There is another sky



There is another sky,

Ever serene and fair,

And there is another sunshine,

Though it be darkness there;

Never mind faded forests, Austin,

Never mind silent fields -

Here is a little forest,

Whose leaf is ever green;

Here is a brighter garden,

Where not a frost has been;

In its unfading flowers

I hear the bright bee hum:

Prithee, my brother,

Into my garden come!

    ~ Emily Dickinson


I wish I could write poetry too. I mean REAL poetry (not that we postmodernists believe anything is "real" anymore ) !!! The few lines I churn out are too Modernist to be poetry. In other words they are highly symbolic pieces of writing with a profound subtext and with encoded meanings which only make sense to me.

I always feel the urge to write when I get emotional about something. Old Will Wordsworth did get something right when he called poetry the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings". Unfortunately my "feelings" are not as idyllic as his.

I generally consider the 13th of any month a good day for me (since I am born on Friday the 13th), but today has been an exception. Today has inspired me to write an epic, or maybe direct a reality show (I am sure that would be more politically correct in 2010). To cut a long story short, today has been a tragedy.

What is literature made up of, but conflict? And washing particularly dirty linen that assualts the olfactory senses is the stuff that reality shows thrive on. I have all the ingredients for a New York Times' Best Seller. The TRPs would be great too. Any takers?

To be honest, I don't want any. I want to go into hibernation. I want to repress ugly memories. I want to forget. I want to explore another sky. Gaze endlessly at a less begrimed horizon. I want to set sail for new lands. I want my ideals back. I want idols too, and without clay feet. I want scintillating ideas. I want devotion unsullied by incertitude. Hope, compassion, understanding, forgiveness - I want it all !!! I want T.S. Eliot's "Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata./Shantih shantih shanti".

***

January is the cruellest month, breeding
Depression out of dead resolutions
Newspaper headlines heralding student hangings
Accusing three well meaning idiots
Hope faces the gallows

"Hurry ! Hurry !
You will miss the rat race
The show must go on"

The burial of the breathing
Multiple games of chess...

The horror! the horror!

***

Another sky, another horizon? Please !!!!

Amen !!!




Poem Courtesy : http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/emily_dickinson/poems/5212

Drops wend their way.
It is loss of hope.

Can you stop this nautanki? People can hear you wail.

The deluge continues.
Stormy sighs. Gulped down gulps.

And then that long silence...

SOS.SOS. No response.

Indifference hurts more than one can imagine.

After savouring tea which costs more than gold in Darjeeling, I seem to have found myself a new obsession. It is 2.00 am in the morning, and I have brewed myself a cup of "Masala Chai" with cinnamon, cardamom, cloves and ginger.

The phrase "storm in a teacup" has taken on new meaning. This brew does have potential.

Cheers !!!!

Despondency - Matthew Arnold

The thoughts that rain their steady glow
Like stars on life's cold sea,
Which others know, or say they know--
They never shone for me.

Thoughts light, like gleams, my spirit's sky,
But they will not remain.
They light me once, they hurry by;
And never come again.

It’s all in the mind. Or so they say. I only wish mine were not so full of chaff. Pessimism seems to be choc- a-block. I am so tired. I wish I could put mine on autopilot at times. Friends, family, fiancé – with a mind like mine, I’m a bane to them all.

A sabbatical is what I really require. I need a mental break. I need time to rejuvenate my fatigued grey cells. Why else would migraines attack me so? I need time to think about what I want. I need good books, and I need good company. Paradoxically, I also need solitude.

The bottom line is that I need help. SOS. SOS. SOS.