Grasshopper Ride

Lazing by, fat on aphids. A loathsome bunch of them try and flip-flop around my insides and die in the process. I burp rancid. Hopping was out of the question. There were no questions either. While I had life all figured out, or so, an unmindful car ambles by, whooshing me onto its front. I scramble on all sixes, staring emptily at the moron behind the wheel, as he parks like a bastard and runs out. People.

I wait and eye the plush insides and out. I begin questioning. Sigh. A burp frees a lucky aphid. I let him fly away.

I could fly. But I won’t.

I could trot by this dirty glass for the meadows but I can’t.

I could reach for the clouds of lingering aphids above me, but I don’t.

I could dance my wings and wait for a flying-by love, but I shan’t.

I choose to ride. My dear driver walks back in and shuts his door. He stares at me and contemplates the wipers and squirts for a minute. Shit. I am all over the place, as the mechanics scrape against the glass. The idiot forgets the squirt button and the wiper trashes his windshield like shit in one big scratch.

Giving up, he chokes the car and drives.

I fill my wings, thirty miles per hour. The two lonely hairs on my head slick back. And in one big hop, I am where I wasn’t. Whee.

So? The conveniences we pick for what.

Found

Three red lines up my arm; like surrender pleasures; to fostered instincts. The fence. A wall. As resident draftsmen fought for the right to use the geometric rulers, I ran the tip of my tea-burnt tongue over my salty fingers and a distant unfortunate speck of gunpowder or fence-venom stung. Pthu. 

Above me, I see my friends. Leering. For even when I was being buried, I chose to play the funny one; an occasional jerk of hand would send a baker’s dozen down into doubting their sanities. Foot after foot, the petrichor filled in. I downed it like I were flying in the rain. Vs in the sky that hunters could never reach. We were Vs. Breaking breezes like primetime television. Quack. And as the sun closed up, a silhouette draws itself. I am dark; the sun a Florida orange. I draw a deep breath as I choose fall.

Days. I longed for him. As I opened my eyes, I saw him in the sand. In waiting, I grew. Smiles were unheard. Tears unseen and fallen to the ground. Rain. Rain. 

But one day. The comfort of a spade hit my left foot. I woke up in grins. My rain had fallen. My sun.  In clumps, the spring of twenty feet above me seeped in, as in blisters, this leper, did.

Caught in the arms of my man, I finally indulged my eyes to find a scene. He smiled back and offered his hand and heart.

He. Was like a tuft of coriander down my throat. 

I was found.

The Writer's Notes

An always pencil on paper, his nick. For if there weren’t a greasy near death pencil pegged upside his right earlobe, a moment of shock would eventually find it on his left or in his hand, of course. He haunts my dreams, he does. The scribbles write original scores for my office day-dreams; for whenever am not working or working, the rascal pencil is all I can see through the see-through cubicle walls. Scribble doodle. Doodle doodle. We gift a fly-size security camera to the voyeur cop guys; conveniently choleric, sits the bug, capturing his scribbles over his shoulder. Zoom in, dammit. We swat the inefficient fly that dies in a scratchy lemmego.  Gossip creeps until I could smell the alcohol on the vine. Oh god; now someone’s drinking at work. I rummage the employment files and let out an evil guffaw, dangling his folder in the air. His job describes him as the writer. A legal topple, as I feel my ass in my throat; can’t blame a writer for writing. Smells. I look out the see-through and find a couple of hundred ass-heads staring back at me. I turn to the writer and he scribbles more, grinning as he does.

The day after then, I receive a note that sends my skin temporarily out the rest of me. It’s from the writer. He invites me to tea over a couple of notes. In minutes, my cube is a die of minced people, crushed into every cornery shape, all their eyes swooping hawked at the note. Some say I should destroy the note like it never arrived. Some think I could rather eat my balls than do that. Decisions decisions. I fight my way to steal a ‘go away!’. My room empties and still feels of the reminiscent meat. I decide to sweat copiously and die before I meet the writer. The former works like Houdini. Death wouldn’t bloody come. And the clock rips the day towards tea time.

