2017

 Of late I'v avoided a known face. It happened overtime. Quietly, without much thought we avoided looking each other in the eye. The long deep and searching gaze a thing of the past. I look and hastily look away with an unsettling twinge deep within.  Knowing that I didn't give my best, that I indulged my senses a tad too much and have paid the price in loyalty.  In my hasty looking away I   glimpse an equally defeated eye ... a sense of fear, resignation? Maybe....

This,  my reflection, my friend from the past, now distant and withdrawing. Today I thought, enough of this. My friend and constant companion,  if I not love thee, who will. I bravely stood in front of the mirror. At first my eyes slide away. I force them back on this dear familier self. Same but yet not the same. Quietly I pick out the unfamiliar, the strange. Frown lines newly formed on my brow. Clamouring to surface in deep undulating waves....strange and new but as I keep gazing, .... beautiful!!! Yes beautiful.

This amuses me and break out in a smile, only to be startled with more unfamiliar...lines, gossamare fine webed the corners of my eyes....unfamiliar  ..yet strangely...those fine lines reach out to twine round my heart....yes..I'm in love...

So I continue to stare long and deep into dulled eyes and scorched skin fast losing its sheen. A downward curve to the mouth and a not too slight hint of  jowl  cheeks and chin. A wave to my old paternal aunts.

So with each passing minute that I stood to stare I found my friend again. Deep within the fading skin and hair the same familier twinkle....still me....still with me.... ready to walk the  rest of the path unfolding ahead....maybe a new adventure. Together  and comfortable in each others presence.

Bliss 5 September 2017

 Today heaven touched earth ... for me.

A beautiful rainy day...A chilled Poya holiday...

I woke up to a day that seem to stretch endlessly before me. To sounds of rain and wind in the trees. A day with no plan, no duties, no one around to disturb me and just my dogs for company.

Feeling warm in the knowledge my family is comfortable and fed and not too far away, dogs and fish fed,  my food quietly delivered at my door...What more could I ask for.

A warm bed, well loved book, a slab of chocolate and a promise to meet with a few dear friends  later in the evening.

I may be fifty or I may be five, but I thrill when it rains on my upturned face, I thrill to stand out in the garden and let the rain soak through me.

I gaze in wonder at the delicate Madatiya leaves which seem to remain dry even as it rains.  Look, touch and feel the rain on different plants and trees. I'm mesmerised as the rain collects in tiny drops and tremble at the edge of a leaf now weary of its burden....

Then I gaze into a pond to watch rain drops cast ripples in water and tiny saree guppies add a myriad colour to its depth.

I blissfully walk barefoot on wet leaves, moss covered brick and wet grass. Visit my favourite spider web to check if it has survived the rains. It has and spider seems unfazed and quite safe....

Back to my warm bed, friendly dogs and yes a new book :) maybe a cup of tea....and truly it being one of those perfect days when Murphy's Law does not effect...I did get my cup of tea...and a buth packet for dinner from a person returning from the village. 

Yes,  once in awhile a day such as this occurs. Today  truly heaven did touch earth... for me...

 I gifted you to the one I love

With a heart filled with hope and joy

Watched you being ignored, hurt, abused and mangled

Ruined, disrespected and discarded

Tonight I think of you

Laying in a bin

Along with other refuse

You went before me

Thank you for holding him up all this time

Thank you for the life you gave both him and I.

Goodbye dear friend

Remembered with love and gratitude always. 

 Orchids in moonlight.... so beautiful . But it needed a lot of care, a lot of fuss and pampering... with a lot of strife and care it grew, then it got tired and withered away. The orchid really did not know nor care. Then maybe the Gardner became wiser. He threw away the withered old Orchid, changed the soil and grew more plants.. but this time , ones that needed less care and strife,  that would survive and serve a purpose than just gleam awhile in the moonlight and wither away.....

 In my lowest and saddest moments she said ' leave it to me'. 

She made me stand in her wild and beautiful garden raise my arms high and  imagine drawing energy of the trees through my finger tips and flood myself with the energy of the universe.  

