cracked open all systems considered invincible, what criminals did when they refused to follow the system—they explored unknown territories. They refused conformance with set laws and rules and framed their own. They lived life as it should be lived.

In the end you all are going to die. It doesn’t matter whether you died in an office sofa while working 24*7 or you died as a beggar after living a life full of adventures. Only need is to realise that it is your life—not that of your parents, your “created” responsibilities or of anyone else. You are free and can do whatever your heart says. Be a child even when you are old. Be free.

Nihil

The blank or hollowness which surfeits in our lives, makes us impetuous and wonder at the very existential aspect of living, is a lingering feeling which recurs with every success or failure attained. We may possess everything and yet there seems to be a void eternally immanent in us which makes us feel incomplete. Glimpses of past and present, fear of future- all montage together, as if life is nothing but mere libretto and we are nothing but mere marionettes.

Have u ever felt this void or hollowness in your life?

Success: o what an aggrandizing feeling it is! You accomplish what u had longed for, dreamed of, prayed for and finally when u achieve it, you feel on the top of the world. You are rapturous, ecstatic, heart seems to be floating in air and bestowed aplomb leaves no place for poignant mentations. Generally.

But sometimes success also makes one muse..wonder..marvel. What have I achieved really? Mind is where it is- all the glory and grandeur. Geezers congenitally wreak to become “big”. Big where? In their own damn minds, and in the mind of equally fatuous buckos. Can’t one feel big even when he is nothing? Do one need approbation of some imbecile to be “big”? Preconceived notions are cornerstone on which we institute our whole lives. Morals, ethics, values…what all these mean in the longer run...who said that confiding by these principles is how you should live. and yet when we look around us, there are blokes telling you that this is wrong, that is conscienceless. Why? Why is not living by this fixed frame of mind vicious to the point of being obnoxious?

Reason... the herd of people...the society. 99% of our actions are not governed by us but by others. Hardly are we born when we are spanked by the obstetrician to breathe. Hardly are we 3 year old, when we are sent to alma mater. Still fine hitherto since we are green. but even when we senesce enough, we find ourselves in shackles. We wish to escape, live differently and who doesn't want to be different. But how many are there who actually sneer at the notions and break free. Life is not given to be framed. It is meant be lived. How many of us live life...in accord with our own wishes? How many of us have even forgotten our childhood dreams, fantasies and fun? How many of us have made our aims which were thrust on us by others...by parents, by family pressure? And how many of us not want to live like this...and yet can see no gleam? Coz all the doors have been shut. How many of us feel smothered, simmering coz of unavailability of any alternative. How many of you have thought of suiciding at one point or other in your life...becoz of feeling as though being trapped like a fly in the spider-web? And we know how many of us actually succumb to this. Why? Is by not adhering to expectations which are not even our own we have not done justice to our existence?

A Dead Poet

It was raining heavily. Standing in my balcony, I was passively watching the rain drops showering the earth, when a guy came ambling. He was in his early 30's and had a prominent, receding hairline. I had never seen him before (living in a guest house, you get used to seeing new faces around). We exchanged greetings, and after staying quiet for a while, talks began.

We started with usual company banter, “How is the job going?”, “What’s your work?” and so on. This guy was working in Coca-Cola for an year (after working in another company for 7 years), and was a chartered accountant. The way he talked gave me an impression that he was feeling quite lonely. He was talking in philosophies and generalities, and I was enjoying listening to him, so we continued.

This guy was passionate about poetry. He was a fan of Ghalib and Harivansh Rai Bachchan. He himself seemed to be an excellent writer (he narrated two of his compositions to me). His writing style was inspired by Ghazals and was enriched with splendid Urdu words. He said he has a diary full of self-written poems.

“But I don’t write now. In fact it has been 4 years since I have attempted to write anything”.

I asked, “What happened friend? You got too involved in daily chores or what?”

He said, “No, it’s not like that. I just stopped writing”

“There must be a reason. Was it a girl?”

He smiled, “You are quite intuitive.”

(Well you don't need to be intuitive to guess that. Behind 90% of the things that happen to a guy, there is a girl involved!)

“Yes. There was a girl I loved passionately, as is shown in movies. She loved me too. It was during our graduation days. I had always liked writing poetry. But it was that girl who was my inspiration. She loved listening to my poetry and I loved writing for her.”

I had understood now. I said, “You are married, right?”

He was lost in his own thoughts. After a moment he replied, “Yes”.

I said, “And the girl is not the same?”

He smiled, “No. That love story couldn’t materialise. On the insistence of my parents I married another girl. Still I was excited. I had always felt some sort hollowness in my life after my relationship with the 1st girl had ended. Now I thought there would be a person who would always be there for me. I felt happy.” I was smiling too. (whatever you say, and whether or not you believe in marriage, but it does bring a smile to your face!)

He said, “But the 1st night was a disaster.”

(hmm...first night disaster...what could that be!!)

“What happened?”

“I recited a few lines from “Madhushala”. I was feeling complete at that time and it came naturally. But after a few lines she interrupted me. She said, “Dear, I don’t like poetry very much. I can’t even understand your poem. Can we talk something else?””

I was trying to control but we both burst into laughter.

After a while he said, “You know there used to be a day some years back when my first love used to urge me to write poems for her. I used to feel so happy, reciting the lines I had written just for her. Then there was that day, when my wife said on the first night of our marriage that she doesn’t like poetry. It was like somebody doesn’t like my soul. I have never written since”

I decided to let him speak his mind. I didn’t interrupt.