I leave traces of sweat that seep by my boots as I walk up to his desk.

‘Umm. Tea, Mr. Writer?’

‘Sure!’

As we hop-trot up the stairs to the tea canisters, he smiles like a darling, while my fake smile freaks him out.

‘So what’s this all about, huh?’

‘What?’

‘Theeee…ummm…aa...you know…theeeaaa…the notes.’

‘Oh these?’

He seems to grab his groin as he struggles his way into his pockets. A thousand notes he sets afloat before me. He sheds weight like fat people on television. A flappy wind, as untimely as a reset clock. Within seconds, he is invisible. The writer has vanished into his notes. I reach out to catch a piece of him.

‘I hate my job.’

It told him what to do. For the second time in two days, I felt like my ass.

Ice

The ice broke like mugged bones and my feet sunk into mystery. Stepping ahead, I ninety degreed and picked at the cracks. Icicle. Broken icicle. Mud. Half an unfortunate earthworm, the rest of him dragged by a former passerby in footstepped goodbyes. Whitely chewed gum, good for nothing. Falling icicle; sudden-sunshine melts of trodden snow. And underneath this wintry world, a little thankful tuft of green runners. Mystery. I read it like it were Poe, squinting my eyes at the blushing grass that now stretched, crackled and went this way and that to butterfly-catch the sun in their green palms and steal it in mousy bits to their little hearts like no one was watching. I scooped a handful of these bold jacketless survivors and held them adjacent, as I walked against the vengeful wind whose I don’t know whom I had killed. Entering the indecent warmth of the howling-murmuring radiators of my home, I frapped the blind-ropes one by one, as everything was flash-bulbed and revealed. I stole an origami of four cups and divided my grasses like a usurer. Leaving them to find their sun, a week passes by, unnoticeable and cold. Another day, I walk in, blind by the white everything.  I steal a breath of the sun, the warm blast of ginger and tea in me. Four green gentlemen tug at my arm. I turn, as one raises a finger to my lips. Another ushers my thumb into my agape mouth, as two more gently sweep me off my feet, swinging lull. As my plants grew up, I grew down. And dreamt of a distant future where I would grow up. Human after all.   

Fire

I seldom do jogs; they machine life into my otherwise dull and grim shoes. In an innate vengeance for all the dogs they had to fend off or surrender to, they bite back, deep into my feet. I jog-walk with sore feet, down a path. I choose to forget where it leads to, every time; contemptuous. Familiar. With red houses all around, and red people walking their red dogs and the interesting douse of ashy perfume, this point always brings me the same memories, even if the houses were a greying white, the people shadowy dark, the dogs still shivery spiked from a recent monsoon, and the air, a morning’s morning breath.

It is at this point, that I stop and draw a canister from my pocket. I look around, the three pronged lanes stare back at me in a been-there-done-that. To the last drop, I drain the contents of the can, sliding it down the lanes, one by one. The silent morning seems to trickle down its neck onto the concrete. When back at the junction, I pause and crouch and draw a box of matches, always stained in jog-sweat. I count today’s quota of ammunition, and place them in careful parallels on the road. The first crack of friction breaks a match that I flick. The second dies in vain bravery, sparking twice before snapping. The third illuminates my face in an interesting warmth, as I draw it down to the junction and drop.

It fascinates me, how fire spreads. In magical straight lines, it burns the peace signed kerosene. And suddenly, the world is red again. My memories flood back, as a hundred staring eyes reflect the crispy licks of yellow and red flames. Someone screams. A lonesome cur whines and runs by with its tail into its behind. A drunk wakes in the sudden heat, smiles at his invisible wife who just brought him a blanket and falls back into dreams. A burning wheel runs by, unmindful of the crossroad traffic. The flame dies in a minute, sapping the last drops of fuel into smoke.