When I visit her, full of complains , full of care, She says,  sit, close your eyes chant the word ''arahan'  let the vibration of the chants calm me. She would cook her favorite garlic rice which I believed to be power food and after lunch I would sleep. Just sleep my cares away.wake up refreshed and drive back home. 

When I visited her after a lapse of many years my dear Aunty Rose had grown old. She clings to my arm and says seeing me has added ten years to her life. 

Dear Auty Rose, thank you. Thank you for being my friend, guru, confidante when I needed it most. Life has changed for both of us. I can no longer visit you freely and sleep the entire visit and rush back home. Gone are the days of our chanting, the magic and the deep conversations on wonder of the universe. 

But you were there for me when I needed you most. Thank you thank you thank you.

 So I spent this month travelling through Ethiopia with Thahir Shah and his mangy crew in search of King Solomon's gold. It was a truly horrendous journey through dirt, squalor endless pot holes, insects, scorching dessert and mosquito ridden forests . I braved tribes with a penchant for killing visitors and hanging their testicles round the neck as trophies, thankful that I was at least spared that one particular test... only to arrive at the final chapter where he does not find the mines. Shar actually comes back a second time and re traces the whole journey and fails again to find the mines. Mercifully he describes the second journey in one single paragraph.  So here I am holding the book wondering what on earth made him write a book where he failed not once but twice in his quest...but then again on hindsight I am struck with the thought that my  month through the book was actually much easier than the one I actually lived through in real time... so bravo Thahir and Yesss!!!! bravo dear old me... we both are true winners....

 No, you do not mess with the infinite intelligence of the subconscious mind. Take it from me, I know and I'v tried. She is the great teacher. You don't get smart with her. Miss a lesson?  hoping it's overlooked? Think again.   She teaches, she refines and purifies, and yes she teaches again .. Just in case.   As the uncut nugget of gold pass through the fiery  kiln, so does your soul pass through the fires of purification. Through the raging fires that melt and refine you to your brightest and purest form...that's what she does and that's her art. Her scorching hand touched me many years ago. She dragged me through the fires of hell and carelessly left me for dead...or so I thought, untill she pulled me through, rich and in her form.

 But let me confess, I thought she missed a cue, I thought I got away somewhat. Had my way....'won' the day. For years did I gloat how I hoodwinked her mighty eye....her infinite intelligence that just happened to  overlook a minor detail in my trainig.  Here I am back in the furnace, heated to an ember,  beaten, shaped and polished again. Oh fool !  Learn, accept, bow down to her will.  At least now know that what you missed out or skipped in your learning will come, if not now some other day.

 The waves gently role in, break into a white collar of lace that kisses the sand only to get pushed away. But the waves keep on doing what they are meant to do. They keep rolling in.....

Much like the lyrics .... 'Like the sea, should keep kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times he pushes her away....'

 Avurudu!!! I’m loving this time of year…love the feeling of closure, a sweeping sense of finale in the air… people around me packing up, happily looking forward to a long break, I feel the joy and wonder of those expectations… hope the new year actually brings in the renewal so eagerly awaited…As for me, I love the feeling peace and quiet and oh those beautiful traditions… traditions I’ve inherited mostly through marriage…It’s a time to try my hand at various traditional sweets, cleaning the house and buying a new broom rug and a pot…. How I love the feel and fragrance of new clay…come new year and it shall be heralded with as much enthusiasm as I can gather, light the hearth and set a table with Kiribath and sweetmeats…most of the homely traditions have fallen by the wayside but it’s nothing but a good feeling to visit relations and share trays of food…to teach my son all that’s good and beautiful of the timeless traditions of Avurudu… but as he rightly said… what is Avurudu without Kavum? So it is time to get cracking on trying my hand at perfecting a Konde Kavum …till then I leave you with my experience with Unduvel… It took a better part of my day, and left me with smoke congested lungs, but still, its Avurudu and for me,  what is Avurudu without Unduvel….Oba Samata Suba Aluth Avuruddak Wewa…

 Everybody has their place of predilection and this quiet haven by the water is mine. Sometimes I lie awake at night troubled by some pettiness that would seem important at the moment, but back of my mind I'm reasured that come first light of day  I would make myself a cup of tea and sit in my quiet spot.  Many hours have I  spent here, reading, watching the birds and the fish, the occasional snake. Many hours I would spend here just simply  being. 

