What an Idea Sirjee....

Economic Meltdown, Inflation, Terrorism ...

What should a common man do...?

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Inject mobile connection instead of any blood transfusion

बुझने दो मेरी ख्वाईशें

चिता के आहट से पहले
राख कैसे छा गया ?
वक्त का दीमक ये कब
परिंदे का पर खा गया ?
जाल को जुगनू ने ही चुना था,
अब छिप गया क्यूँ खाल में ?

बुझने दो मेरी ख्वाईशें
रखा है क्या इन सवालों में...

भीड़ की हर शाखों पर,
फन्दों सी लटकी है क्यूँ टाई ?
सुलझे फीते वाले जूते,
कब भेंट दे गएँ तन्हाई ?
पंख वाले बुलबुलों ये कैसे ?
दब गएँ दीवारों में ?

बुझने दो मेरी ख्वाईशें
रखा है क्या इन सवालों में...

तनहा रोकर बारिशों में,
हौले हौले जल रहा,
तारों का सपना कभी था,
आज मैं ही ढल रहा...

Guilt Pleasure

Mercury was challenging the lowest limit of the year. I was shivering under the newly constructed flyover with some old memories and a gold flake in my hand. The flyover was my most significant and ambitious construction project till date. Completion of this flyover was had much to do this gold flake. Probably, this was my last fag.

Shadows and desires share at least one very common fact. They spread their wing of dominance in relation to their distance from light and reality. I started smoking, when I was in my second year of under graduation. Gold flake was least expensive and so the first choice of middle class bachelors. My existence without a gold flake was not imaginable those days. I shared my luck ,bad luck, job interviews, sad moments and happiness with that wrap. I associated smoking to my days of struggle and my days of graduating life.

After my graduation, I entered corporate battleground with waves of changes shaping my life style. Everything from my hair style to my shoe laces underwent a phenomenal change. I had separate wallets to carry my plastic money, currency notes and visiting cards. I attired in latest market brands and had my own car. Even, the gold flake found Marlboro as a new substitute.

Smoking and miracles always excited me. However, the idea to quit smoking was more fascinating and having some miraculous exit would have made it a masterstroke. I thought to jot down this script with some gaudy dialogues. However, I decided not to sweep off my old foot prints for showcasing my new pair of shoes and thus decided to tie off old poignant strings with a last puff of gold flake only.

The gold flake thought, like many of my other thoughts was very similar to few strange new relationships, which enter your routine accidentally, then follow you, haunt you, delight you and finally drive your steps. Although absurd, but I often design some reasoning to justify myself from these thoughts.

Memories and thoughts unfold their dimensions, when you are alone. I was sitting alone on a broken bench under the flyover with that probable last puff gold flake. Although, synchronization of events could not have witnessed better moment than that, but my mind was responding only to words of my college physics lecturer. His lessons denied existence of two objects at a same place at same time. For me, thoughts are also objects and today many of them were dwelling inside my mind. I could even sense all the needles of my wrist at the same place which was adding flavours to the mood of romanticism.

Tickers of my wrist watch and my trembling shoes were disturbing the grave silence of that ambience. I was waiting to meet the managing director of my construction company. He promised me to meet after his late-night show to discuss the latest most promising project of the company. Floods of thoughts were reverberating in my brain. I was looking at the ruins of that last gold flake. Suddenly, a car stopped in front of me. It was the managing director. When someone brings a ray of hope to you, your eyes start imagining halo around him. I could sense a similar halo around my managing director also.

He opened the door of car ,came near the bench and offered a cigarette to me. Every big discussion should start with spark and smoke. I hesitated for a moment, looked at the crushed butt of the probable last gold flake, smiled and accepted the new cigarette.

How do you feel...Sir?

It was 9th of may 2008. I was expecting the clouds to rain heavily and the winds to shove me hard. My anticipations and desires to look other of my batch mates at the same emotional level, where I was standing had no logical explanations. Such absurd dreams neither had any logic nor any dark philosophy embedded or wrapped within it. But honestly since past 10 years, I was waiting for the day to end up with such kind of dramatic setup. I woke up that morning expecting to notice some phenomenal change in my ambiance.Loitering in my hostel lobby,I interviewed people and expected them to burst out in emotion.I expected the four year long movie to flash on my cerebral projector and drench my face in tears.

Probably, the fear of shift in my co-ordinates was bothering me more than emotional or sentimental detachments. A wild and absurd known fear was scaring me.I could have easily figured out vibrational causes that made me feel uncomfortable, but I wasn't in the mood to do that. I wanted to sit alone keeping mum, with my mental fluctuations touching the X axis.I kept my cell phone on silent mode.I had no idea about what,when and why to speak.My life, which have hitherto witnessed a lot many departures was witnessing the greatest ever shift till date.

The law of inertia which holds true for Newtonian body seemed to agree and satisfy my mental state too.I would have always hated to call my self a satisfied ,complacent and stoic kid but at 9th of may I was helpless,speechless,tasteless .....

My search of the "never-land" diluted while the graduation . My quixotic and utopian dreams were drying at that very moment, and I was helpless.I was debating against myself for smoking,drinking,professionalism,responsibilities,love,money,fame and hell lot of affairs,which never knocked my priorities before that day.The waves of fear and hesitation subdued my emotional and sentimental breeze. I was not accepting this fact and never wanted to accept it.This made me feel jittery,I was experiencing the unrest.

