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Arcade Games
There is a packet of cigarettes on your desk. It is a foreign brand; not the type I occasionally buy. It looks pristine; unlike the wrinkled characteristic everything I own acquires. My dilapidated house is the last in a row. I see the commercial plans and drawings on the easels. Everything has fine straight lines.…
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Rebellion and Romanticism
The night in its limitless darkness a black hole engulfing all thoughts The picture of James Dean on the table, apparently, a symbol for flagrant rebellion The clothes yet to be ironed yet to be washed scattered on the floor, that we walk on the rug eaten by many winters The arena for some poetry…
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Freedom in a Nutshell
All wrapped up in my own thoughts. Is there anything called freedom? Where you know the ground that you stand on, understand the decisions you plan on taking? I heard you saying, “we are the choices we make,” as you dragged your toe drawing patterns on the dusty floor. I suppose that you believed in…
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Thinking About the Floating Dead
The painting above is a depiction of Shakespeare’s Ophelia from Hamlet. The haunting scene describes how Ophelia, driven out of her mind when her father is murdered by her lover Hamlet, falls into a stream and drowns: There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke; When down her weedy…
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The Uterus Inheritance
I remember the Ambassador rides from Bhubaneswar to CuttackYour tussar sari draped around your shoulderAt home you would read files, make notes“It is tough being a woman Secretary of Industries”You had endometriosis A fresh incision on an arterial veinNever did you take a day off,Never did anyone find out In Raghurajpur they had an exhibition of handicraftsYou…
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Scratching at Layers of Patriarchal Sedimentation
During my research on the ghazal, I discovered that the work done by several women poets in the eighteenth and nineteenth century had been removed from written history. Women had systematically been excluded from several anthologies. In Urdu, as oral poetry started being complied and printed, the biographies penned by poet and historian Altaf Hussain…
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Why Can’t You Smell Your Own Home?
I discovered this fascinating article on The Cut “Why Can’t You Smell Your Own Home?“. It talks about how we get so used to smells that are non-threatening we stop sensing them. It seems that we “tune out” the smells, which probably explains why we stop smelling a perfumed candle or a pillow spray, after…
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On Reading “The House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros
I am currently reading The House on Mango Street (2004) by Sandra Cisneros. It came recommended by a friend’s daughter; she read it as part of her English Literature syllabus in Grade 8. Well firstly, I am absolutely delighted that this young bright student recommended this book to me. Secondly, how fabulous that a book…
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The Last Post of 2018 – a ghazal
I asked him what should my last post be year end He said, reflecting creatively on the year end How boring, no? All year you follow and watch, still on YouTube, endless rewinds declaring the year end I started work in diversity, submitted my thesis, Going to mentor, gearing up at the year end Revolution…