Then in those endless  hours  the elements in me and this space would become but one.  If you ever wonder what's missing in the me you would meet ...filling my cart with groceries at the local market, mingling at some fancy cocktail party with a glass of wine in hand or  pacing the corridors of a hospital anxious for a loved one.... maybe that missing element might be safe by the little water garden... and maybe that strange waft of water weed in the air, glimpse of a sparkle or a sudden overcast might be the spirit of the garden in me...

Then as Don Juan, my favourite person from my favourite book tells his pupil Carlos  ' this is the site of your last stand, you will die here no matter where you are. Every warrior has a place to die. A place of his predilection which is soaked with unforgettable memories,  where powerful events left their mark, a place where he has witnessed marvels, where secrets have been revealed to him, a place where he has stored his personal power'.  ( pg 168 Journey to Ixtlan )

15/ 3/2024

 for the artists amoung my FB friends.... these lines by Tagore in his poem 'The Dream' would make a pretty picture...this lovely lady has flooded my mind but would fail to capture on canvass....." Far, far away, at the dream-city of Ujjain, by the bank of the river Sipra, I go searching for my beloved of a former birth... Her face pollen-powedered, a pink lotus in her hand, white lotus buds stuck behind her ears, and crimson amaranath in her hair; her lithe body enwrapped in a crimson sari, her ankles tinkle shyly...."

 Amma was the face I searched for in a sea of adult faces at my annual school concert, christmas carols, prize giving and sports meet. Seated in the midst of a hundred others but hardly part of a chattering group of mums. A sweet but dignified presence.

Amma was my plate of rice served and kept covered, which I hungrily looked forward to after school,  the mug of warm milk last thing at night. 

Amma is my memory of endless hours of story telling with each mouthful of rice she fed me and my younger sister. Bob and Sally and the fairy party, Jack and the beanstalk, Blue Beard, Three little pigs, Goldilocks,Ciderella and many more  with which she fed our childhood fantasy. 

Amma to me were those late nights when we gathered around the kitchen table chopping up ingredients for Cristmas cake, the bottles of Thambili wine being  strained on white filter paper and Ham cured in the fridge. Amma was the fragrance of Christmas cake being baked, of polished floors, New curtains and Pinus of the Christmas Tree. 

Amma to me was to  wake up on Christmas morn to the deep voice of Jim Jeeves as he sang  'We thank thee'  and sounds of a busy kitchen.

She  was the letters to Santa, Santa's elves and Santa Claus. The bonus gift apart from the long list I asked for simply because I had been 'extra good' that year.

Amma was the trolley laden with Christmas cake, butter cake, milk toffee, mung etta toffee and kokis.

Amma was always and always Chocolate cake... 

Amma was a suitcase full of night dresses and house coats, bed sheets and lace edged pillow cases in every shade of pastel and white, prepared before the marriage of each of her six daughters, and suitcases full of baby shirts, towels and baby napkins prepared for the birth of each of her grand children.

Amma was the delicate lace edged white handkerchief on my wedding day.

Amma was that warm sweet dark coffee in the early hours of morning when I lay exhausted in the Labour room after delivering my son.

Amma was also the quiet presence by my side in the months that followed , visits to the Doctor or a warm massage when my toes cramped from a chill.  

Amma is sweetness, amma is flowers of every pale hue, she is the fragrance of the sweetest talcum powder.... of lavender and English Rose.

Amma is the patterns in the clouds, the early evening star and the beautiful sunsets of my childhood.

 Amma was everything gentle, quiet and mainly every thing that was consistent.

 Amma was the unfailing birthday card and telephone call on my birthday and Amma was the anniversary card every year on the day...never mind and come what may...

Amma most of all was that sweet voice that taught me to keep quiet if I had nothing nice to say. 

Thank you sweet angel you are resting now with Jesus after a long and fruitful life. I hope you were happy with us your loved ones, I hope you were not sad...all I can say is thank you for the wonderful gift of your life and hope something of your beautiful self would remain in me... 