Some of my juniors visited my lobby and asked " how are you feeling ?"...If I should utter and accept the truth...I felt like an orphan at that very moment.....

या यूं कहे..

ये कोई इत्तेफाक नहीं,
पर कभी कभी,
हम,
नदी के एक किनारे से
दूसरे तक,
लम्बी छलांग लगा देते हैं ;

या यूं कहें,
उस पार जाने के लिए,
इस पार सब कुछ गवां देते हैं॥

चाँद को चाहना,
बेहद कोई गुनाह नही,
आख़िर सारी दुनिया यही करती है,
गुनाह है ये,
हम चाँद से चाहने की उम्मीदे लगा देते है,

या यूं कहे,
चांदनी बटोरने के लिए
हम सब कुछ ग़वा देते हैं...

और, इस पार
तुम्हारी कविताओं की जगह,
किसी और को पढ़ा जाए,
तुम प्यासे ही रहो,
किसी और को भरा जाए

दर्द होने पर,
रो नही सकते;
तुम नाटक के किरदार कहलाओगे,
गुस्सा करने पर, भाग नही सकते
पागल घोडा बन जाओगे॥

ये इत्तेफाक नही,
तुम्हारा झोला अब खली है
शब्दों से सजाई दुनिया,
गन्दी सी एक गाली है

या यूं कहे,
छलांग लगाने के साथ,
हम ख़ुद का मजाक बना लेते है,
अक्सर चाहते चाहते
सब कुछ गवा देते हैं..

Was that OUR REVOLUTION?

Was that OUR REVOLUTION?

Rhyme…Rhyme…Rhyme.
You force me every time,
Is it not a crime?
Bargaining thoughts to rhyme,
And, branding the poem to be sublime.

The funniest of all the fun,
We all are heading some run,
Blindly following some Sun,
Announcing “I had all the fun”,
Eagerly waiting to hear “Well done”

We are dragged to fight some war,
Are convinced to help as far,
We bleed and get some scar;
Satisfied and proud,
We boast, blabber and declare ourselves a star.

The formula I was told
To succeed, being young or old,
Was to rhyme, rhyme and rhyme,
Each and every time.

Identity Card- Part 1

Today, I have reappeared in my city after spending many years in a jail. Things have changed a lot here. I guess no one remembers me here. Just out of curiosity, I smiled and waved my hand arbitrarily to a barber. “Nice to see you after a week Sir…How is your father?” It was so irritating and annoying for me that I moved without replying him back.

I walked from the barber shop to a place exactly in front of a splendid mall. It never existed, when I visited the place last time. I had merely 500 bucks in my wallet and a cell phone which hardly had the balance to manage a call for half an hour. I was never a shy man and have been winning challenges for the last many years to prove my balls. So, I geared up to get into that opulent mall. At any point of time and with any sum of money in my wallet, I wouldn’t have hesitated to enter the mall. But, I wished to chill my self having a quick fag before getting any royal reception inside the mall.

It was a long queue of strange faces with cigarettes in their hands. Probably, few of them were smoking because they had to prove that they are social animal and they socialize every evening and few of them were smoking under the wrong impression of looking elegant while performing the ritual. It have always been a great mystery to me that “Why do we try to impress strangers”. Surprisingly the media chosen to prove us are absurd at times. A hell lot of blabbering discussions forced me to leave the place as soon as possible. I dragged my self closer to the mall with the cigarette in my hand.

Memories were flashing in my mind. I still remember my father. He was a principal at a blind school in the city. He was a very qualified scholar from a prestigious college. But, I never understood why he was so much inclined him the social service. Obnoxiously, while I was very young he wrenched me also to serve the school. It was much more than any punishment.

I was never excited interacting those blinds. They were never any factor of delight. But, the banner of my benevolent father made every one of them interact with me. They used to share their feelings, their possessions and their memories with me. Hardly, any of such emotions conciliated my anger. ‘D’ was also among those blind students. He is not much relevant in my diary except the fact that he had a nice I-pod which always enticed me. I was an egoistic child and rarely asked him the I-pod. I asked my father to gift a similar I-pod on my birthday, but in reply had to face severe scolding and lectures of frugality. I was very possessive since my childhood and had hardly compromised for my demands. After the death of my mother things changed a lot. But, this time the matter got serious. Late in the night, when all of the students went to their bed, I decided to snatch the I-pod from the blind without making any noise or give him any clue. His bad stars couldn’t help him to save either his life or his I-pod. I was caught snatching the I-pod .In my defense I attacked him. Unfortunately he stumbled and died on the spot. My moral father had nothing but few more moral lessons for the jail. It was probably his society and his social image that made him at least to shed tears at that moment.

My first trysts with those prisoners are not too great or enthralling to boastfully discuss anywhere, but I have always conversed different versions of that story at different places. It satisfies my ego and the appreciations make my nose look further up.

Things at the jail changed over the years. I was not new to those ragging phases. I never felt bruised. My father even treated me like that. Surely, I enjoyed being discussed and glorified among the prisoners. They often idolized me. It served their purpose of being praised as connoisseur of recognizing talents and my purpose of turning into an icon. My days of misery were over. I was greeted as a don there, had all the facilities available behind the bars. I used to demonstrate and rule the prisoners.

But, I hated the place. I hated the inmates. I was dying like anything to get out of that quicksand. I had to see the world. I had to learn life. I had to eat in restaurants….I had to hear the I-pod.