TICK TOCK! TICK TOCK!

to wait, to be kept waiting,is a sad thing....it is a BAD thing.
in such moments of silent nothingness, the self-annihilating bug breaks out of its fetal posture of dormancy and brings out the very beast in you- in such moments, you gather hillocks of dog-eared nail-ends, scraps of ravaged skin, with a shivering tongue calming down an over-massacred lip.
a bloody business it is....
to wait, to be kept waiting.
and so, a million light years later, i would reason- of what use are nail polishes and lipsticks to me? huh???

ESTRANGEMENTS

estrangements of this kind should not steer the heart towards depression\feelings of annihilation\whispering agitatedly to the severed finger nail- "shit! i am left without moorings!"
for this kind of estrangement is for the good...good and necessary for the Theatre of the Glorious Future, good in joyous anticipation of that one breezy twilight-sharpened eve when arm in arm, overlooking the world in miniature, we would gush- "see! it was all for this day! hurrah!"
but who sits younder and whistles like a crude street urchin?
ah! Time of course!
see how she knows it all...knows it and sticks out her tripartite tongue (note how each is of different size and speed...strange, no?)at me....at us. and i cannot punch her back.
cannot.
for she ridicules the future, ticks off the precious present and gives a rat's arse for the past.
"what we had is good....so, it would be good in the future too..."

but what of the Now?
of the Now that would now bifurcate, one belonging to you, the other to me; each like penfriends, writing with the urgency to tell all, and yet, missing to mention that careless nibbling of a Marie biscuit while scribbling vigorously....to tell all.

and so,we would miss out on witnessing each other grow...
send me in the details...that you will, with all the earnestness of a man overfed and bursting with the habit of growing with another self.
so the details would come...come flying through all the surrogates- the cell phone beeping, the mail box jingling, the letter-box bursting....to tell all...sigh!
and just like that, my world would become a picture postcard in your world- all the while, Time sneering at the subtle contradiction between the static, one-dimensional nature of mine against the vibrancy of yours.....and vice versa of course!

but hush! remember, these kinds of estrangements are for the good!

good for the heart to grow fonder perhaps?

i do not know. joy of the spic-and-span nature with its associating lucidity evades me. i feel little joy.

to say "i miss you" sometime in the future....to fall into the habit of saying "i miss you"....stinks of nothing but a putrid blend of lost time and touch.

what i would touch then, would be papery nothingness....a replica of life....a replica of you....but not you in life itself.

(yet and yet, i am proud of you anurag for you made it through TISS, one step closer to the realisation of your dream of living up to the oft-abused title of 'the argumentative Indian'. this post should not depress....that is so not the motive....it just asserts....you know what.)

why debate over weakness and strength?
why debate over forgiveness and the unforgiving?
perplexed conscience stabs at you still...perplexed, coz your skin is too too thick.
who made you God, i ask....
and if YOU are God, there is no Heaven....or Earth.

NOKOL HOITE SABDHAN!

so he said, amidst thundering applause and an orgasmic sweep of digital trumpets-
"my name is Khan...and i am not a terrorist."

and so we gasped in mock horror (of course)-
"your name is XYZ...and you are not Barrack Obama!"

well, the 'mock horror' part might be\could be edited for the sake of maintaining an iota of humility, for proclaiming sheepishly to the world- these things do affect us, sachhi!
so Karan Johar threw at us a fake Obama. that's the best\the most\(er, the least?) the asparagus syndrome-hit Rizwan Khan gets for all his travails. that's the best we get for having chanted 'yes we can!' in our sleep. that's the best Mother Teresa gets for having prepared her table with lip-smacking vittles for her worthy fellow inmate?
and this man turns....no he won't...but he is...no not reall...and then, he really does turn. he turns to reveal a set of black eyes, a glistering set of finely-structured teeth, bubbles of benevolent confidence strung firmly round his slightly perked up ears....and yet, he was no Obama. Anurag, Sharad and i conjectured over his identity, (to allay your shock let me assure you that we possess in our itinerary, acres and acres of spotless nothingness.)and decided that he could be a potential porn star. "yes he is! look at that masochistic gleam in his eyes...he is all ready for a spank!"- declared Sharad (and hey, who am i to refute him on that?)
but the settling tide of agitation in Rizwan Khan's eyes was strangely unsettling. he smiled. so did his wife. so did the picture of their dead son, a victim of religious violence. and so did we. "the film was gooood!", we gushed (albeit partially to drown the guilty pricks of missed classes!) but definitely, the film was gooooood, na?
so we would settle for less. the message has reached its destination, now to hell with the authenticity of the destination!
as one of our wise professors stated- when you have great expectations prepare to face hard times.

p.s. the fake George Bush was strangely, not so fake.

(note from the dead author- the idolatry and salivating over the American Dream, specially form the infinite distance of this, my native land, is ridiculously unfunny....and i am no party to this.)