And as illuminating my efforts to burn peace were, I realise they were worthless. For everything is morning again. And the smell of sleep nudges the smokes away. I jog-walk back home. Somebody who is everyone should try it.

Bhaja Govindam

Another translation that I've been wanting to post in a while now! Makes enormous sense; almost like the whole Bhagavad Geetha condensed into thirty three verses. I've tried my best to keep the translations intact; do drop me your suggestions and corrections, if any.

For more on the work, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhaja_Govindam; I just noticed that they've a translation posted too; but I think mine's way better and more precise.

Bhaja Govindam

Worship Govinda, the cowherd,

Worship Govinda,

Worship Govinda, O Fool!

When you have reached the very end, your rules wouldn’t save you!

 

Oh Fool! Give up your desire to heap riches,

And in a good mind, be content with all your heart.

What you get is a result of your actions;

Festoon your mind with such good thoughts!

 

And in the illusions of a woman’s bosom and navel,

You would fall in lust; but these are but mere flesh,

Think and rethink; these are but mere flesh.

 

Like a drop of dew on a lotus leaf, so is a man’s life,

We, the world, all grieve, are egotists, and are diseased.

 

As long as a man raises and protects his family,

He earns the respect of his peers and they hail him.

But to the lived man, with frail body;

No one asks; no one speaks.

 

As long as the breeze lives in a man,

All question his good health,

And the moment the air skips the body,

Even his wife fears what remains of him.

 

Strength;

As your childhood, is spent in games,

And youth in the women,

And as an elder, in thoughts of the past.

Without a thought to the creator.

 

Who is your wife? Who are your children?

In the ways of the world, these are like bursts of surprise.

Whose are you? Where and who did you come from?

Think of these truths here, dear Brother.

 

From the friendship of the good, stems non-attachment.

From non-attachment, you lose your desires.

As you lose your desires, you stand your ground.

And as you stand your ground, you realise life.

 

As your youth goes by, who is the lustful?

What is a lake, when the water is gone?

As your money is spent, where is your family?

As the truth is revealed, what is the world?

 

Don’t pride in your wealth, people and youth;

In a minute, time would sweep it all away.

Kill all your desires and illusions,

And realise the truth and God, enter.

 

The days are just evenings and mornings.

The seasons, just winters and springs.

As the games of time takes your life with them,

But the winds of your desire never leave.

 

These blossoms of twelve verses,

Were imparted to a scholar,

Through the knowledge and enlightenment of Adi Shankara, the honourable.

 

Why would you think of your wife and wealth?

Oh fool! Don’t you have a guide, a director?

Hurry and hop into the vehicle of the good,

Free from the pulls of the three worlds.

 

They roam the world in matted locks,

In tonsured heads, in orange robes,

In many colours;

But as fools, they don’t see the truth, even when it is revealed,

All guises, of their worldly bodies.

 

The body is weak, the head is bald,

The teeth fallen, his bones in pieces,

The old man has been cast away from home,

Despite all, he clings to the spheres of desire.

 

The fire in front, the sun at his back,

And in the night, he hugs himself, surrendering to the cold.

His hands stretched out, he lives a mendicant,

Despite all, he clings to his wants.

 

Journeying to the holy river Ganges,

He holds his fast, gives all he possesses,

But the knowledge eludes him, despite all,

In a hundred births, he isn’t blessed with the truth.

 

Live as you would under a temple’s tree,

Wearing deer-skin, the earth as your bed.

Give everything, your greed, in sacrifice,

Would this not fill you sate, this pride?

 

The way of the sages, or the ways of the greedy,

The friendship of the good, or devoid of friendships,

The scholar who loves thoughts,

He is the one that is blessed, and the only blessed.

 

The one that thinks in the Bhagavad Geetha,

The one that drinks but a drop from the enormity of the Ganga.

The one that recites the name of the flutist.

He hasn’t a word to quarrel with the God of Death, Yama!

 

And we are born, again,

And we die, again,

And again fall into the wombs of the mother,

This odyssey, is too long, too tiring.

Protect me, Oh flutist, please do.

