A Song 182

Two parrots
upside down
from an electric wire
romancing.

A love over

A love over. A romance runs out. Affair stirred in the 50s at Lake Temple Road with The Statesman. Rare days Amrita Bazar Patrika. As a six to 10 year old, scanned the Sports pages of The Statesman; never went below the headlines; Pataudi, Abbas Ali Baig, Sobers, Kanhai ... stylists.... read their names and also Mohun Bagan, East Bengal, Balram, Chuni, Jarnail, Rehmatullah....a five minute job; and then at Sevak Vaidya Street, dwelt on The Statesman, the Monday last page, M.Krishnan column.....In the 70s, The Statesman dropped in favour of The Times of India, K.N. Prabhu, Joe, Leyland.....In Chenna it was The Hindu, never much appreciated it.... orthodoxy ..... never slipping or making mistakes. Grim. And as an old, The Indian Express. Over. Told newspaperman Patil to stop dropping newspapers... why, he asked, had no answer .... upset the entire day...Today, sipped coffee staring the window, no newspaper. Yes, me am living and laughing. From 6 to 71, a long time for an affection to end. Being a journalist all living, there is a tang of disappointment .... as if me am debunking me profession. Could be, dont know ....Friends, me wont do that. They said me do not change. Switched to iphone, a fresh instrument presented by son Ganesh and the social sites on wildlife, Thay, wire.in, scroll.in are a good read. Social sites deal with humans and animals and forests and cinemas and sports .....read a fine essay on P.V.Sindhu by Shirish Nadkarni... after a long, long, long time an honest piece of sports writing. And there is humour. Me has changed. 

A Song 181

On Marine Drive mornings,
Kabir,
Tuka,
joggers,
walkers,
yogers
walk into each other,
mocking each other.
Birthed by Ram,
mutter Ram
for uplift from a traffic jam,
made by them and Ram.
Arching over them,
BSE Towers flags:
Insider trading,
a stock market scam.
   

A Song 179

Evenings,
sun crawls down backs
of high rises;
sips a chilled coke.
on the way,
moon, in an escalator,
on duty.
Mornings,
moon slides down
mobile towers,
at ease with steamy, chais;
Sun, fresh, takes an ontime
flight,
describing 24 hours in
Eternity.


    

A Song 178

Old Man
palmed a still butterfly,
breezing on the window sill,
a morning;
buried the flyer
under a mango tree,
with prayers;
returning favours.    

Remembering Kurdi

Sans roots
zero memories
absent stories...

Gangubhai Kurdikar walks a mud track in Kurdi, perhaps to her Shiva temple; with daughter Kishori Amonkar sings a bhajan with a Kurdi crowd; some identify a few names in the crowd. Kurdi town in South Goa is no more. Her home is no more. Gangubhai Kurdikar is no more. Kishori Amonkar is no more. Salaulim Dam, some three decades ago, displaced more than five hundred families; they protested; they were resettled; in summers when waters dip, the unsettled flock to Kurdi to nest in memories. As one generation births another, there may be no memories. A gentleman settled in Mumbai talks of Kurdi to which his daughter is no relation; she was born after the dam, cannot imagine Kurdi. Director Saumyananda Sahi rolls the cameras over Kurdi under and above dam waters; Muslims, Christians and Hindus have little to quarrel about as all of theirs is below vast stretches of water, brought in by rains. men and women stand on shores trying to pin down  their homes; yes, that was my house; here was mine; a ration shop, a chukki, abandoned along with gods; cruelty of a marred love is mentioned and the camera hurries. A Films Division of India film; Sahi shoots facts; does not much trade in opinions; curated by Tatasky. The one hour film left me a bit frozen; at least some 500 families got settled; at Tehri and Narmada, humans have been plucked from their homes, dumped on contractors and agents. Yes, the Salaulim Dam has helped some get water; we agree, says a displaced resident; but ....  Perhaps, Development or Vikas with broken tails and tales of cruelty, may be necessary; is there no humane alternative. How long can we live without stories? Bhils in Madhya Pradesh still seem to have stories. A drought; villagers go to the soothsayer for relief; he is drunk and driven; they paint their homes with trees; thats what they know; rains come. Hum Chitr Banate Hain is a short animation film by Prof. Nina Sabnani with Sher Singh Bhil, an artist. Painting stories on walls is a wall art; it needs villages, homes, stories; when Smart Cities come, India will turn dry. A country is known by stories. India has lots. Will it be so 50 years away?  

