Thursday, February 21, 2008

Still. Resplendent. Lila

She was sitting on the ground with her knees bent. Her heels touched the ground delicately and her feet were bent towards herself, her toes straining to touch her shins. Her arms gently embraced her knees. Her back was stretched and curved inwards and her forehead rested on her knees. Her curly black hair spun out of her head in long wavy strands and spread on her shoulders. The symmetry of the spread had a mathematical beauty. Her pale white skin was moist and glistening. Her back, arms and legs were taut. She was like a wound spring who could spring out of her stillness any moment.

The light showed her from the side. Her face was completely hidden by her hair and arms. Her breasts were flattened, pressed against her thighs. It was dark all around. She was the source of light and only she was illuminated. I approached her from the darkness, from behind. It was light that I was seeking. Darkness was within me, enmeshed with me and indistinguishable from me. I wanted to embrace the embracing arms.

As I crept close, I confronted the hard shell of a turtle. The dark invisible turtle was crawling very slowly on her back. Its movement was as incredible and unreal as the possibility of its existence between us.

My embrace was an inert fluid that surrounded her and the turtle without their knowledge. I waited in agony for the turtle to move away and allow the fragrance of her naked skin to touch me. Time was frozen in the endless wait and she sat motionless in her resplendent, silent beauty - palpable and yet remote. As the turtle moved, my arms started metamorphosing into large white luminous wings - the only part of me that was now visible. My body disappeared leaving behind a head, my enormous wings and claws that had nailed themselves into the turtle's shell. The turtle had conquered me. I flapped my wings in vain, in an attempt to fly with her and the turtle. Her stillness was unyielding and the darkness impenetrable.

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Friday, February 08, 2008

Fog

Like a possessive husband the fog had hidden the mountains from the real world. Today, perhaps, he has gone to visit another lover of his. As the haze left, the ice-capped peaks peeped out like a shy bride. Oh! The husband has returned and quickly veiled his wife again!

It is a gloomy winter evening. The sun is not a fierce ball of heat in the sky. Instead, it is a battered splash of yellow in one corner. Besieged by the gray fog it is waiting for the next hour to carry its impotent rays away from our eyes.

It has been raining since noon. The heavy shower has turned into a specter of a drizzle. The drops that I hear are not raindrops but water falling from a collected pool in the terrace. They are falling at a constant pace with enough time between consecutive drops to make me aware of each drop's journey. I hear the beginning of a drop's flight as it detaches itself from its source. The timid whistle as it cuts through the air in an acceleration of exuberance. And the final splash when it shatters its existence to make the world aware of its past.

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