 

Rags on the road, he picks for clothes,

The scholar that counts his blessings and walks,

He is a scholar that has mastered his senses,

He walks on, like a child, like a drunk.

 

Who are you? Who am I? Where did we come from?

Who is my mother? Who is my father?

Question thus, while everything else is tasteless,

Let go of all, all these pointless dreams.

 

There is but one Protector; in you, in me, in everyone,

So quell your anger and deceit, meaningless.

In an equal mind, you’d dwell everywhere,

And you are the Protector.

 

In enemies, in friends, in your children, in kin,

Don’t fight, for love or hate.

In all, in you, you’d see the soul,

In everyone, for this difference is but foolish.

 

Lust, anger, greed, desire,

Cast them away, become your soul, become the you.

The fools that can’t see themselves,

They would suffer forever, like in hell.

 

Recite his thousand names, sing the Bhagavad Geetha,

Think of his many forms, the lord,

Lose your thoughts in the company of the good,

Give to the poor,

And needy.

 

The man who lives in pleasures and joy,

Leaves his body, to disease, like prey.

And even though he would die, and fall to the Gods,

He is still haunted by his bad deeds and sins.

 

The meanings and meaningless,

Of the happy life,

There is but no joy in that!

The rich man is afraid of his own son!

For that is wealth, as we see it, all over!

Control your breaths, every meal,

And your joys and sorrows, know your discretions and indiscretions,

Chant his name, to your end, through your fate,

Give yourself to him, in care, and more care.

 

Oh follower of the Teacher, at the lotus of his feet,

May you be free of everything worldly, soon.

And your senses and heart, be one with the Lord,

And from your true soul, you would see him, the Lord.

 

A fool, there was none, but the scholar of grammar, his vision cleared,

By Adi Shankara, the holy one,

Taught by him as yearned, shown the arms of light.

 

Worship Govinda,

Worship Govinda,

Worship Govinda, O Fool!

Chant his name, and everything is revealed,

For there is none other to cross the ocean called life.  

Cat

With darker forces at work, a half a pounder brain was considerably easy to defeat. All they had to do was roll their tongues and slur Texan; “Stick ‘em up, buster! Game’s up!”

Now our not so quick somebody, in a philosophical outburst, says “What game?! I’ve been sitting with nothing to do in the middle of the day and the middle of the night for I do not know how long now and you accuse me of having completed this “game”, which I refute, for I do not know what this game is that you are talking about and even if I did, I can most certainly assure you that I am not playing it right about now and have not been playing it.

The darker forces, thicker than their owner, of course, let bollocks be bollocks and repeat “Stick ‘em up, buster!”

A duh moment; nobody speaks and while we wait for something to cull the silence, the man and his devil’s breathing in and out are all our sources of happening. Another dull day.

Breathe in; and a couple of airborne chopped moustache pieces fly in and choke our man. He coughs and as he coughs, a couple more from the previous breath fly out. Adamant kids at a theme park. “Wheeeee! Can we go back up the water-slide, Daddy?!” “Sure, son! Just wait for the next breath.”

It was art; existential silences. An art that nobody died perfecting; they just went on and on, like journeys back home, and eventually, either gave up or died giving up. But our man was in the middle of one such vicious silences; so edgy, that he spent two days observing rust patterns on his last customer’s shaving blade. That did not mean that his last customer dropped in two days ago; just that he started noticing it then.

And like televised economies with tuxedoed grouches screaming for goodness-gracious-some-money, his cash box just excused itself, blaming it on the dog that ate all the cash. No money, no heat, no electricity; boy was this getting boring.

So one day, he sprang upon a resting cat that smelled fresh from the night’s hunt. And while it squealed in purrs to get away from his grasp, he ripped a new blade off its casing, slid it into the razor, kachinking it in place, he slid the lather off the disgruntled cat. In patches through the lemmego protests and in expert moves as it white-flagged defeat after yesterday’s mouse burned itself out.

Tada! A shaved cat.