A Song 177

'Hi, what are you doing?',
asked the house sparrow,
pecking Marie
at the window sill.
'Watching you,' he said.
House sparrow:
 'Old Man and Lady are missing,
leaving us guessing,'
He: 'Are you sure?'
Sparrow: 'Many times over.'
Karuna banyan, temple peepal,
mangos, copper pods,
flying fox
flew the news around.
Deva, the donkey, rolled brays
on Karuna Road.
Marched to the police station
with protests of compassion.
Police offered chairs, tea,
asked for photos, Aadhaars....
Missing need a sure guessing.
With nothing working,
waited at Karuna banyan,
when came a bicycle
with Lady and Old Man
on its back.
A Magic Cycle,
had its own mind,
out of time,
had wheeled
Lady and Old Man
over minefields of cars, roads,
metros, mobiles;
a vacation.
Ordained by Magic Cycle, 
Lady and Old Man
turned parts and portions
of Karuna banyan;
A spectacle not for opticians;
A waking not of Zen;
A compassion,
not for TV stations;
out of  internet equivocations; 
sparrows
light diyas in devotion.



A note to the reader if any:

A poor, incomplete affair. Anyone can add or delete parts of the poem. Make a new poem. Take a byline for the effort.  

Amma & Appa

Rama and me liked Amma & Appa on Tatasky. Perhaps many middle class families discuss marriage, caste, community, religion the Amma and Appa way and the film shoots the moments. Tone of the debates is low, we could be with Amma when she says she cannot change, not with a thud but a mumble. Amma and Appa live without make ups. Their son, brought up in Cuddalore, marries a German girl; the German family comes home to Cuddalore, tries to grasp a Cuddalore living, where Amma loved none till she got married to Appa to love, tries to appreciate and fly out home, Germany. Amma & Appa are disappointed, they do not show it as they go about tending their garden; buffalos on the road, temple chariots... reminds me of Perumal Murugan. We have these discussions at home and know what it means... when me daughter Dakhi decided to marry Rajesh Patil, there was talk; but me mother came off best accepting the wedding entirely. There is some substance to Amma saying she wished for a Cuddalore daughter-in-law for her son from Cuddalore ... but not Tamil Nadu, not India but.... Germany, she takes off her steel specs, wipes her eyes. What does one say of this woman, slot her ....Yes, parents in India do find it hard to bless weddings of their daughters and sons, outside caste, community, nation. Amma and Appa are honest enough. There are no filmy turns and twists, the boy flies out to Germany with his German lady and her parents; no wails, disappointments stated ordinarily; Amma & Appa together at Cuddalore. No needless music ... something of a non-mantra  documentary done well by directors, Franziska Schoenberger and Jayalakshmi Subramanian. Wish there were English sub titles. Thanks for spotting a troublesome itch .....

Of decencies

In the 60s, NCC was a must in schools and colleges with influentials managing exemptions. NCC parades at the Maidan in December and January mornings bested lectures in economics at the St. Xavier's College. Fogs washing the greens and the Maidan was then green, please believe me; dew bulbs on thin strands of wet grass; and none really paraded, at least me did not; never saw sense marching...Left, Right ...Dayen mud...how does it help. After two hours of needless unpleasantness, squatted in front of the Bihari bhaiya under a tree, boiling adrak ka chai; 'Siya Ram ji...', he softly intoned... sometimes trail off with a Siya... and me would nod a 'Siya Ram ji'.....and then the sipping of the tea from hadi (mud cups) with an occasional beedi free from the gentleman .... they are gentlemen despite the Bengali contempt for them ....me took my time and lay down on the grass for a laugh..... It was so till 2014 when a greeting switched to a hollering, command: Jay Shri Ram with Sita left out. Ram is an Army order today not soft-toned by Sita, last heard when me marched on the Maidan with Armymen commanding the morning quiet. And it was in the Eden Gardens me admired Nawab or the Noob net practicing... the thuck of the bat meeting the ball ......no needless shouts.... Noob served the game quietly... rather silently; till date no Indian cricketer has the Rolls Royce of Noob, and then came Ganguly celebrating half naked ....and today Kohli tearing the pitch, the players, the umpires.... showing off his distorted face .... the Modi of Indian cricket ....A decline in decencies. Akin to the drop in quality of city air breathed. A good friend wonders: Have you ever seen a car stop to let a child or old cross the road in Borivili 2017? There is an inordinate pride in being a Bhakt,  Modi is trending....Touching of feet or better falling at feet ....Maybe one day .... waiting for India women and men 2017 to bow to namastes in old, soft dhotis and kurtas, jeans, sarees ... pure cottons.  