 Last night it rained. I lived that storm in my senses. Felt in my bones that inevitable hush....The calm before the storm. Listened to the distant rumbling of thunder and watched distant flashes of lightening illuminate the night sky. I steped out to feel the breeze that preludes the storm and on my upturned face the first sweet drops of rain... watching and waiting as the storm approached. To recall these lines 'in order to have power one must live with power'. Here I was experiencing absolute power in all its harsh and wondrous splendour. The storm was upon me. I felt rather than watched the relentless onslaught of rain, ever increasing amidst a barrage of thunder and incessant flashes of lightening illuminating my surroundings. I watch the silhouettes of trees dark against the silveryflashes of light and the bejeweled leaves heaving helpless and succumbing to the mighty forces that were alive in that moment.  Watching in awe and with a sense despair as the forces of nature unleashed its glory and majesty around me and then cease. Imperceptible in its waning....distant rumble, flash of light and a gentle rain, almost apologetic and a soothing balm on wounds left in its wake.

 The deafning sounds of silence...Little did I realize how loud quietness was until my phone fell silent. The steady magnetised hum of the universe... vibrations of a beginning of time fills my ears.... Sounds of eternity picked up in silence... the never ceasing sound of crickets, incessant croak of frogs, the earth whispers when the Porcupine treads its regular path... gentle breeze and a rustle of leaf.. A sleeping dog wheezes and scratches its ear adding to the din of silence....this night sings its heart out ....only if you listen...

 Your smouldering soul, why would you burn

There is nothing there

Why torture your yourself

Your honour or shame..

It does not matter

There is nothing there..

Your pain and your grief...Your happiness and glee

Oh why...Why do you bother

There is nothing  in it..

Your good and your bad

Who cares...Just leave it, I  dare

You see....this drama  you create act and believe.

Empty words, empty space.... leave it

There is nothing there....

 It took awhile

It took its time

This much awaited peace

Then it happened

One morning

I was free...

Free of hurt

Guilt....

Prejudice and pain

Was it in words read

Or a smile and a hug

With the last  shudder of a stolen fuck

I know not

Nor do I care

I'm in peace...

 Long long ago

When I was young

Naive

Judgemental....oh yes

Very judgemental 

There was this lady 

Sitting alone at a table

At a pub

 I sat and watched.....demure,  surrounded by family

She sat there

Alone

Lost in thought

A glass of whisky in hand and in a cloud of smoke

.....so i judged...

Mused...

Felt sorry for her alone ness....

Laughed and giggled when she called for the bill and staggered out.

Today

Years later.....many many years later

I sit alone

Lost in thought

Enjoying my drink, in a cloud of smoke

Happy....at peace

I think of her

This old lady

Maybe she was happy too

Just as I am now

Alone yes

But happy... laughing...

At peace with the world

With her self

With myself....

 

Sitting alone past midnight

scared....shitting scared....

slowly ...slowly...

shedding layer upon layer of

doubt, fear, sadness ....

I'd have thought there would be nothing left...

as though peeling an onion 

I'm wrong....

I'm unveiling huge reserves of strength....

layer upon layer of strength, resilience, fearlessness and grit....

yeah....that's me...

a shaking, shivering mass of unbridled strength 

  It took awhile

It took its time

This much awaited peace

Then it happened

One morning

I was free...

Free of hurt

Guilt....

Prejudice and pain

Was it in words read

Or a smile and a hug

With the last  shudder of a stolen fuck

I know not

Nor do I care

I'm in peace...

 No limits, no boundaries

no lines to be crossed

heedless, reckless

this shooting star

destroying itself

whirling so fast

an illusion of stillness

of great calm

 Where is she

The wayward soul

 Who dared to dream

Longed for  nights

To trace the skies

Friend of the stars

Whisperer of crazy plans in the wind.