“If I would have got married to the girl I loved, my life would have been so different. Daily chores and hard work would have always been there but there would have been an anticipation. An anxiety when I would have told my poem to her, whether she would like it or not. People tell me to get my poems published. But how can I? These are dead for me now, as is their inspiration.”

I was partially listening to what he was saying, but my mind was wandering somewhere else. I used to be more of a loner when I was a kid. I had some great friends, but many a time I preferred staying alone and I never used to miss anyone. But over the time, the great friends became greater, and so did the time we spent together. Perhaps I would never make a friend who is incompatible with me. Even if I did, the friendship would itself die. But what choice this guy here had now. He was stuck in a phase in his life with an incompatible partner whose incompatibility he had discovered on the first night itself, but he couldn’t do anything about it, nor can he now.

He said, “There is something I have observed in my life. It is the ordinary who succeed in life, of course in materialistic terms.”

Perhaps he wanted to divert the topic. But he was still speaking from his heart.

I too continued on this new topic, “Of course. Advanced beings understand the flaw in system very soon."

"What do you mean?"

"The flaw in the system is that if you follow it, you would end up at exactly the same point where everyone else ends up. It’s like a written script. Schooling, college, job, marriage, children, raising them, getting them married, retiring, the end. So they get disillusioned. They do what their hearts desire. There are people who leave a job fetching billions to become musicians, some do social service in rural areas leaving the comfort of their sofa cushion behind, some just leave to travel across the country and the world. They may end up dying on streets. The world may never call them successful. But they know better. They know it’s better to die as a beggar after living life of their wish than to die on a sofa after being a slave of the system.”

Now i was speaking my mind.

We talked for some more time—music, drugs, people and many other stuff. It was after a very long time I had such a talk with anyone. Remarkable evening. After all, how many times do you get to listen to a real love story, that too of a poet!

Trance

The satan asked the man in his empyreal voice with a delusive calm expression, “You desire trance? What do you want? Wine, Morphine, Opium…”

“No”, the man shouted, “I want to be submerged in the sea of trance. Give me the strongest you have”.

“Behold. Then I give you pain, and not physical. You won’t be able to express it to anyone. You will be calm outside. But inside you will die. That’s the strongest I have.”

The world seems dark. Where-ever I look, I see an eerie darkness. My head is swinging, and yet I feel I am imbibing more detail than ever. I hear my breath. As I focus on it, I feel its slowing down. I check my heart. Its thumping slowly, as an unsought reassurance.

I wonder why I am feeling such tranquility in the dark. I decide to go on the terrace. Groping, I move fore. The stairs-railing seems like a log floating in the river of darkness. Holding it, I ascend. One, two…I find myself counting my steps, and I cannot stop it.

The moon-light is here, shining like a waned, fragile soul. I look above…at the sky. There is a lone star. None other is visible. I wonder how it might feel being alone, in this vast canvas. Ironical, for I too, am alone this night. I walk fore.

Near the edge of my roof, I see white flowers. A beautiful stem has wrapped itself around the steel railing. Unlike the lone star, they are with each other. I wonder why I never noticed the flowers before. I move my face closer to them…closer…closer…until I am into the vast tangle of flowers and leaves. I close my eyes, take a deep breath. The hypnotic fragrance deluges my senses. I feel light…very very light. I open my eyes.

The house in the front mystically seems closer than it used to be. I feel I can easily jump from here. I move my eyes around. There are two flower-pots kept on the other side. They look majestic. I wonder why I never paid any attention to them. I am standing at one place. My eyes traverse the floor. I see big spots. The poor terrace—weathered by myriad days of sunshine, rain, hail-stones and what not—and yet it is still there—stable. The spots seem like balloons to me. No, more like bubbles. It is beautiful. I never noticed them before.

There is a folding-bed in the corner. The stripes make square patterns that seem like an eternal maze. I remember sitting on it, with my book in my hand, on many evenings, with my little kitten Brownie running around. She used to jump and sit on my lap. That was an year back. I don’t have her any more.

I lie down on the bed and close my eyes. Seems like ages have passed. When I was a small kid, I used to spend contless hours playing here, on this very place. I remember everything I have lost. No…I don’t remember a lot…its just a haunting feeling.

I try to shut my mind…try to stop thinking. But I cannot stop this eerie feeling. I don’t know what is it. Is it nostalgia? Nostalgia of what? I have been here forever. I am with everyone I love, have everything I had, and more. No it can’t be nostalgia.

Vague images come to my mind. Horses running in desert, butterflies flapping wings, me running with my friends. Is it real? I open my eyes. Nothing is there. Just me—and that lone star.

Wonderland

The smooth sound of metal echoing through the depths of night. The state of mood swinging as the chords of guitar reverberate and invisible, intangible ripples push through the heart piercing the brain. Nostalgia, love, dejection all form a tornado. The state of haziness surrounds and I am floating above some unclear waves. The waves of feelings and memories. Ah! Doesn't it feel light...or am I actually sinking? The thumping beats of music. Nothing surrounds me now. As if in some other parallel universe where consciousness doesn't exist and nor do words. Just a mesmerizing feeling piercing straight to the subconscious and although there is no visible change yet everything seems changing. Where am I? It’s a wonderland.