A Song 176

Betwixt evening and night,
stars and skies,
at Saro Lake County
in Kumarakom,
sun at the showers,
moon in deos,
Old Man hummocked
in the styles of
Vembanadu kayal. 

A Song 175

Vembanadu kayal,
flows with
Old man on the bank.

A Song 174

Caped in certainties,
government orders of adversity, 
they machine sawed
badam,
rain tree,
mast tree,
umbar,
mango
with little ado.
Nothing spared
as if,
seeding, leafing and
fruiting
unfair. 

Whoa Goa.....

Thursday morning sunned by Justice Gautam Patel poetic ruling: '..... Goa mostly liberal, kind and gentle.' Smita Nair from Panjim posts a detailed report, FP anchor in The Indian Express. She writes: 'The Bombay High Court's Panjim bench today quashed the Centre's notification to move western zone of National Green Tribunal (NGT) in Pune ---which handles all cases from Goa -- to the NGT's principal bench in New Delhi.' Modi Bhakt and Goa CM, Manohar Parrikar pushed the idea to bloc the poor from fighting green cases; it could get tougher giving time to Manohar Parrikar to sell away Goa to hoteliers and corporates; tourism earns forex and kickbacks. That the NGT in Pune has so many cases from Goa, Justice Patel said, is because the people of Goa, "perceive that there is something of value here to protect." By tripping protesting Goans, Manohar Parrikar is being unfair, but when were Bhakts fair. Is it not time Panaji had a bench of the NGT? If me could settle out of Mumbai, it will be Goa with Paul Noronha as neighbour. BJP will try its best to ruin Goa, make it less gentle and charming, but dear Goans wont fall.  Paul does complain tourists 'finishing' Goa over Old Monks at Press Club, long ago. Goa is a failed case of the tourism model. You cant use Goans as bunnies for tourists to depocket dollars and euros. Goans like their fenny and rum, their women, funs and laughs .... and thats better than yogic poses and meditative confusions and hates. They felled me from the first day at The Times of India, Bombay, with the sports desk manned not womaned by Goans. Frank, Leyland, John, Joe .... they had played the sports and reported them with civility and facility. Sports desks in Bombay newspapers were manned by Goans. And there were the beautiful Goan women at offices.... me preferred them to their stuffy bosses. And there was sports in Bombay....athletics, billiards, snooker, football, hockey, basketball, badminton, table tennis apart from cricket .... loaning Bombay a sports fairness, a sporting spirit, a shaking of hands after a match won or lost.... that went with the death of sports in Bombay and the city went and is still in a decline of many dislikes. Bombay lost it and Mumbai has not gained a bit. There were Goans at the press making pages like Alberto and Claudie at nights, a bit tipsy and smoky, and yet fun. Me has shared them drinks and smoke. Today, there are less Goans in Mumbai and perhaps lesser in Goa as the younger generations fly to Australia, New Zealand, America, Canada.... Thats what Paul tells me leaving silent bunglows in retirement homes for cheap corporates to buy and sell. Yes, India is not for them... India is no place for funsters ....India is religious hatred and killings and more of it as years go by, a miserable shut down ..... Mumbai is India in that measure. Yes, Justice Patel, me agrees with you, Goa is a beautiful slice of earth with beautifulest humans as the FIFA U17 ad says... If today me am a human being it is because of Goans and Paulies.  