Where is she

Of the silver sunrise

Burning lips on scalding coffee

Seeking out birds

Feet deep in mud

She of the blissful mornings

Lazy days

Hours in bed

Seeker of secret spaces

 Lover of old books

Scribbling words of longing

Ignoring the ring of phone

Following the trail to the foot of a rainbow

She of the unmade bed

Unkept dates

Forgotten plans

Waiting the day out 

For long dark nights 

To sit alone

Waiting for the queen of the night to bloom

To inhale  deep its sweetness

Lie on the grass gaze at the sky

Friend of the moon

And the cloudless sky

Marginal person 2015 !10/22

 '..a marginal person....A marginal person who has lived comfortably, true, but only under completely uncertain and temporary circumstances.' Identity, MilanKundera.

That's me... How did Milan Kundera know me...see me?

"When he wondered: what should I choose for my whole life's work? His inner self would fall into the most uncomfortable silence." identity, MilanKundera.

Me again...in a hundred lines, in a slip of a book, there is me, over and over again..

This is what I love in a book... To see me. Listen to  answers to my  questions. Wander through an eternal labyrinth with the author who is as confused as I am. Searching for answers to the same questions. To rejoice or be disgusted with the journey...the discovery... Together.

With Albert Camus's 'Stranger'

I wanted to be the prisoner on death row,  ' Happy Death' found me in a delirious existentialist journey..."

But some books, however  well written and well received leave me cold... Why? Because the author did not know me... He is not talking to me and was not on my journey.

Books... A narcissists utopia.!

 This tree did not bear any fruit for years. I thought it had stopped bearing. But loved it for its beauty nevertheless.

It had the most beautiful vine growing on it which quite covered its branches. A wonderful sight.

Then one day I strippped off the vine. A cruel and heartless gesture it seemed at that moment.

Free of the vine that sucked at its life the tree bore fruit again. More abundant than I had ever seen it before...

A new lease of life....

 Life is for learning. Every day I'm learning deep cruel quirks that lurkes in me and others around me. I look for beauty and mercy and find that too. Only for it to be dashed to splinters at he very next turn I take. 

At the very core of our nature we don't make a for a pleasant picture. 

Let go

 Let go they said

Move on

Heal your self

Be your own hero

Save your self

But I'm not ready to let go yet

I'm not even ready to let things be

I'm just feeling numb

Discarded and humiliated

But no not ready to let go yet.

Will it happen?

How does it happen

I don't know

I've not been there before

Or done it before

My life shattered once before

Everyone said let go

I didn't know how

I just held on.

Healing happened

But I had not let go

Circumstances changed

My mindset adopted to what remained

But I still did not know to let go

The lesson has come back again

As it would untill I mastered it.

So is this my time to learn

All I feel for the moment is

I'm not ready to let go. 

 It took awhile

It took its time

This much awaited peace

Then it happened

One morning

I was free...

Free of hurt

Guilt....

Prejudice and pain

Was it in words read

Or a smile and a hug

With the last  shudder of a stolen fuck

I know not

Nor do I care

I'm in peace...

 Oh you

That laugh, then cry

Want so much...so much love a hug a hand to hold and cling. 

You who care beyond boundaries, those boundaries you never marked, noticed or cared for. 

You who smile at butterflies and would sereptitously hug a tree

Take pains to be elegant untill your stub a toe

Come let it go

Be free

Be happy

It's a new world

A new place

A place that was always there

But elided you in your rush to live 

Come

Be still

Just be

Be happy

This is your world. 

I am enough

 Not so long ago I felt  ' not enough' ....the anguish of  separateness from what was... A hunger which led to  wanting more, being more, the need to leave a mark in a world which to me was the 'other'..then slowly and imperceptibly the gap between me and 'the other' closed...i the small separate self became the ' i am'..  I am the  silver sunrise and am also the stars that shine...I am the waves that wash over my feet and am in each poem i longed to write and the painting I wished I could paint. Its me that roars as water falls and the cool and the deep of the seas.. I am the fish that swim and the birds that fly... I am all the far away galaxies the sweet perfume that wafts from the jasmine outside...I am you and also you and I also am that was and is....the beautiful and the not so, the high and low, all that I touch, feel and see... I am .....so I know I am enough, just as I am because I am a part of and the all of everything that ever was and ever will be....forever one and complete....