Men Without Women

Men Without Women, Stories by Haruki Murakami could pass as Women without Men or Murakami without Marathons. He writes of a loneliness; maybe tries to make sense of it. Translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel and Ted Gossen, all the stories speak of men losing women. Kafuku, an actor, has a wife he loved and who went with other men. She died. He invites one of her friends to chat.....then a lucid Murakami:  '.....He seemed to be trying to discern what, if anything, might lie behind the invitation. But he could read no intent in the older man's expression. All he saw was the kind of stillness you might expect from someone who had recently lost his wife of many years. Like the surface of a pond after ripples had spread and gone.' And then the demon leaves Kafuku. Murakami then sups a bit of Kafka in Samsa in Love: He woke to discover that he had undergone a metamorphosis and become Gregor Samsa. Like the telling. He meets a hunchback girl. And wants to meet her again. Like Murakami taping one marathon to start another. Marathons are lonely,painful and the stories are marathons run by Murakami. He may have had golds at the end of runs but not the  imaginations in Men Without Women. His men and women are losers. Wonder whether they ever loved. They are left alone to plod. From running to walking or just standing, staring. In a manner Death is a loneliness, though Murakami does not invent revenge or violence. Me bought the book at T2 International Airport on way to Kurampala where did not open a page. There were birds and trees and silences to watch. The book felt an excess. Back in Mumbai and read as me felt damp. Men Without Women is worth a read.    

Jaane Bhi......

Let Go could be an equivalent of Jaane Bhi do Yaroo of Kundan Shah. Life is a Fixing. Laugh. To live the Fix. Fixing or as the Mumbaikar says, 'setting ho gaya' is norm. Jabs at journalists, real estate corporates, bureaucracy, death with Om Puri dragging a dead municipal commissioner, gods confused -- one can be with them with laughs alone.  No use getting uppy; Let Go. And if Kundan Shah did not make any more films, as critics say, it is because he had nothing more to laugh about. Nukkad and Wagle ki Duniya were smiles. Kundan Shah and his audience had sadly done with laughs in Jaane Bhi... Today, one can watch the film again, laugh and appreciate the eternality of a peach of a film. Thanks Kundan Shah. To the point, Nasee Babu in The Indian Express writes: ...Thank you Kundan; no flight of angels; may an army of clowns sing thee to thy rest. Gods, above and below, may not much enjoy his company. No God has ever laughed. Religious tomes are at best depressing, if not suicidal. Gods are not fun. They have no clowns as assists. Have seen Janne Bhi a couple of times and still guffaw the funeral scene. Every one takes a dead body seriously. Not Kundan or Om Puri. And for me that's about the best piece of art, laugh art ..... Yes Kundan taught us to guffaw. Sure will be guffawing wherever he is, alone if he finds no company. Wonder how you made it Sir. Bye Sir. 

A tic

A peepal and a banyan like bouncers at far corners of a padam wider than Arabian Sea at Shankhumukham beach with skies bearing crowds of Brahminy kites and crows. Or imaginations of todmorrow times. You could call them brothers or sisters or brother and sister. Shuddhan, in a white mundu and a khadi jibba, musing to self, sloped in an wooden, arm chair with legs resting on extended arms under a tamarind. Sun spotted as sunrays glimpse Shuddhan through tiny leaves of the tamarind. 100 years ago... present, past and future flowed as one at Vembanadu kayal. Yes, father had passed on tidbits chewing vettila-pakku from the same wooden arm chair. Grandfather and grandmother were of some age when they strayed into Kuyil Padam one day or night, unsure. Uncertainty opens imaginative spaces. He could muse anything and it could stay. Another moment, another musing. There was no rhythm to his musing; it was wayward, tuneless and he liked it that way.  Whims altered the musing and telling to none. Appuppan and Ammumma liked Kuyil Padam as the sun, stars, skies, streams, birds never left them; never let them down. Evening sun would nest on the peepal, snooze to buzz of roosting birds; morning moon had his bed on the banyan with flying bats for company; streams made their way like shlokic poetry in heads of Appuppan and Ammumma; for a god, as god has always been a must at Kuyil Padam, two lighted oil wicks, one each for banyan and peepal. Shuddhan's wife Kamini came in with dosas and teas to find him in the familiar muse. That's something she is uneasy with. Story-tic of Shuddhan. He did all the work, helped her, loved her and when time lost its clock, fell into his arm chair for the tic take over. His friends lbusy on TV, drinks, smokes or gossip. But for Shuddhan, it is this tic, oru chori, a pleasurable tic. He has tic and tic has Shuddhan. They did not want anything else except a murukkan to chew. Appuppan and Ammumma, some 100 years ago, ah! when there was no time..., were taller and girthier than the peepal and banyan. They did not eat to become that. They were that. Brown earth, a broad stream, birds followed them or they tracked them, as they tilled the land, grew crops and vegetables and fell in love with them. They conversed with birds and animals. They, perhaps, loved them more than their lone daughter. They did not build a hut. They slept on the earth; sunned, rained, chilled....it was like that. Their daughter, Sundari, brought a man to birth Shuddhan. And something changed. They were shorter than the peepal and banyan; the stream had shrunk to a channel; and some tiled homes came alive offering enough cosy corners for house sparrows to home. To be precise, they had a wavy home. Their tiled home waved to winds; took many shapes; it had no fixed build. The man was called Prandan. Set up a shop to buy and sell Words. And a Kallu shop housing fresh toddy. Words and drinks sold briskly like the Sensex; shelves of cash; words became isms, isms became quarrels, quarrels spiked blood .. a story of Creation. Sun and moon and stars rested on the peepal and banyan. Earth looked a sky; sky became earth. Gods were in the diyas. One morning or was it noon, Prandan could not bear his madness ... the urge to unwind ... walked away tied to a white dhoti and a Khadi kurta. Followed wife a month later, a different way. Shuddhan, slapped a vettila on his mundu, applied a dash of chunnambu, popped a few grains of supari into his mouth and got to chewing his tic. Shuddhan walks  the Kuyil Padam, chirps with house sparrows who first flew in when Prandan walked away. A morning, the peepal, the banyan and house sparrows left without a Bye. Is my tic true? he asks none. Creation a tic? Creation uncared, abandoned? In came with the wind many winds and Shuddhan thought it was his Ammumma and Appuppa.

Tic, Tic, Tic / gives Shuddhan a kick/ to rove Kuyil Padam/ like a free kick; maybe someday/ the tic will turn a story wick/ a flick/ keep the world pleasant/ not slick. 

Oct. 2

Facebook Alert: Oct. 2, Gandhi's birthday. Please wish him the BEST.

A dance in the air.
Tuka, Kabira, Gandhi on
staffs
tap-danced morning quiet
on Marine Drive.
Happy Birthday, Bapu, they said.
A wisty Bapu nodded.
All in a dance.
'Can you gentlemen do me a favour?'
Gandhi jazzed.
Tuka, Kabira waltzed Old Man:
'Anything for you.'
'Can you put in a word to Rama?' asked
Old Man.
They dropped into the Sea
in laughs..
Sea returned them.
For aeons,
Tuka and Kabira were friends of Ram.
Mobiled.
'Will you bhakts leave me alone?
Its a public holiday,'
snapped a sleepy Siya Ramji ki.
'Sorry, a third bhakt of yours wants a favour,'
said Kabira.
'Sir, Please can you delete me? pleaded Gandhi.
Siya Ramji ki tinged and tanged.
Nuisance is Gandhi.
'Have been trying to get my name scratched.
It has not worked.
I can try.
You, me and Ravana are cursed from birth.
In memory pads ever.
Get Tuka and Kabira
to be silent from Rama, Krishna, Hari,'
pleaded Siya Ramji ki.
Gandhi hung up.
Chewing vada pav and kante pohe
to Ram Dhun of Tuka and Kabira,
Siya Ramji ki placed a few words on
a paper plate on Marine Drive.
'Should not have taken the job.
BP, diabetes, thyroid, bypass....
Yet the power over files ....
more pending than cleared ...
aam janata with folded palms
filing past ....
awarding penalty points....'
Siya Ramji ki said.
'Quit,' said Gandhi.
'Did you?' returned Siya Ramji ki.
Sea bobbed, traipsed ........
A dance in the wind.